best suburbs for public primary school around CBD ?

[jsuciadi]

Hi, I'm newly arrived in Sydney (2 weeks ago) and currently live & work at CBD. My son (5yo) will arrive in about 1 month time and I'm currently looking for a place for me & him. I will also need to find a live-in nanny who will be able to help taking care of him. Any suggestions on suburbs around CBD (max 45 mins travel to CBD) with good public primary school nearby ? And maybe where to find a reliable live-in nanny in Sydney ? How much does it normally cost to hire a live-in nanny in Sydney ?

[floridagirlinsydney]

Hi, welcome to Sydney. We moved here about a year ago (we have 3 & 4 yr. old boys) and live about 10 minutes (20 in bad traffic) from the CBD-- and we have found that there are excellent public primary schools in the eastern suburbs- but you are definitely paying a premium to live in the eastern suburbs. I have been looking to hire a live in nanny for the last 11mos., but it is very difficult here... though today I have someone coming to do a trial week with me, yippie. Anyway, they basically cost about $15-20 an hour, pretty expensive. We've found that we are just trying to cut out hours where possible so we end up paying about $600/wk.
I've gotten a lot of response from a website called find a babysitter (the australia site)-- it costs about $80 for a 3 mo. subscription-- but it's much less than a nanny agency and the agencies just put ads online like you would to find candidates. Another place you can post an ad for a nanny is gumtree-- but I haven't had as good of a response of quality applicants there. I hope you find everything you're looking for here easier than I have!! ha,ha.
I have a blog about our crazy last year here-- if you search Florida Girl in Sydney you'll find it. Good luck!

[RichardK]

45 mins travel to CBD......

best place to live is walking distance to a train station or fast bus service.

driving into CBD and parking costs is not fun.

lots of good public schools in all directions - generally the higher the house price, the better the school.

Eastern suburbs and North Shore are upmarket.

Also depends on where you work in CBD. You don't want to have to change trains to get to work nor walk blocks across town. ( North Shore line goes Wynyard, Town Hall, Central but not the whole City Circle like Museum & Circular Quay ).

Where to live - what rental price range are you planning for ?