Back from CT!
Mikayla and I had a pretty successful weekend checking things out around the area. We got to see a lot of neighborhoods... New Canaan, Darien, Rowayton, Noroton, East Norwalk, South Norwalk, Silvermine, Wilton, Stamford downtown, Glenbrook, Springdale, Belltown, Greenwich and Old Greenwich. There's some amazing homes in the area, wow.
The prices are blowing our minds though, haha. An equivalent apartment to what we have now is about $2500/mo, compared to the $1000 we're paying now. WHAT!!! So that's kinda stressful. No idea how much I'd be making up there, but it sure better be MORE.
We really loved New Canaan and Darien, and thought we could see ourselves there. Of course, we only got to see each area very briefly, so it's pretty hard to judge.
Dan, Rowayton is a beautiful little town. We checked out the Market you told us about. So cool! We ended up eating brunch right down the street at a place called Rowayton Seafood Restaurant. Very, very good.
when do we find out if you gotta move up there or not?
Hopefully this month. It's killing us not knowing.
glad my recommendations helped!
Ian, I know this won't help you feel better or anything, but we currently pay $1310 for 2 bedroom apartment (includes heat/hot water) 15 minutes from the GWB. So uh, your current situation is good, haha. $2,500 is a lot.
We had dinner with some friends from Hazelton, PA, who told us they have a 2 bedroom, 2 bathroom house that cost $72K, and their mortgage is $472/month. No joke, I have friends with car payments bigger than that. I felt ill when they told me that.
Can I just ask - REALLY, what is one supposed to do in this world if you want a house? Either live somewhere where the average family brings home $30k/year and houses are $90K (like PA), or live somewhere you can make $90K/yr and houses are $400K (like Northern NJ)?? Honestly, this ratio makes PA look better. It does.
Lauren and I ask all the time ... where can we live that we would afford a house and Lauren might, one day, not have to work full time?
Does anyone else struggle with this? It can't be just us, right?
//end rant
yeah we totally don't get this either. and real estate taxes in NJ just make it worse.
PA is ridiculous. Mikayla's sister lives in Pittsburgh and is in the same situation as your friends in Hazleton. ugggg. So cheap. Basically for the down payment on a house in NJ, you can buy a house outright. dude, that's what you guys should do. save up like $70k and just buy a place in PA! taxes would only be like $600 on a place like that.
You, my friend, are so right.
In Bergenfield (the town next to where we live now), one of the families in our hall with 5 kids and a house that takes up ALL their property told me that their property taxes are $15,000.00/yr. No lie, our rent is almost the same as their taxes. ($1310 x 12). Insane.
wow. there are places out by us too with insane taxes. like in Long Valley, it's not uncommon to hear of people paying $24,000 a year. i think at any point above $10k, i'd just say forget it and leave the state. not worth it!
Yeah, but in the end... you are living in PA... and thats a lose lose all around
when angela and i got married we qualified for medium income housing. basically they control the amount that the homeowner is allowed to sell the house for. Each year they can raise the price of they can sell the house for by a few percentage points. So the upside is that I bought a 2 bedroom condo for less than $130,000 when the same condo in the non rent controlled section were selling for close to $300,000. So if you and your wife have been making less than 70,000 combined (i think that's the amount) for the last 3 years you can qualify for it.
dude i make like 250k a year!!!! no way i could ever qualify to make it into that complex!!!! LOLOLOLOLOMG
well then screw you! go live in your palace!!! lol
argh, missed it by $0.05!
But too bad PA's dead boring.. & you'll still have to work full-time anyway, 'cause the pay's lower there. It's alllll relative.. so in the end the best you can do, is just live where you want to live, so at least you'll be happy & not depressed. Personally, I'd never want to go back to live in NJ even if it might be less competitive than NYC & I probably wouldn't be happy in PA either.. even if it's a "more simple life." In my case, this move to NYC has been really good for me.. even if I feel I'm always strapped for cash..being the city's soooooooo expensive. I always thought I'd need to own property.. like house or condo or whatever.. but, I'm happy enough renting an apartment. The economy's depressing.. so just try to ignore it the best you can. That has worked a in a weird way for me.
WHAT is with all the PA hate. It's not all pennsyltucky, people! I live in a town where I can walk to four coffee shops, a whole bunch of little custom clothing shops, and liek almost 10 bars/restaurants of all different types of food from asian to south american to european, as well as a vintage movie theater, pet stores, a museum, two bed&breakfasts, and somewhere around 8-10 hair salons/spa's. Pretty much anything I want I can walk to. JUSTIN GUARINI lives across the street from me (like how i capitalized it as if he was an actual famous person lol). It's a huge artist community that does artsy fartsy things all the time and bike races and running/racing events.
PLUS - Most of the people in my congregation drive nice cars and live in really beautiful homes and vacation in Mexico all the time - but they are not "materialistic" or stuck up in any way... no one has the air of trying to get rich they just live comfortably? A lot of business owners and highly educated brothers and sisters. Our hall is awesome. Philadelphia is less than an hour away. NYC is about an hour and a half. There are three major malls within about a half hour each way. There is a TON of stuff to do.
Our car insurance was cut in half, or more, i can't even remember, I just know it's like next to nothing, a lot of other expenses are way less than NJ, and I can walk down the street to a produce shop (or the weekly farmers market) and get all local fresh organic food, cheap.
We have a LOT of people in our territory that live here but commute to NYC or Philly so a lot of "city" folk and not back-country hicks.
Moving here has seriously been the best decision we have ever made.
So yeah PFFFTTTT to all the PA hate!!!
http://www.gophila.com/P/Doylestown/36.html DOYLESTOWN FTW
oh and we live in an apartment, it's the upstairs of an 1800's house, it's really unique and we love it, we got rid of our house in NJ and will probably never get a house again, we are definitey apartment people and need the freedom of being able to move if we want to, and the financial freedom of knowing the landlord will pay to get stuff fixed! we are still living a pretty simple life, we don't have a lot, but we value what we do have, and we love this town and everything about it. It has been a year and a half and I am nowhere near sick of living here, which says a lot.
alright, that's the end of my PA love rant.
(and btw i did not want to move to this area and I hated Philadelphia but that's just because I was a stupid closed-minded newjersian. it is awesome here.)
Philadelphia sucks... I hate that city.
I don't hate it. Just like it less than NYC. And depends what PA we're talking about. I agree, Downtown Doylestown (that's like a PA exception to the rule) has it's appeal...and I was even looking at moving there at one time in my life...or West Mount Airy maybe (Greater Philly) or Rittenhouse if we're talking posh. However, in the end.. sorry, but Philly do not compare to the City I call my home today. And admit it.. you love NYC as well. :)
there's two things in life that i hate. 1)people who judge others because of where they're from, and 2) the state of pennsylvania.
LOL
and the "pay is lower" thing is not true either
we are close enough to Philadelphia that it's more like "city pay", Chris' salary is better than what it was in NJ, the pay is better for Wedding Photographers too, aaaaand my brother was even able to get a job at Chris' company with no college and no office experience, and he is making way better money than he did working as a retail manager in NJ.
PA is huge, and i'm sure there are parts of it that are boring but you can't generalize a whole state and say that it sucks.
Cuuuuz a lot of parts of NJ and NY and even California suck too sooooooooooooo EAT IT redsweater
angry there little pumkin? lol yeah there are places that suck here too...like 909. bleck