looking to move to culpeper or front royal/Stephens city area. Me and the wife are having a kid and she wants to be a stay at home mom. I can't float our mortgage on my own so many off we go. And I can possibly get some land

With the contract I'm on, the gooberment allows work from home twice a week so good internet is a must

Any areas to avoid or look at?

I'm from nova & am living between front Royal & Stephen city.  Nice, scenic & peaceful.  Get a 4wd or awd, as the private roads most homes are on are pos.  lots of wineries, and 340 defense probably best range in the area, not to far away.  Great riding if you have a Harley.

Though you will miss civilation, such as trash pickup, conveiance store, delivery, nice resturants, recycling, non-trashy people, ect.

I cant help much on exact areas.  I'm in the Tysons area now--I can see the USA-today building out my window.  

Watch out.

Many of the developments have sub-standard roads that VDOT will not accept.
This forces the homeowners association to maintain the roads.

Monthly dues can be a real killer.

Many hundreds per month. around Culpeper.

I like Front Royal for it's closeness to Skyline Drive. I am a big fan of the Linden area though for better views and being slightly closer to NOVA.

Yea are very used to all the amenities nova has to offer.. That's what scares me. I would love enough land to ride the atv's and have a spot to shoot, but looking at the prices for 10+ acres seems to not include a house unless it's 400k+

Might keep an eye out for short sales or foreclosures. How's the school systems out there?

Stay away from Culpeper. I own several free grave plots there and would not even be buried there.

I live the Town of Front Royal just inside the limits on the east side of town.

Back yard critters.







Pitfalls of the edge of town.

I don't have kids but from my understanding schools are decent but not amazing. Front Royal to me is dependent on location. Some area's I like some have WAY too many people and I hate HOA"s with a passion.

That's amazing!! We have deer in nova, but I've only seen a bear from distance. We visited front royal and the realtor showed us some houses in high knob, which is basically on the side of a mountain. Great views but the land is worthless

you didn't get back over to apple or blue mountain?  Apple mountain you have a fairly restrictive hoa that wont let you do anything fun, and you may end up with that on blue mountain too depending on where you go.  There's no restrictions where I'm at but its only 90 or so houses.

Public schools in front Royal are garbage, however there are a couple of very good private schools.  If public Ed is important, don't go west of gainsville!

Culpeper County is OK but the Town is no good.  Town residents have to pay 2 personal property taxes and 2 real estate taxes.  There are still some good home sites available in the county with decent acreage at good prices.  The schools are what you make them, stay involved as much as possible.  What they don't get in school, they get at home.  We also have Cedar Mountain Youth range which has free membership as long as you volunteer your time to help coach the youth shooting teams.

The town share is rather small.
Out of about $1,800 a year the town gets about $200.

Having a town property tax is pretty standard in Virginia.
The town needs some money to run.

Warren County is becoming a bedroom community of NOVA commuter troglodytes who get the blessing to work a few days at home, and figure a few days off justifies moving into the area and not keeping the South beautiful.  Lynden is at the point that at 5am in the morning it needs 2 miles of merge lanes onto 66 just with all the commuter traffic coming from the mountain.  Culpepper is the same way.

Thankful I live in Shenandoah County, were the hour and half drive into NOVA will never be justified by transients.  

Grateful OP and other posters in this thread are cool, but 6 out of 10 cars coming out of Lynden are Prius's with Obama 2012 bumper stickers on them and tailgate my ass at 4am as if 75mph isn't fast enough into NOVA.

That made me lol.  We looked at lake holiday on Saturday and it was amazing... The price is great but like you said 1.5 hrs to nova is tough to swallow

I'd take a close look at Marshall or Markham.  I grew up right next to Warren County and while I have many friends in "Fro Ro" they have some serious crime issues for a smaller city.

DANGER, WILL ROBINSON!!!  The HOA fess will kill you there, last I heard 1.5 years ago...$1500 year, plus they had/have water, sewer and dam issues...although I've heard the dam issue has been fixed.  Great place to visit but no way I'd live there.

Uh...

I looked at both.

Picked Culpeper (outside of city limits/ downtown).


Front Royal... is chock full of fundamentalist Catholics. I'm Catholic, but not that Catholic.

Front Royal is just .... not very nice.

But I'm a bit of a snob and prefer more of the Rappahannock and The Plains lifestyle.

I pay $220/month right now so that's actually a pretty good deal haha

I guess there is a reason why the houses over there are so cheap.

WTF.....

What's a fundamentalist Catholic?

I've lived here all my life and have never seen one unless you count the old Nun I'd see walking about every now and again. The Catholics have a college in the county but they don't run anything politically that I'm aware of.....Plus they let folks pass through their property to go fish on the river....Yep, just terrible folks.

Damn dude you are quite the self-admitted snob.....Meh, enjoy your huge racial problems in Culpeper Co....And take care to not get shot by the po-po.

I'm curious, what huge racial problems are there in Culpeper?  And one bad shoot makes all Culpeper PD officers suspect?  Yes, the town and county have their issues (political), but show me one place that doesn't.

