Help me find a new city.

May 3, 2005 2:46 PM

My wife and I are contemplating a move to the North-Eastern US. We currently live in Southern California and know nothing about the area.

My wife is an opera singer (soprano) and her career is just starting to take off...trouble is all the good gigs are on the other coast. We'd like to move somewhere that's within an hour or two commute from NYC. I'm a network admin and would be looking for similar work while I finish my degree. I haven't picked a college yet; I'd go with whatever is close to where we move.
We've built enough equity off the crazy housing market here to afford a house in the 200 - 300k range. We're looking for small to mid-size cities, definitely not suburbs, but not Manhattan either.
(Oh, and before anyone asks, we both grew up in the upper Midwest, so weather is not a deterrent. Not much of one anyway)
Help us right-coasters! Where should we be looking? What's a good city for a married couple, no kids, looking for a fresh start?

posted by Eddie Mars to travel & transportation (27 comments total)

Well, I live in VT, but upon reading more, I definately will not be able to help you, sorry. Nice name, though. The Big Sleep was a great book.
posted by C17H19NO3 at 2:58 PM on May 3, 2005

You might try Peekskill, an hour north of NYC (the train goes right into Grand Central and it's a beautiful ride); my wife and I lived there for a year and enjoyed it a lot -- we talk about driving back there just to enjoy the river view (it's on one of the most beautiful stretches of the Hudson). It's got a good bookstore, coffee house, and recently restored old theater, all within a couple of blocks of each other downtown, there are tax breaks for artists (they're trying the SoHo route to civic reinvention after the factories emptied out), and for special occasions Zeph's Restaurant (638 Central Ave) is one of the best places I've ever eaten—my wife preferred it to any of the fancy places I took her to in Manhattan. You should be able to find something nice under 300K, but hurry—the market has been booming (everything closer to the city is outrageously expensive, so people are heading north). Of course, that means you should make a nice profit when you sell... Good luck!
posted by languagehat at 3:11 PM on May 3, 2005

On second look, it appears that I'm limiting myself to New York City proper. I should have mentioned that we probably want to live outside of NYC, but within easy driving/train distance. Anything within a certain radius (4 hours max) we'd consider. We've been looking at Philadelphia and Boston, but that was just throwing darts at a map.
posted by Eddie Mars at 3:15 PM on May 3, 2005

Princeton is nice, and a little over an hour or so from Manhattan by car/train?/bus.
posted by nyterrant at 3:21 PM on May 3, 2005

So Philadelphia and Boston are the ends of the range? Boston would be good for your wife, and good for your education. But it might be bad for your employment prospects-- we're in a bit of tech glut right now.
posted by Mayor Curley at 3:24 PM on May 3, 2005

There are a bunch of nice places of varying size on the Hudson which are accessible to NY by commuter train — it runs up to Poughkeepsie, so anything between there and Manhattan should be near a stop.

There's also Connecticut, but it doesn't really have cities, except Hartford, which isn't very nice. And the nicer (IMHO) small towns in Connecticut are the ones outside commuting range of the city.
posted by IshmaelGraves at 3:38 PM on May 3, 2005

Mayor, Philadelphia and Boston were just the obvious cities that show up nearby on the map.
Sorry to be so vague about this request, but we don't know much about the area and have no friends or relatives to go to for guidance.
Actually, this is pretty much how we ended up in California. We made the decision to move one afternoon, and were unpacking about a week later.

I guess my real question is, if you got to do it all over, and had no attachments or obligations, what is the coolest place you could think of to live?
posted by Eddie Mars at 3:51 PM on May 3, 2005

I would give New Haven, CT and the surrounding area a look. It's a nice, small city and is about a 2 hour train ride to NYC.

You shouldn't have too much problem finding work and there are several colleges around, like Southern CT , or Univ of New Haven, and of course Yale, which is a big piece of New Haven.

