It happens rarely, but often enough to be a sobering lesson for home seekers.
An eager shopper visits a home in a desirable community on a tranquil Sunday, becomes enamored and signs the papers. Then the first Monday after he moves in, he heads for work, only to discover that the commute is longer or more agonizing than anticipated.
“What he didn’t know was that on that calm Sunday, everybody was resting up for the two-hour highway joust that comes on Monday morning,” quips Peter G. Miller, host of the real estate desk for America Online. “They were refueling for the `Commuter 500′ that comes the next day.”
“Commuting is a serious issue, because people are spending more time on the job, away from home, away from family, away from leisure and there’s a tremendous amount of pressure,” he notes. “We didn’t see that 20 years ago.”
To complicate matters, more commuting is now suburb-to-suburb, because many of today’s new jobs are not in traditional commercial or financial centers, says Donna States, a broker-associate for the Prudential realty chain. That means commuters are less likely to have the option of easily using mass transit systems.
What’s more, as States points out, “there’s always the potential for an unusual situation on any road.” Perhaps your commute requires you to navigate through airport traffic or through a congestion-prone central business district. Or maybe you’re intending to use an interstate highway that carries not only commuters but also commercial and vacation travelers, which all come together into maddening backups.
Although many home buyers are intensely conscious of the commuting issue, few take a systematic approach by trying a prospective commute. Especially vulnerable to mistakes in this regard are first-time buyers or people who are moving to a new metropolitan area.
Real estate experts urge home seekers to try the commute between a prospective neighborhood and their offices before they commit to a home purchase. Miller stresses the importance of simulating the two-way commute on at least one business day at the actual times you’d be making the drive.
Granted, the ritual of trying a commute can be an annoying one. “But consider the alternative,” Miller notes. “You may be commuting on that road for a decade, and you don’t want to be surprised by the traffic.”
Another less arduous–though also less reliable–way to learn about your potential commute is to survey your coworkers or quiz neighbors in the new community. If others are making virtually the same commute at roughly the same times, you can get a good feel for what you’ll face.
Even so, there are individual variables that make it wiser to try the commute yourself rather than rely on the opinions of others. Some personality types handle long or stressful commutes better than others. What doesn’t bother your work associate could annoy you to no end, notes Miller.
Stress is a major factor for many who have long commutes or who rely on heavily traveled highways, where anger and frustration are prevalent among drivers.
If you discover that a main artery you’ll be using is a high-anxiety zone, your real estate agent may be able to suggest reliable alternatives that still make it plausible to buy a home in the neighborhood of your choice, suggests States.
Here are three other pointers on the commuting factor in home buying:
1. Consider a potential commute in context with other factors.
“Everybody wants everything. They would love to be just walking distance to work and still have a big, beautiful house in a neighborhood with nice schools. But most people must make trade-offs,” says Shirley Saydiman, who sells homes through the RE/MAX chain.
One of the more excruciating alternatives many buyers face is between a larger, newer home that’s in a distant suburb and one that is older and smaller yet closer to work, Saydiman says.
“It’s worth the commute,” is an expression Saydiman hears more often among buyers she serves who are searching for the amenities and tranquility offered in many a distant suburb.
2. Consider living between two employment centers to hedge your bets.
It’s no secret that people in the labor force change positions more often than they used to, and frequently with little notice. On the other hand, it can be costly to trade homes often.
But by positioning yourself between two commercial centers, you’ll stand a better chance of finding a new job nearby if you should lose your present position, says States.
3. Think of the commute you’ll face in the future as well as the present one.
It’s not enough to get a snapshot version of the commute you’d confront if you moved into your favored neighborhood today. You must also think about the future. In our dynamic society, employment patterns are constantly shifting as some commercial hubs gain jobs while others lose them.
Obviously, no one can make perfect predictions about job growth. But it’s often possible to obtain good information on where local governments are trying to channel growth through planning and zoning offices, says Miller.
He also suggests you call the local economic-development office that serves the communities you’re considering and ask if they’re expected to become stronger or weaker job centers in the future. At the same time, ask if any large-scale employers are about to open offices in the region and, if so, what road improvements are planned to serve the new workers.
