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Any North Carolina folks out there?!


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My hubby is considering a possible relocation to North Carolina. The company currently has openings in either Charlotte, Raleigh, or Winston-Salem. Anyone from any of those places? Can you give me the low down? How do you like it? How is the homeschooling? What about cost of living?

 

In general what are the homeschool laws like in North Carolina? We come from a fairly "easy" state so I am curious how NC works.

 

Thanks so much!!

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Charlotte area here---lots of homeschoolers, tons of program options for them, lots of groups of various flavors (Christian-specific, secular, inclusive, etc). We have a large (2 storefront size) homeschool consignment store in the area, which is a great benefit.

 

The laws are pretty reasonable: http://www.ncdnpe.org/hhh103.aspx

Basically, register the school, keep attendance/immunization records, kids need to take a nationally-normed standardized test yearly from age 7-16 but you only have to keep the records on hand rather than turn them in. Teacher must have a high school diploma or GED.

 

For cost of living---it will really depend on where you are coming from and where in the area you choose to move. I grew up here, so don't have a good basis for comparison.

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I've lived for many years in both Raleigh and Charlotte and my hubby works frequently in Winston Salem. I strongly prefer Raleigh (I like smaller cities) but almost all of my family is in Charlotte. If you can tell me the addresses of the offices in each place I can give you more info. They are both large cities and where you can live and still be near work matters bc/ of the traffic. We are able to live right near 85 in Charlotte and can hop on and head places quickly. Plus we are 5 minutes from the outlet mall and the stores, while still being in a great neighborhood. In Raleigh, we lived out of town in a quaint suburb and loved it, but traveled far to get anywhere. My perception of Winston Salem is that it is kind of gross - not as pretty that is - although of course it has nice areas too. Charlotte traffic is pretty bad. Our location is pretty ideal to avoid getting caught in it. I'd recommend renting for a year to get a feel for any of these before hunkering down. Homeschooling in NC is a breeze - voluntary requirements mainly and yearly testing which I'd do anyway.

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p.s. cost of living -- 4000 sq ft all brick house costs about $350,000 on about a half acre and the neighborhood has 7 pools... nicely kept. You can go fully custom and the cost doubles I'd say. The prices where we lived in FL were easily double this for half the house. You can use zillow.com to get an idea of houses. Have you checked it? It is fun! Uses google earth to let you see the houses on any street in 3D and lists all for sale... People sometimes list their own crazy asking prices but you can tell those from the ones truly on the market.

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I've lived for many years in both Raleigh and Charlotte and my hubby works frequently in Winston Salem. I strongly prefer Raleigh (I like smaller cities) but almost all of my family is in Charlotte. If you can tell me the addresses of the offices in each place I can give you more info. They are both large cities and where you can live and still be near work matters bc/ of the traffic. We are able to live right near 85 in Charlotte and can hop on and head places quickly. Plus we are 5 minutes from the outlet mall and the stores, while still being in a great neighborhood. In Raleigh, we lived out of town in a quaint suburb and loved it, but traveled far to get anywhere. My perception of Winston Salem is that it is kind of gross - not as pretty that is - although of course it has nice areas too. Charlotte traffic is pretty bad. Our location is pretty ideal to avoid getting caught in it. I'd recommend renting for a year to get a feel for any of these before hunkering down. Homeschooling in NC is a breeze - voluntary requirements mainly and yearly testing which I'd do anyway.

 

Winston Salem is gross? I've only visited there, but thought it was lovely. Old Salem is there http://www.oldsalem.org/ , Wake Forest University, lovely old neighborhoods. Not sure that it is grosser than any other city its size. 1 1/2 hours from Boone or Blowing Rock.

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I grew up in NC... I would vote Raleigh, but I'm prejudiced. Charlotte is weird to me. It's all too new. I find it somehow strange that an entire mid-size city could be built in the 80's with so little history before that. But that's just me... and Charlotte has some nice things, I suppose.

 

Really I prefer Durham to all those options. Durham is where it's at. :D

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There are lovely parts of Winston Salem, but overall I would say it is the least beautiful to live in (unless you can live in the historic areas). But I'm biased!

 

Oh -- I agree, Durham near Southpoint is wonderful! Traffic is a nightmare if you have to get on 85/40 during obvious morning or evening times. But if you can live where you don't have to, it is fabulous there now.

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I grew up in NC... I would vote Raleigh, but I'm prejudiced. Charlotte is weird to me. It's all too new. I find it somehow strange that an entire mid-size city could be built in the 80's with so little history before that. But that's just me... and Charlotte has some nice things, I suppose.

 

Really I prefer Durham to all those options. Durham is where it's at. :D

 

Charlotte's got plenty of history going back to the 1700s if you look for it ;) (lots of Rev War sites around), but, yes, a lot of it is new as much of the growth happened in the 80s and later. A benefit of that has been vastly increased diversity in the region on all fronts. It's quite different from the way it was when I was growing up (graduated high school in 81).

 

The Charlotte metro region has basically doubled form 1960-2000 (702,383 to 1,499,293) while Raleigh has also exploded over the same time period (442,523 in 1960 to 1,187,941 in 2000), so there's plenty new in both areas.

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