Houses are getting a bit pricey around here, but you could still get something in your price range.
posted by isotope at 4:00 PM on May 3, 2005

There are already some great suggestions here -- I've spent some time living in or near New Haven, Peekskill and Philadelphia, and they're all great (Philly would be my top choice of these); however, the one place I've lived that I pine for, where I would live forever if possible, is Montclair, NJ . It's about a 30 minute train ride to NYC, and is diverse and artsy without being frustratingly urban. There are three indie movie theaters, countless amazing restaurants (ranging from Indian to Thai to Ethiopian to the standard NJ Italian), great little shops - including the best used bookstore I've ever encountered - plus a very nice art museum and theater. Housing might be a bit expensive for your budget, but I'm not sure about that since I was a renter. Please, whatever you've heard about it, don't write off NJ!
posted by katie at 4:21 PM on May 3, 2005

Oh, and I know of a couple of other cool towns you might want to check out: Nyack, NY and Red Bank, NJ.
posted by katie at 4:24 PM on May 3, 2005

Oh Nyack! I grew up in and around Pearl River, NY...I second Montclair, NJ as well (katie--those are great recommendations.)

Really, there are little gem towns in NJ that no one ever thinks about. I haven't lived there in so long though.

Growing up, I loved Bronxville, Tarrytown and Peekskill, but I imagine they are all expensive as sin now. I'm also found of Rowayton, CT...but ditto on the expense.
posted by jeanmari at 4:32 PM on May 3, 2005

I moved to Philadelphia almost 4 years ago (after graduating college) and I never want to leave. You'd probably be able to afford a decent house here or even on the Main Line (suburbs)- there are lots of cute little towns like Ardmore and Narberth, plus the suburban neighborhoods like Mount Airy, which are within city limits.

But since you seem to want a smaller city, I nominate my hometown, Bethlehem PA. We had a pretty nice house there (the house I grew up in) and my parents sold it recently for about $300k. It'd definitely be within your price range, and it's about 90 minutes from NYC (buses are available too). The school system is great and there are tons of colleges there: Lehigh, Moravian, and Lafayette to name just three.

Good luck with your move!
posted by elisabeth r at 5:03 PM on May 3, 2005

How long is the trip from Albany or Binghamton or other SUNY-school-town to NYC? I assume Stony Brook is the closest SUNY school, but you can't afford to live anywhere close to it.

Note that if you were to go to SUNY, or another state school in the area, it might behoove you to work for a year and then go so you can get in-state rates without having to jump through a zillion hoops. Resident in the state is not resident for tuition purposes.
posted by ROU_Xenophobe at 5:09 PM on May 3, 2005

It is all burbs between Manhattan and Boston, Philly etc. There are big suburban cities, with more population than most independent upper midwestern cities, but yet they are still suburban cities. What exactly are you looking for in a place to live? Good theater, movies, restaurants, a bar scene, recreation? The burbs in SoCal seem to have more trendy fare such as restaurants and spas etc. I am not sure how to say this without insulting everyone in SoCal, but the NYC area seems just much less vapid, not that tons of really thoughtful and intelligent people do not live in SoCal. In general, Long Island is a little more like SoCal in terms of money and trendiness, but with a different ethnic and cultural flair. Westchester and Conn. are oldish money, and less trendy, but perhaps more so for the rich. NJ is more down home, it was recently considered "the country" and lacks some of the panache of the other burbs, but also lacks some of the snobbiness. These generalizations are so broad as to be almost meaningless once you start to focus in on a particular city, hence my question, what do you seek?

Without social connections, without kids and looking for Opera and college I would focus right in on NYC. Forget the burbs, unless you are right outside the city. You want to be there and travel into the city sucks so stay there or close. Everyone in SoCal seems to be a transplant so moving in from way out is easy. In the NYC burbs many people have never left home so it is harder to establish a social network. Manhattan is the exception, as it seems everyone who lives there was born somewhere else, well at least a lot of people.

Outside of NYC I would recommend you investigate Hoboken, Montclair and Huntington, but that is based as much upon my extra knowledge of these places as what you have said. Making a recommendation is too hard without knowing what you want, except to recommend Manhattan, the center of the universe.
posted by caddis at 5:46 PM on May 3, 2005

Thank you all for your answers! They've given us a place to start which is exactly what I was hoping for.

