Communities in NY area!! Help...

amother

Oak

Mon, Nov 28 2016, 11:36 pm

My husband and I are wanting to move to the NYC area to have a bigger jewish life than we have now right now. We are just a plain frum family! I cover my hair fully but no stockings etc. I love dressing up, in to fashion and having fun in general. My husband is a businessman and dresses accordingly. Being both baal yeshivas ,we are still strongly connected to our secular values while living a true Torah life. Right now our kids are at a right wing yeshiva. Although we love the school for its Torah values we are very very unhappy with the academics, the attitude towards secular studies and how unprofessionally it is run in general. We want to move to the NY area because we want our kids to get a great Torah and secular education. Not even mentioning the restaurants and many like minded people that we would love hanging out with. The community in our city is too yeshivish for us and we end up becoming friends with secular Israilis or conservative jews, which is great but then our shakos experience is problematic. I guess we are bit of tired trying to balance our secular and religious life in this city and want to move to a place where we can find many people like us.
So far we looked into the UWS and Teaneck area. Don't know the community in the UWS well but the schools were too left wing for us. We check few schools in Teaneck area and really liked them cuz for us they were the perfect balance of religious and academic excellency. My only concern about Teaneck is that it looks a bit suburban and not esthetically appealing much. I know its close to the city but still... I hear shabbos is amazing in Teaneck which is really really important for us as we have small children and we love learning and hearing shiurim.
I would really really appreciate if you could think of any other communities that you think we would fit in.

skee

Tue, Nov 29 2016, 2:33 am

I think it will be hard to find a place that's not suburban and is aesthetically pleasing. The non-suburban communities are generally more city-like and less pretty. Unless perhaps something like the Five Towns which is possibly less suburban than Teaneck but not city-like. The Five Towns mayb also be a good option for you based on your description of what you are looking for.

happyfrum1

Mon, Dec 12 2016, 11:07 pm

Thank you for all the replies! I am new to this forum and I actually almost did not see any of your replies until today!

We did a research on Riverdale but it seems like the community is not as big as we would like. At least the right wing community. It might be too modern for us. And again icy husband and I would be fine but I need a big established more right wing community for my kids.

We are talking to many people from 5Towns as well and so far it sounds amazing. However it is at least an hour away from the city so that might be an issue for us. we also need to make sure that we can find a great school with excellent academics without it being coed all the way.
Have not looked into Queens yet!

happyfrum1

Mon, Dec 12 2016, 11:13 pm

amother wrote:

As a Teaneck resident I can't imagine how states island could be more aesthetically pleasing than Teaneck. But if you don't like suburbs then you won't like most of the ny area communities except the ones in the city I guess.

Can you tell me how you like Teaneck? And what could be an improvement? It sounds like the community is amazing there! Down to earth people and a feel of an out of town community which is a big plus for us. do you feel like the city is within your reach? or end up hanging out on the NJ side most of the time?

thanks

happyfrum1

Wed, Jan 18 2017, 10:30 am

It is OP here!!! We actually narrowed than our search to either UWS or Englewood. We prefer Englewood over Teaneck esthetically. Never spent a shabbos there and from what we hear it is too much to the left. Now honestly living in a OOT communty I don't understand what it means to be shomer shabbos and be too much to the left:))) But we can get a nice house with a nice yard etc in Englewood which we are used to. On the other hand, UWS sounds very exciting for many reasons as well. There are many shuls there which is what we need. Some heterogeneity in the community! But we will have to get used to apartment living and have to commute to NJ side everyday for schooling. Any ideas or suggestions?