I have been leaning Zephyr and Sharon has been leaning Minneapolis (actually, to be more accurate, she's been leaning only towards not rushing into anything).
With all the energy focused on cracking to code on this issue, one of the primary ways for me to process my observations & experiences these days has been to view them in light of "things I love/things I hate" about my neighborhood & my city. With the exception of the amazing trails and the coffee shop (and, to some extent, the diversity) things to hate about my neighborhood have been piling on like a defensive front line on 39-year old Dan Marino. But things to love about the city, and my city in particular, continue to accrue like pictures of Orlando Bloom in teen magazines. Perhaps the only thing I know for sure is that I'm done, done, done with my neighborhood. From unidentified teens cutting through our yard in the middle of the night and leaving our gates open to roaring/booming/speeding cars, to the neverending chain of loud, annoying ice cream trucks that parade through our neighborhood to prey upon families that neither understand nor care about nutrional basics, I feel I've had it.
But, in continuing my background work surrounding the whole relocation issue, I've started to identify a couple (and believe me, there's only a couple) of neighborhoods in the city that might be somewhere we could be happy, that still have a few properties within our price range. You see, in our search for a place to live among peers, this sad reality has become evident: Our peers all have far more money than us. It's one of those great mysteries of life: How the "liberal elite" got so damned wealthy. They should all be working as teachers, social workers, and coordinators at nonprofit organizations. Instead, they must be Head of Acquisitions for the Walker Museum or on the Board of Directors for the Minnesota Zoo. The one eqaulizer of sorts is that we will have around $90,000 of equity to put into any purchase-but we're still on the outside looking in with respect to those "No War in Iraq" sorts of neighborhoods with coops, coffeeshops, active neighborhood organizations, and surrounded by green space. A lot to ask for-but we're still looking for our next move to be our last. One place I'm sort of looking right now: Bryn Mawr. Just west of Downtown, at the northern end of the chain of lakes (though across 394), nearly surrounded by greenspace with Bryn Mawr Meadows, Basset Creek, the Cedar Lake Trail, and Theodore Wirth Park, as well as a really progressive, sort of artistic demographic makeup. http://www.bmna.org
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6 comments:
I'm inclined towards the city life for you too, mostly because it simply allows access to a far greater diversity of stuff than Zephyr could ever.
I'm encouraged that you're exploring other options.
$90,000 bucks should give some leverage against a more expensive house than your in, without blowing the budget entirely. Of course, interests rates are currently still really low, but this shouldn't be a rush decision based on that. MSP is among those places that have seen a bubble of home costs versus the rest of MN - that's annoying.
As to 'liberal' elites - I have no explanation or idea what they're doing. My income may be somewhat higher than yours but we're in the same league - we'd struggle to buy the house we're in now.
If we put down a $90K down payment, the house I was looking at today would still cost us >150% what our current loan is. Basically have a $70K loan, looking at a $219K house. Rough stuff-especially considering we tend to be really pushing it, budget-wise, from month to month.
One suject I am just beginning to breach a bit with Sharon-the notion of her working full time. The whole "two marriage partners having to work full time in order to make ends meet" is one of the great shameful changes in our country over the past 30 years, but it is what it is. And if we decide that a certain future is what we want-it may be one of those sacrifices we need to make. Lucy not getting two extra days a week with her momma versus living in an environment in which we are more comfortable-potentially the next great decision.
Zephyr definitely still looming large-the whole "Switcheroo in the works" actually partially refers to the fact that Sharon has startd a book called "Rural Renaissance" that presents an ecological defense for relocating to rural America. Perhaps she's gonna start being the Zephyr proponent in the family (it would make sense-the place is soooo Peace Corps...)
Definitely much to ponder and trust that the decision you make would the right one for you.
$129,000 with 5.75% interest over 30 years equals $753/month. Not sure what the property tax implications are, though they would presumably increase.
Property tax and insurance-another $300+ extra bucks onto that, I would think.
By the way: www.edinarealty.com
enter MLS # 3032690
Looks pretty good - seems a bit larger than your current domicile.
Yeah-we don't really feel that we need more space, so if places in that neighborhood popped up that would be less expensive with a couple hundred less sq ft, that'd be totally fine. Ours is about 1200 finished sq ft, I think, though I consider a decent amount of it wasted in our upstairs-we don't need a bedroom with near that much floor-space, but there's nothing else we can really do with it. It would be nice to still have an office/den. Deck, fireplace both nice amenities. Also, having certain things already done that would cost us over $10,000 to do in our current place (refinish hardwood, new roof, central air), would be sweet. One more thing that would be nice-not being so crammed into our kitchen-separate digning room or at least a space for kitchen/eating that is a little more modern-living accomodating.
Well-designed, I think 12K-13K sq feet would be ideal.
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