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Real estate is about location, location, location...
What is interesting is the popularity of certain towns as a function of proximity to Boston. The suburban towns within easy commute of Boston, with good schools (the W towns, Newton, Brookline) are in demand.
Due to the bubble, thinking warped a bit and towns that are not in proximity to Boston became in demand, because they were far out, but still within a barely tolerable commute radius. As the bubble made even these towns unaffordable (e.g. $800K for a small 1950's ranch), people looked further West beyond 495 for any haunted house that was in a relatively good school system. What City are you closest to when you straddle 495? The answer is not Boston, it is Worcester.
Now that the bubble is slowly and painfully beginning to deflate, these sellers still believe they are in "hot towns" and are pricing unrealistically based on the past demand levels.

If you can find a way to eliminate all traffic noise, all pollution, and have 1-2 acre lot sizes as well as large wooded areas for trail running, and hear nothing at night in the summer except the chirping of bugs, I would be happy to live in the city. Everything I love about my living environment is in the suburbs, and absolutely none of it is in the city.

There is a reason a lot of people live in the suburbs and not the city. It is because they love the suburbs, and hate the city. Its not about cost, or getting more square footage (although that is a nice perk). Its because many people just cant stand the city.

How many institutions of higher learning, with their associated academic communities, are located in the core vs the suburbs? This seems like a rather silly and self-evident argument.

The problem is... BubbleBoy and Middle are BOTH correct. The quality of life out near 495 (Harvard, Bolton, Boxborough, etc.) is wonderful. With that being said, the RE market is collapsing MUCH faster out that way and residents have a false sense of 'my town is recession-proof.' I've been looking at houses in that area for more than 6 months now, and not a single agent/broker that i've spoken to will admit that they are on the decline. They continually give you the 'Harvard commands a 10% premium over surrounding towns' or some other crock about they have already bottomed out and are once again on the rise. RE agents are to blame for unrealistic expectations. Luckily, they will go the way of the dinosaur... and soon.

So I wait... Come this fall, reality will have set in.

I've lived in the suburbs and lived in the city. Quality of life is excellent in the city - the suburbs bored me to tears

I'lll probably be forced out to the burbs when I have kids, (city schools being wretched) but until then I'll enjoy the city during the week, and the country on the weekend, and I'll visit the suburbs whenever I have a craving for strip malls and bad chain restaurants

Perhaps the focus is on the wrong statistic?

People in "core" Boston may be more educated because the cost of living in the "core" is so high that it is only affordable to those with the upper-level jobs which demand the upper-level educations.

I have friends who live in the city who really cant stand the suburbs. Thats cool. There are no restaurants within walking distance of my front door. There are no grocery markets within walking distance. There is one tiny town historical museum. The center of the town is a church and a diner that closes after lunch. There are no big concerts. No Celtics games. This is the definition of everything not cool to many people.

I must admit that you are right about the chain restaurants (although they arent necessarily all bad, the fat content is crazy). Outside of a few scattered diners and restaurants, you gotta go the city for some really good eats. Its a great place to go for food, for a nice stroll down by the shops, but then its back to peaceful suburbia for myself.

Some towns are much better managed than others. The schools are newer, facilities cleaner, town hall more efficient, smarter zoning, etc etc.. not all towns are equal. Some towns deserve a 10% premum, even a 30% premium over surrounding towns. If these things are not important to, then by all means don't spend the money. Heck, if you just want shelter and are not interested in connecting with and nuturing a community, then you should question whether you should even be buying a home; perhaps renting is a better fit.

Regarding RE agents... there are a lot of bad RE agents who should not be in business. However, a good one is worth every single penny.

MiddleMay,

I don't see the case that "some towns are better managed than others" to be honest. What I have seen in the outer suburbs (the exo-burbs), is that most of these towns are badly managed. Some of these towns however have good schools and that's mostly it. If you look at these towns, do they have what people in most of the USA would call good amenities? example: Street lighting, underground electrical wiring, sewer systems to houses (rather than septic tanks), sidewalks on both sides of the street (or even one), storm drains, etc. These are pretty basic things and almost no towns in the exo-burbs do these things.

Your mention of zoning is interesting, since that is mainly used by towns to prevent development.

Mass parents care a lot for our kids, yes they will pay a premium for good schools, but don't pretend that they are actually getting any decent home value for the sadly deteriorated housing stock in the exo-burbs or that these towns in any way compare to the inside 128 suburbs in terms of quality of life.

Does having an OK school system mean that these towns, which saw 150% price jumps, will retain these higher bubble values? No, they will not. The conditions that led to higher bubble pricing has now been corrected and pricing will drop significantly even in these "better exo-burb towns".

I disagree with Middle's contention that "you gotta go the city for some really good eats."

Last year I was invited to a birthday party that was held in a japanese/fusion cuisine tea house in Boston. It was a reception, so the menu was predetermined. The appetizer consisted of a few stalks of limp asparagus cooked in salt water (the chef apparently thinks "salty" is a compliment) and the entree was a "lasagna" made of slices of pumpkin with tofu skin instead of cheese. The people across the table from me, whom I hadn't met before the party, loved the food and insisted there were no good restaurants where I lived because I lived in the suburbs.

In my town, I have easy driving access to the best barbecue joint I've ever been to outside of Tennessee, an exemplary thai place, a cafeteria-style restaurant that serves some of the best homestyle cuisine I've ever eaten, and a brazilian barbecue joint that only recently opened, so I haven't had a chance to try it.

I'd rather have a heaping plate of spaghetti with meatballs the size of my fist than a few stalks of brine-soaked asparagus and a slice of tofu-wrapped pumpkin innards. If that's fine dining, you can have it.

As a foodie, I'm certainly not going to defend Boston as a food city - it fights way under its weight class. But most of the decent places are in the city or inner suburbs, with a few exceptions that prove the rule