Living in the San Juans

T

Trinity

New member
My brother and his family are thinking about moving to the San Juans and has asked for some recommendations on which island to live on. He has 3 school age children. Not sure what he is thinking about for employment. Are there are some C-Brats out there with first-hand knowledge?

Kerry
 
Trinity":2izuhnlf said:
My brother and his family are thinking about moving to the San Juans and has asked for some recommendations on which island to live on. He has 3 school age children. Not sure what he is thinking about for employment. Are there are some C-Brats out there with first-hand knowledge?

Kerry
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Too little information to make any concrete suggestions but from what I know the schools are considered to be quite good, the real estate stratospheric and decent paying jobs a bit scarce. A single-wide mobile home on 1/5 of an acre will set you back just shy of $300K on Orcas, maybe even a bit more on San Juan where most of the jobs are. It is bad enough that I don't see how the folks who teach, work in the clinic, etc can make it. It'd be best if your brother had buckets of money or a well paid consulting job or the like (ie, did not depend on making a living in the local economy).

- k

PS FWIW, I don't live there but have owned property out there for 20 years.
 
Thanks for the info. My brother is a consultant and his wife a teacher. Had no idea of what to recommend as we have just visited by boat.

Kerry
 
Trinity":2nca7gwc said:
Thanks for the info. My brother is a consultant and his wife a teacher. Had no idea of what to recommend as we have just visited by boat.

Kerry
Click to expand...

Well, if you/he want a better idea of the real estate prices then a pretty good website is:

http://www.rustypost.com/property-for-sale.html

Its Orcas-centric and I don't know this guy but its one of the easier to navigate sites (and real estate websites are some of the worst).

What sort of consulting does your brother do? If he needs to travel often then San Juan might be the better bet, the airport is quite a bit larger than that on Orcas (though they are both pretty well served by small carriers).

- k

PS By the way, the Journal of the San Juans (http://www.sanjuanjournal.com/) just had an article a week or two ago indicating that the median house price had dropped about $100K since a year ago to something like $550K.
 
Kerry,

We have a summer home in Friday Harbor, on San Juan Island.

San Juan Island is the biggest island of course, and has the largest population and, I suppose, the most jobs. Largest employers, I would guess, are construction, real estate, and tourism, the latter two being quite seasonal. Someone good in construction will have no trouble finding jobs and will be well paid.

What I hear about the schools is that they are just fine.

I have the sense that year-round rental rates are not that bad, though I have no data on that at all. Summer-time-only rental rates are pretty high.

We think it is a great place to live, and we are in the retirement years of our lives.

URL's to check:

http://www.guidetosanjuans.com/

http://www.windermeresji.com/
 
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