Another "Hi I'm new and I would like some advice" thread :-) (Albuquerque: neighborhood, buy)

[casden]

Originally Posted by vgs2abq

(2) Where would a 20-30 something, single professional go to find a nice, atmospheric, place to have a drink and mingle? Preferably someplace that's not strictly Friday/Saturday nights only, and is filled with intelligent, beautiful people?

(3) Still on the "where to go" tip, where is the best burger in town?

You can find some pretty good answers to these two questions here:

Duke City Fix

You can join and post a question, or simply read the archives and find out what's going on in ABQ.

There might even be a group for 20-30 somethings. There's definitely a group for food in ABQ. Here's a list of the groups:

Groups - Duke City Fix

Here's the group for Eating and Food in ABQ:

Chow Down in Burque Town - Duke City Fix

ENJOY!!!!! ...and, err Happy eating!!!

[jrod2828]

Hmm.. I think my problem is I checked out a lot of newer homes. I'll start to look more at older homes. Do you know any good websites for home listings (purchasing and renting)?

[TigerLily24]

Start at Realtor.com and then look at individual realtors. Although a lot of the realtors post properties on realtor.com, I found that they often keep quite a few nice ones exclusively on their sites.

Just a quick comment about the grass: I recently moved to Las Cruces from North Jersey, the 'Garden State' and I was really concerned about my dogs making the adjustment from grass to gravel, etc. While they do get really excited when they happen upon a grassy lawn or patch, they are doing just fine with the gravel for their 'businesses'. They also really like the soft sand that is quite prevalent here, so much so, that I am thinking of building them a sandbox.
Good luck with your search

[TigerLily24]

P.S. The last time I was in Albuquerque, I drove by a beautifully green, grassy dog park, and I remember thinking how cool that was, in the midst of all the xeriscaping, to have this wonderful oasis for dogs.

[InTheDesert]

jrod,

<MOD CUT: No realtors' sites allowed per forum TOS>

You can narrow it by your price range. Believe me, once you live here and realize how much water you'll need to keep grass green, you'll appreciate the xeriscaping, maybe you could have a small shaded area of grass for the dogs. I know the grass that I do have is the easiest to maintain where there are large trees in the yard, but anything out in the open to the sun, forget about it.

[ABQConvict]

First off, green chile is to burgers like kissing is to sex. You don't need it but, come on, what kind of weirdo are you? ;-)

Second, dogs have been p issing and c rapping on dirt and gravel for 10,000 years and their wolf ancestors for 100,000 years before that. If your dogs can't take it, there may be a canine psychotherapist in Santa Fe who will retrain your dogs using a combination of crystals, hypnotism and vegan doggie treats.

Third, Albuquerqueans have cinderblock walls because they are a cheap way to keep dessicated dog c rap from blowing into your yard.

Fourth, most new developments have tiny lots because developers are greedy b astards who want to cram as many people as possible into as little space and still sell 'detached homes'.

Fifth, the lack of lawns is because it is tough to get blood from a stone. Rely on Mother nature to nurture the right types of plants (think local natives) and you will have a beautiful, environmentally appropriate garden (and not necessarilly a bed of gravel as some people believe the defintion of xeriscaping to be).

The Valley (north or south depending on how afraid you are of bumps in the night) has a shallow water table thus more trees and grass as well as older housing stock. You may want to check that area out.

ABQConvict

[InTheDesert]

try the coldwellbanker site jrod

[Towanda]

ABQConvict:

Loved your post! LOL

I gave you some reputation points for that one.

[mortimer]

jrod2828 asked about:

> ... concrete walls? Where are the decent size yards?

Growing up in Ohio, the yards seemed much bigger because we could run from one to another without hopping a fence.

I'd bet that having a cinder-block wall makes a yard look smaller.

Also, in a moment of irony, ABQConvict mentioned:

> ... new developments have tiny lots because developers are greedy
> b astards who want to cram as many people as possible into as
> little space and still sell 'detached homes'.

One of the most common complaints (from many people, I'm not sure about ABQConvict) in this and many other forums about an area is sprawl. Just as a mental exercise, imagine if all the yards in Albuquerque were approximately twice as big as they are now. Now, calculate how much more area Albuquerque would cover and what would happen to commute times.

My take on the developers is that if people were unwilling to buy such lot sizes they would increase them. People might want larger lots, but aren't willing to make the sacrifices, in general to have them.

I can practically touch my neighbors' house(s) whilst staying in contact with mine. I'm perfectly OK with that.

BTW, you can also write the B-word (with an @) as "b@stard" and not have it 'asterisked' away. It's possible that it could get "moderated" away, but technically, it's not a bad word.

[jrod2828]

haha.. all good info. Abqconvict, I'm guessing you aren't a dog person. My dogs are the biggest spoiled brats on the planet. I keep telling me wife we need to have kids soon so we can stop babying the dogs. They are going to complain about no grass. Perhaps I'll hit that dog psychologist in Santa Fe you mentioned