The International Schools Review Forum

when I started international teaching, during summer I would travel for a few weeks and then go home to be with friends and family. Now that I have a small child, it's a lot harder to deal with long flights and hop from house to house all summer. I'm thinking about buying or renting a house somewhere. What do other international teachers with small children do to have a home base in the summer?

We stopped going home every summer. We go back around every two years but still end up staying in one area for a couple of weeks (1 week with family, 1 week at a hotel) and then traveling around to see other family and sights we have missed. I know people that get/keep a house (or part of house) to use for the summer and manage to get family to come see them but that was never on the cards for us.

Now we go to other parts of the world for some vacations and stay put for others (we really love where we live). Next year will be 3 years since we have been back so we are preparing ourselves for a massive trip to see multiple sides of the family and get in a trip to WDW for our son.

Some of my friends use Home Away or AirBnB because you can stay for an extended time for essentially what you'd pay for rent.

Our kids were a little older when we went overseas to stay and we thought it was important for them to have a place to call home, so we bought. They were able to find summer jobs, get a drivers license and eventually have some place to call home when they went away to university. It isn't a perfect solution and occasionally it drives us crazy but even today we enjoy coming home and doing the things we love to do even when our kids aren't here.

Overhere, were you able to use the house you bought to establish residency for in-state tuition purposes? Our kids have a few more years in our international school, but we're thinking about buying something for just that purpose. However, I hear it might not be that easy. Because they will have graduated overseas, they might not be considered in-state residents in the state where we own a house. Do you have any idea if that's true?

When we were overseas with kids, we went home every summer. It is so important for kids to gain a sense of connection and community with family. I am so glad we did because of all the memories our kids had with their grandparents (since deceased) and cousins. As well, they had relatives who knew them well and welcomed them to share family celebrations and holidays.

When the kids left, we went home, but now we spend summers where we don't go home at all, and spend time in SE Asia, Europe, or other parts of North America and don't really see family. Or we will go home and see family for a bit, then travel.

Everybody will have different plans for different reasons. None are better than others.

justlooking wrote:
> Overhere, were you able to use the house you bought to establish residency for in-state
> tuition purposes? Our kids have a few more years in our international school, but
> we're thinking about buying something for just that purpose. However, I hear it
> might not be that easy. Because they will have graduated overseas, they might not
> be considered in-state residents in the state where we own a house. Do you have
> any idea if that's true?

I'm not sure we went into buying a home with that in mind and we were fortunate that is what happened. We have friends in California that didn't share that experience and ended up paying out of state.

We have a house in Minnesota, but it has been rented out for the past 10 years so we've done the couch-surfing summer routine for many years. We are in the process of selling our house and buying a townhouse, something that can be left empty when we're not here. Since we've been overseas, we have owned property, voted, and paid taxes (state and property) as well have several of the utilities in our name.

When our kids were younger they didn't mind bouncing around, but as they've gotten older, they have talked about wanting/needing a place that feels like a home base. I have 1 in college and another starting next year--we've been able to spend the past 2 summers in a friend's house that really made them want a house of our own.

For residency, it probably varies state by state. In Minnesota, they key is that it has to be permanent in that a student can't come to "live" in the state just to go to college and then claim residency. My oldest son is at a private college so the in-state thing doesn't matter, but our next will likely be going to a state school. The colleges that we've seen have told us that they don't make the decision until after we are accepted. We've been told unofficially that we are likely to have residency, because it is our official permanent residence, but that we will probably have to go through a review process with the college when the time comes. Unfortunately, no one seems to be able to tell us in advance.

We keep a lake home in Minnesota. Our children have a place to call home, our extended family has a place they can come visit us, and we have come to love it so much that we don't really travel in summers - just the trip home. Our children who attended state schools did qualify for in state tuition as well.

Thanks to everyone who responded. It really highlighted what I have already been in the process of accepting. With a child in the picture, it becomes more important to have some type of home base.

We used Air BnB so we could stay for extended time periods. You can rent places for months. If you want a good price, reserve places during the winter months before the summer prices kick in.

We rented a house this summer near the beach for us and about 30 minutes from family...I used online real estate sites and finally settled on a local one....