LOL, ... ok.

Hint. They look Mennonite, but they are actually Catholic.

Hint 2: It probably helps if you actually _ARE_ Catholic, as I am. My wife noticed that at Church, if you are a woman and you wear pants, and not full length skirt that goes all the way down to the ground, you get looks. ... The number of children you have....

Again, I may have a distorted perspective because I am _in_ the Catholic community, but FR comes off as a Hard-Core Catholic commune.

I've lived in Stephens City for 11years. We are close enough to the convenience of what Winchester offers without being "urban". There are areas west of Stephens City that are housing developments that sit on a minimum of five acres. Some of the older developments sit on an 1+ and the HOAs have faded away. We also have an Issac Walton park with range right off of Rte50 about 10min from town.

OK dammit don't hold out on me, where is this "Catholic commune with Mennonite looking women" you speak of located at?

Hell, they must keep them locked away. I know some guys here-about that might help them fill their kid quota. They will even profess to be Catholic if that's what they want to hear. Looks don't matter cause the guys aren't much to look at either but hey, they have all their teeth and jobs.  

I must say that that in my almost 60 years in the area I did not realize there was a Catholic "vibe" in the air that only Catholics can hear. Is it sorta like the dog whistle thing or did you just get  "touched" (by God) a little bit too hard?


BTW....The only Mennonite "looking" people I see are a couple of young women that come from Shenandoah County and sell baked goods at the flea market in warm weather. Both are Mennonite...I asked. Nice to look at (in a plain way) and have damn good baked goods too. Their molasses cookies are to die for.  

“Finally, I would like to say a few words about Front Royal, Virginia. Within a stretch of about a mile in Front Royal are located the campus of Christendom College, as well as the world headquarters of Seton Home Study School and Human Life International. There are many stories about the origin of the name Front Royal. It is believed that during the Revolutionary War, when captains were mustering their troops, they called the men to ‘Front the Royal Oak Tree’.

If we look carefully, however, there is another meaning for the term Front Royal. When a country is at war and the king has gone to battle, the area or ‘front’ where the king is located to lead his soldiers, that area is called the Royal Front or Front Royale. So we believe it is no coincidence that Seton, Christendom, and Human Life International, certainly in the forefront of the Catholic battle against the secular culture, are to be found at the Front Royale. Because we are engaged in a battle royal, with the Heavenly King of Kings at our side.

St. Peter tells us to be ready to give reasons for the hope that is in us. If you would like to see more reasons for hope, I invite you to come to the Front Royale and visit us. You will find it is worth your effort to visit the beautiful Shenandoah Valley and drive down the stretch of road where Jesus Christ is King.”

- Dr. Mary Kay Clark, President of Seton Home School


Definitely been an influx. This stupid gypsy law protest, the donut shop thing. Didn't used to be any religious "bookstores" on Main Street.

Also called Hell Town. Due to the cattle wranglers and fur trappers that would come down from the surrounding mountains looking for alcohol, prostitutes, and a hell of a good time. Lots of rugged men, bar brawls, and the meeting of several waterways used for floating logs to the mill.

LOL....As late as the 60s there were eight bars on Main Street and at least two whore houses I knew of (Afton Inn and above the Capital Restaurant). Main Street was no joke on a Friday/Saturday night especially when the Moose members on Water Street got all lit up.

Dad was a town cop back then and he came home more than once with a bloody uniform. I still have his well worn and blood stained blackjack from that time.

Now the watering holes have been replaced with those "wine places" were the snotty set and the tourists go sit and sip grape juice. Weak Sauce.

Culpeper doesn't really have race problems, more so a community that use know each other  that is now over run by NOVA, yuppies, and illegals.....people just don't mix like they use to.  As for the law enforcement, their faults go FAR beyond murdering an unarmed old lady and then spewing lies to cover.  Culpeper politics is a bit more corrupt then most VA locales.  It can be a great place to live, but there are plenty of caveats and so much freedom has been attacked in recent times:  A former town manger was pushing for parcel size restrictions for shooting in the town/county(VCDL got involved), the last town manager tried to ban "Don't Tread On Me" from the town logo despite the Culpeper Minute Men history b/c it was political and racist , and they still haven't given up on regulating sound after 6PM. Heck even pasture parties are subject to paramilitary type raids.  I am concerned that we have politicians that could pass any kind of BS and the police are itchy to run their FLIR and MRAP for any cause. It's a weird place.

Culpeper has problems with illegals??? That's why I left manassas for gainesville....

It's not as bad as Manassas and hardly the Latino gang culture in more urban areas, but yeah the town has it's own version of the Hispanic hospitality office and so it's a draw.  The place isn't all bad, but it does teeter on some insane restrictions and has a very poorly led town and county law enforcement.  Many of the bad politicians are getting ousted and I think we could see some major changes for the better, but just know the place lacks leadership and I believe the citizens are finally calling out all the BS.  I bought a fore-closed farm a few miles South of town, much better living.