'Hood vs Home
What do you take into primary consideration for your home: the neighborhood or the actual home?
I'm in a conflict right now searching for a place, and to make things worse, I'm only vaguely sure of what I'm thinking about--I can't actually see these places that Katie is looking at for me.
She saw a place today that is 2.5 bedrooms, huge kitchen, tons of windows and sunshine. It's close to my school, and near an interstate. The problems are, it's actually TOO near an interstate (try half a block), and just generally in a neighborhood I don't want to live in. (I'm a north-side girl, this is kind of south.) The hood is fairly residential, though an artist's community, but it doesn't necessarily have many restaurants, bars, sidewalk cafes in the area, and so forth. I'm not even sure where any grocery stores are in the area. It's also not in a great location for Tim (the theatres and agents' offices are mostly on the north side) so he'd have to drive everywhere instead of biking and taking public transit.
On the north side, for the same price, we'd probably be in a smaller one-bedroom, but in a cute, darling neighborhood.
(Also, even though they are developing a park across the street from this big apartment, on the north side, there are tons more trees.)
Arg. This is stressful.
I'm in a conflict right now searching for a place, and to make things worse, I'm only vaguely sure of what I'm thinking about--I can't actually see these places that Katie is looking at for me.
She saw a place today that is 2.5 bedrooms, huge kitchen, tons of windows and sunshine. It's close to my school, and near an interstate. The problems are, it's actually TOO near an interstate (try half a block), and just generally in a neighborhood I don't want to live in. (I'm a north-side girl, this is kind of south.) The hood is fairly residential, though an artist's community, but it doesn't necessarily have many restaurants, bars, sidewalk cafes in the area, and so forth. I'm not even sure where any grocery stores are in the area. It's also not in a great location for Tim (the theatres and agents' offices are mostly on the north side) so he'd have to drive everywhere instead of biking and taking public transit.
On the north side, for the same price, we'd probably be in a smaller one-bedroom, but in a cute, darling neighborhood.
(Also, even though they are developing a park across the street from this big apartment, on the north side, there are tons more trees.)
Arg. This is stressful.
posted by LE at 4:38 PM
5 Comments:
For me it's the neighborhood, but I have kids.
I consider the home. I live in what isn't considered the best neighborhood, but I know more of my neighbors now than I ever did when I lived in a "good" neighborhood. I consider the creep factor. If I can stand outside at night by myself and not feel creep out then it isn't an issue. Our last street we lived on was dark and everyone went to bed at like 8pm and totally gave me the creeps. Plus now we live in the middle and I love that I can get anywhere in wichita in like maybe 10 minutes and Robynn's school is fabulous. So really I think that you need to consider your needs and what is going to be the best for the 2 of you.
You know, I'm in a quandry about where to live. In some ways, I would like to just get in a car and drive until I run out of money or find a place I just love. I may end up in Madison, which I love. Except....it's so perfect. There are bike lanes everywhere, about 6 health food stores, probably 25 bookstores, lots of good restaurants and cafes, music, farmers market, great university blah blah blah...but somehow it just seems too perfect. Like, I want to be DOING something, like school, or a job here. I don't want to get apathetic because I can't see the problems I want to work against on a daily basis.
I wish things were more clear. Living in chicago is another possiblity. I'm not that excited about chicago itself, but I've never lived in a city. Maybe it's something I should do.
Above all, I wish that I wasn't doing this all alone. You guys are lucky to have partners that help, and maybe hinder decisions.
The hindrance for me is money. Argh. It freaks me out so much how much housing costs in cities.
It is hard to decide. Cost was also a huge factor. What could we afford with just steve working and our other bills. We pay 200 less now than we did at the last place which was smaller. So in the end you have to look at the big picture what will be the best in the long run.
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