Caddis, let me see if I can try to explain what we're looking for based on where we've been:
Boulder, CO: Nice mountain town. Size is a bit too small, which meant that there isn't a lot to do. Close enough to Denver that it could make up for what Boulder was lacking in.
Santa Barbara, CA: Even nicer beach town. Size is better, but there still isn't much to do unless you're fabulously wealthy. Too far from LA for LA to compensate on SB's short-comings.
Ventura, CA: Kind of a cheaper version of Santa Barbara. Size is bigger, but still not too big. Cultural life is still pretty dull, but you're now close enough to LA (1 -2hrs depending on traffic) so the bigger city can pick up the slack.
We're hoping to find a mid-sized city that has some semblance of a cultural life, I'd settle for a movie theatre that isn't all first-run fare and a used book store or two. But, we're also addicted to having our own house and a car, so I think Manhattan would be out.
Hoboken is someplace we'd been looking at...

To the New Jersey recommendations, I've been hearing good things about it for years now, so it is definitely not off the list.

Thanks again to everyone who's replied.
posted by Eddie Mars at 7:26 PM on May 3, 2005

Peekskill, Nyack and Montclair are all great suggestions, although Peekskill and Montclair are probably both already outside your price range, already. Most of Westchester's going to be, unfortunately--we actually just sold our house in Tarrytown a litte while ago, and it went up 25% in just two years.

You should definitely look at Duchess, Putnam and Rockland counties, though. They're basically the three areas that border Westchester to the north, and if you're willing to put up with a longer commute, you can definitely find decent bargains near train service up there. (You might still have to stretch your budget a bit, but it's a pretty safe investment.)

You might also consider Riverdale, which is actually in NYC, at the very northern edge of the Bronx. There's no way you're getting a house for that price, but you can still pick up a pretty nice apartment at those rates.
posted by LairBob at 7:32 PM on May 3, 2005

Oh! One last bit and I'll stop talking. We currently have a likely mortgage. The 200 - 300k is about how much we expect to have in cash once we sell our house. I was kinda hoping to take the equity and buy a house free and clear. The idea of not having any more mortgage payments ever just makes me smile.
So 250k for a house is the ideal, but we can go as high as 600k without breaking our budget.
posted by Eddie Mars at 8:02 PM on May 3, 2005

How long is the trip from Albany or Binghamton or other SUNY-school-town to NYC? I assume Stony Brook is the closest SUNY school, but you can't afford to live anywhere close to it.

Albany: 2 1/2 hour drive.
Binghampton: 3+ hour drive.
Stonybrook: 1 hour drive.
posted by tomorama at 8:18 PM on May 3, 2005

Rhinebeck, NY. Not exactly a city, but gorgeous, near the Hudson River (direct train to NYC from Rhinecliff area on Amtrak, which runs along the river and is lovely). Otherwise I think it's less than a 2 hour drive. Kind of crunchy/indie/artsy area. Definitely a movie theater, and great restaurants courtesy of graduates of the Culinary Institute. Other local colleges are Bard, Marist, Vassar, and a SUNY branch. Houses in your price range, definitely, especially if you like older victorians that need some sprucing up.
posted by xo at 8:23 PM on May 3, 2005

I'd like to put in a good word for Providence. Housing is going to be much more reasonable than Boston, and it's a pretty cool city. It's got fantastic food, downtown mall for mainstream stores, as well as Thayer Street next to Brown for the slightly more eclectic (though there's now an Urban Outfitters and Gap there). It's a very walkable city, but parking downtown on weeknights is tough. I've always felt safe basically anywhere in downtown at night. There's a pair of really solid indie movie theatres, a couple of great used bookstores (Myopic Books in Wayland Square comes to mind). The theatre downtown (PPAC) gets most of the major touring shows, Trinity Rep is a totally fantastic smaller theatre with some great actors and a fabulous artistic director that always does innovative takes on old favorites, as well as featuring some newer stuff. I've never been disappointed with shows there, though they are expensive on a student budget.

Boston is only an hour or so away by car. Commuter rail runs frequently during the week and isn't too expensive. NY is 3-4 hours by car, about the same by train. All the busses that do the NY->Boston route tend to stop in PVD, so it's possible to use those too.
posted by heresiarch at 8:25 PM on May 3, 2005

there are tax breaks for artists (Peekskill)

I was born there, and they've been trying that artist stuff for about as long as I can remember...

