Buying a home? Don’t forget to do your school homework!

Buying a home? Don’t forget to do your school homework

If you’re thinking of buying a home, then you have probably made a list of all of the important features that you want and researched which stores and restaurants are located nearby. However, did you also research the schools in your preferred neighbourhood? Many buyers get caught up in the excitement of purchasing a home and sometimes forget to check out the schools their children would be attending. Even if you don’t have children now, it doesn’t hurt to plan ahead.

Once you have settled on your preferred neighbourhood, then the next step is finding out which school your children would be attending. This can be easily done online by going to the Waterloo Region District School Board’s website at www.wrdsb.ca and using their School Finder link. You can type in the address of a home and find out which Public or Separate schools children in that neighbourhood attend, and whether or not the home is within walking distance of the school.

Now that you have determined which schools fall within your neighbourhood’s boundaries, you can find out how they compare to other schools in the Waterloo region. The Fraser Institute releases an annual School Report Card which measures the academic success of local schools based on provincial math and literacy testing. Schools are ranked from zero to 10, with the provincial average being six. If you’d like to find out where your local school ranks, visit http://compareschoolrankings.org for more details.