Considering moving to Western Michigan, need opinions
My husband(32) and I(31) are considering escaping the hustle and bustle and moving our family (two kids- 2 & 4), but we’re having a hard time figuring out exactly where to go
We visited Manistee and fell in love, but are open to suggestions.
Places we’ve looked into are:
Manistee
Ludington
Traverse City
Holland
South Haven
Grand Haven
Big Rapids
Muskegon
Holland
Grand Rapids suburbs (not super interested in trading one metro for another, but considering anything)
How are the school districts in these places? We’ve looked at Niche for school ratings but I want real reviews from people currently enrolled in these districts.
Are these towns safe? What are the communities like? Job markets? Commutes? Affordability?
We prefer a smallish town (we’re coming from a big metro so anything less than like 50k people is small to us).
For reference we are left leaning, non religious but welcoming and friendly to anyone. We’re coming from a right leaning, heavily Christian suburb in a red/purple metro so we’re tolerant to most anything.
My husband is currently a construction project manager for a commercial real estate company and has an extensive background in facilities maintenance/building engineering. I was an esthetician for 10 years before I closed my spa to be a stay at home mom after our youngest was born so I have experience in esthetics and admin/small business management and operations. We’re open to smaller towns (we’ve looked at places like Cadillac, Whitehall, Pentwater, Bear Lake, etc.) as long as they have a good public school system, decent grocery store and a few restaurant/fast food options and are somewhat close to a bigger town with a bit more options. We don’t have a giant pile of cash for a house so places like Glenn Arbor and Saugatuck are probably not an option and we will most likely be looking for new jobs (husband would love to work outdoors/with his hands, I’ll be looking for admin/reception/anything really when our youngest gets into preschool, so preferably somewhere with jobs similar to those.
Does a place like this exist or are we dreaming? What are your experiences in western Michigan?