If you look there take note that there is, for want of a better term, a lack of commercial amenities. That is, there is a severe paucity of large/chain stores. So there's only 2 (if I remember right) real supermarkets, which are very close to being outside city limits (one of them might be half in the next town.) There's no first run movie theater, no real mall, no large electronics stores, no department stores, etc within city limits. Everything is a 10-15 minute car ride away at least. That can be good or bad, I guess, depending on how much you can live off the small local stores and ordering online. On the definite good side, there's no Wal-Mart or any crap like that.

Also, the good pizza place burnt down.

If you don't like the nuclear power, you're right next door to Indian Point. This is a hot spot in local politics. "Safe. Secure. Vital." from an Entergy astroturf campaign vs "Close Indian Point!" from various fearmongers and environmentalists.

You might want to consider renting in Brooklyn or Queens though, unless you really need a *house* and a *yard* and that sort of fancy stuff.
posted by TheOnlyCoolTim at 9:42 PM on May 3, 2005

If you're looking for something "within 1 hour of NYC" you should take a look at Morristown, NJ - a larger town then some of the suburbs in the area. Or, a bit more expensive but very quaint, Bernardsville, NJ (which has one of the best public schools in the state). Both of these towns are accesible by train to the city.
posted by ebeeb at 1:29 AM on May 4, 2005

There's a cheap house on Ocean Drive in Amityville up for sale. Might be up your street! Only half an hour from Manhattan!
posted by wackybrit at 5:21 PM on May 4, 2005

I'm here in Philly -- it is a lot cheaper than Boston or anything within an hour of NYC. I mean both real estate and stuff to do. We have parking, too, free, depending on the neighborhood. It's fairly compact for an avid walker. And if you heard horror stories about how disgusting and dangerous it is, well, this city has been cleaned up considerably in the past seven or eight years.

Nice thing about Philly is that it can be very small town and neighborhoody, despite being a big city. This is a positive or a negative, depending on who you ask, of course. For example:

* You really can meet people and then run into them in unlikely places on a regular basis, just like on TV. (If this person is your recent ex, it kinda sucks.)
* We have world-class music and art, from the oldest of the establishments to avant-garde and the up-and-coming. (The naysayers think we're stodgy on one hand and just waiting to make it in NYC on the other.)
* Our politics are so entertaining that you don't even need to watch the Sopranos, you can just read the rundown in the free weeklies. (Corruption, cronyism, and some seriously annoying policies piss us off.)

Snark askide, if this sounds good to you, feel free to e-mail. I'm totally biased...I moved here about seven years ago and love the freaky combination of underdog and attitude.
posted by desuetude at 7:25 PM on May 4, 2005

we're also addicted to having ... a car

Well naturally you are, having grown up in the Midwest, moved to Southern California, and knowing nothing about the Northeast. To put it in perspective: New York City is the only place in the U.S. where less than half the households have cars. Your addiction can be broken.

You say you'd like to buy a house and not have a mortgage hanging over your head; do the math and see what you would save in not having car ownership hanging over your head. Once you've done that, factor in what you think your time is worth, and multiply by how much time you spend in cars.

-- a New York City boy, presently ensconced in Southern California --
posted by Aknaton at 10:15 PM on May 4, 2005

If you really want culture and you want to be in the NYC area you will probably have to actually be in NYC or very close because almost all of the good cultural stuff is there. Princeton, New Brunswick and Red Bank get some decent theater and music in NJ. Hoboken has good music but is nearly an extension of NYC. However, you are probably not going to find a house for 2-300K, except in a bad neighborhood, within commuting distance of NYC. You might find something very small, or a condo. I would skip the condos though. If we are about to see a real estate bubble burst I would not want to be in a condo; on the tail end of a bubble their prices tend to drop faster than prices for regular homes. This does not apply to condos in Manhattan.
posted by caddis at 7:12 AM on May 5, 2005

I currently live in Montclair and also highly recommend it for your consideration. But if you find appealing houses in the $200-300k range would you please let me know?
posted by Songdog at 9:25 AM on May 5, 2005