Those living in Northern VA, it's no  surprise that buying a home in a good school district is important to most homebuyers.  Even people looking to purchase in Northern VA with no aspiration of have children often request specific school districts.

According to  Realtor.com research, 86% of 18-34 year-olds and 84% of those aged 35-54 indicated that their home search areas were defined by school district boundaries.

The more important take away however, is that 78% of recent homebuyers sacrificed features from their “must-have” lists in order to find homes within their dream school districts.  This trend is echoed by Northern VA homebuyers who rank schools in the top 3 of their home search criteria.

In Northern VA the top feature sacrificed was a garage at 19%,.  This was closely followed by a large backyard, an updated kitchen, the desired number of bedrooms, and an outdoor living area. These results are in the graph below.

Northern VA home Buyers are attracted to schools with high test scores, accelerated academic programs, art and music programs, diversity, and before and after-school programs.  They also sometimes rely on the web site, www.greatschools.org

With a continued low inventory  of listings in today’s  NOVA real estate market, competition is fierce for homes in good school districts. Danielle Hale, Chief Economist for Realtor.com, explained further,

“Most buyers understand that they may not be able to find a home that covers every single item on their wish list, but our survey shows that school districts are an area where many buyers aren’t willing to compromise.  For many buyers and not just buyers with children, ‘location, location, location,’ means ‘schools, schools, schools.’” (emphasis added)

Bottom Line

For buyers in Northern VA, the quality of their children’s education ranks highest on their must-have lists.   When you are ready to buy and/or sell a home in Northern VA give me a call to discuss your options.