Thoughts on Rye, Scarsdale, Purchase, Harrison, Armonk and Larchmont (White Plains: real estate, buying a house)
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I am looking to move to Westchester but don't know much about these places. My budget is between $3-4.5M depending on the taxes. A few questions:
1) How would you rank the following towns in terms of prestige / wealth within tiers. In other words, what is the general pecking order?
Rye
Scarsdale
Harrison
Purchase
Armonk
Larchmont
2)
How would you rank the school districts within tiers. I understand that Purchase feeds into Harrison.
3)
Specifically, about Purchase: it seems to be under the radar for most people. I grew up in a wealthy suburb outside of NYC and a lot of my friends never heard of it. It seems like a beautiful place, however, with nice estates.
4)
Best commute to NYC. I assume that Scarsdale / Rye / Larchmont would be the best.
5)
My top two at the moment are Scarsdale and Rye. Can someone please elaborate on some of the differences between these two places?
Thanks everyone in advance for your contribution to the forum!
With your budget, you can move pretty much anywhere in Westchester, it just depends how big the house & property are.
1) Prestige/Wealth
I would loosely rank them. Please note that there are wealthier and less wealthy areas in each town. For example, Rye has $20mm+ mansions on the water but also under $1mm houses on an 1/8 of an acre or less. Take it with a grain of salt since it's stereotypes, but type each of these towns in UrbanDictionary.com to see what they say about each.
Rye
Scarsdale
Larchmont
Purchase
Armonk
Harrison
2) School District
Scarsdale
Rye
Larchmont
Armonk
Harrison/Purchase
3) Purchase is basically North Harrison. Since it's slightly further North, the properties are bigger so you're able to build larger mansions on it. A lot of NY Knicks & NY Yankees used to live there (Mariano Rivera, Joe Girardi, Isiah Thomas, etc.)
4) Scarsdale or Larchmont simply because they are closer to NYC. Armonk and Purchase have the worst. For Armonk, most people drive to the North White Plains station. Since it doesn't have its own train station, the houses typically have a discount for that.
5) Scarsdale & Rye couldn't be more different aside from wealth. Rye has very little diversity (mostly white Protestants at least in name). It's near the water so a lot of people are part of boat clubs, etc. Scarsdale is land locked and is mostly Jewish and a growing Asian population that is attracted by the school's reputation.
A lot of (former) athletes live in Purchase. I've bumped into Joe Girardi in Wegman's (literally ), Isiah Thomas at the UPS store, and I've made small talk with Joe Torre walking my dog on more than one occasion, just to give a few examples. If you want to be incognito, this would be the place. It flies under the radar, which suits some people. Some super large estates. If you want to splash your wealth around, then definitely go to Rye or Scarsdale. Larchmont will be less in-your-face with the wealth. I'm personally not a fan or Armonk. The Rye train station used to have about an 8 YEAR wait for a parking permit, but covid may have changed that. You'd have to look into the parking situation at each station.
Curious for more opinions about the pecking order for reputation / wealth for the following towns. Tiers are sufficient. I added a few other towns into the mix. Thanks in advance.
Rye
Scarsdale
Larchmont
Purchase
Armonk
Harrison
Bronxville
Chappaqua
Bedford
Curious for more opinions about the pecking order for reputation / wealth for the following towns. Tiers are sufficient. I added a few other towns into the mix. Thanks in advance.
Rye
Scarsdale
Larchmont
Purchase
Armonk
Harrison
Bronxville
Chappaqua
Bedford
Genuinely curious, but is it really that important to you whether you live in a town/village that is known for its wealth or whether it's at the top or bottom of the pecking order?
I know it a superficial question but I am relatively clueless about these towns other than what I have read on the internet. So, I would really appreciate as much insight as I can obtain. And yes, the pecking order is intriguing / important to me haha!
Curious for more opinions about the pecking order for reputation / wealth for the following towns. Tiers are sufficient. I added a few other towns into the mix. Thanks in advance.
Rye
Scarsdale
Larchmont
Purchase
Armonk
Harrison
Bronxville
Chappaqua
Bedford
Curious for more opinions about the pecking order for reputation / wealth for the following towns. Tiers are sufficient. I added a few other towns into the mix. Thanks in advance.
Rye
Scarsdale
Larchmont
Purchase
Armonk
Harrison
Bronxville
Chappaqua
Bedford
Aside from the mansions on the water in Rye, buying a house in Bronxville is the most expensive. It’s a smaller school district (all 3 levels of school share the same address) that’s a very WASPy town. Back in the day, I heard that the real estate agents would steer the Christians there. Roger Goodell, the NFL commission lives there. He did the 2020 NFL draft from his house there during the first year of COVID.
Chappaqua is wealthy and is an express train stop, however, you can get a lot more bang for your buck buying a house there.
I don’t know much about Bedford but that seems pretty far North if you had to commute into the city every day.
With your budget, you can also consider Greenwich due to far lower taxes. If you don’t have to commute into the city every day, Westport, Darien and New Canaan are also good options in CT.
In terms of wealth/prestige you have to put Bronxville clearly first. That is the hardest town to buy into. You can find 1.2 million dollar homes that are small or outdated in rye or scarsdale but forget about that number to get into Bronxville. I would rank in terms of wealth prestige
Bronxville
Rye
Purchase
Scarsdale/larchmont even
Chappaqua/Armonk even
Harrison
Bedford
In terms of high school prestige it’s different
Scarsdale/rye/chappaqua/Armonk/Bronxville - basically even
Harrison (purchase and Harrison)
Larchmont (Mamaroneck)
Bedford
The town of Edgemont you might as well include in there. It’s equal with scarsdale in terms of prestige and school
Agree that Bronxville would be tops in terms of what the OP is asking. In general, be careful about mailing addresses. A Bronxville mailing address doesn't necessarily mean you are in Bronxville. Same for Scarsdale and pretty much all over.
As far as schools, they vary significantly in terms of size. Bronxville is small, and has an exclusive private school feel to it. As already noted, the entire district is at the same campus. Scarsdale, on the other hand, is very large, and with that, has a more diverse economic feel to it, and will seem much more like a large public school, which it is. Rye is sort of in the middle of these two in terms of size.
Scarsdale has a lot of secular jewish families and Asian families. Bronxville and Rye will be very Wasp/Irish.
Mamaroneck (where Larchmont is) is a very large HS with a significant diverse (Spanish immigrant) component.
Byram Hills (Armonk) is similar in size to Rye (a little smaller) with a lot of secular Jewish families. Kind of like a smaller, more rural version of Scarsdale.
Harrison will have the most middle class vibe of all of these.
Fox Lane (Bedford) also has a sizable Spanish immigrant population (like a slightly smaller version of Mamaroneck)
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), Isiah Thomas at the UPS store, and I've made small talk with Joe Torre walking my dog on more than one occasion, just to give a few examples. If you want to be incognito, this would be the place. It flies under the radar, which suits some people. Some super large estates. If you want to splash your wealth around, then definitely go to Rye or Scarsdale. Larchmont will be less in-your-face with the wealth. I'm personally not a fan or Armonk. The Rye train station used to have about an 8 YEAR wait for a parking permit, but covid may have changed that. You'd have to look into the parking situation at each station.
