Submitted by Bruce Hecht:
I was working with some buyers this past weekend, they had some pretty specific goals in
mind for what they wanted in a home.  2400+ sq ft, 4+ bedrooms, OK sized backyard, newer construction, 3+ car garage, things like that.  It started to sound like there would be no chance to find them what they wanted.
 
But as we began our search and tours, another hidden, very important requirement floated to the top of the search requirements, the schools.  They have 3 kids that are in elementary school or will be starting in the near future.  We stopped searching for homes immediately and chose to focus on looking for schools first.
 
Great school sites can be found from our team website, these really narrowed the home area(s) that my buyers were willing to look in.  They drew the line at 7 out of 10.  This was the lowest score they were willing to accept for the elementary school that the home they would buy, feeds into.

With this information in hand we continued to search for two full days and found a beautiful NEW construction home in an outlying suburb of Portland Oregon.  The home has 2600 sq ft, with ALL of the nicest upgrades you could want - for $15,000 less than my buyers wanted to spend.  This new subdivision is also close to the Oregon beaches, by a nice lake where my buyers can take their kids to go fish and plenty of walking trails, and a really deluxe park that is in the sub division.
 
We are writing the offer up now.