Where should a young couple live and be near Harbor Hospital? (Baltimore: apartment complex, renters)

[basheesh]

Hi, everyone. My wife and I are moving to Baltimore in June for her intern year at Harbor Hospital. We're only going to be there a year, so we're looking for a safe, quiet place to rent. We don't want her commute to have to be too long, so we were looking in Federal Hill and East Harbor (Harbor East? I forget what it's actually called.) One thing we have found is that the Harbor East apartments all bill themselves as "luxury," but the reviews we find online say they mostly have thin walls, a lot of noise, rude staff, and are poorly kept. Now, we aren't necessarily looking for "luxury" anything, but it seems rather disappointing that the so-called luxury places have such bad reviews. (Although, I am certain there is a lot of bad marketing involved mixed with renters who expect to be handed the world whenever the label "luxury" is used.) But still, I'm getting nervous about finding a good place at all. So we looked at some places in Mt. Vernon too, a little further out but still not too far from Harbor Hospital (unless anyone can comment on the traffic?) The new Fitzgerald looks nice, but there doesn't seem to be anything interesting around it. The Cecil also has good reviews. We currently live in a walking neighborhood and love that lifestyle, so it would be nice to have a lot of shops, grocery stores, etc. nearby. We also need a gym, be it included in the apartment complex or nearby. (Must have.) I'm getting a bit long-winded, so I'll stop now. Any advice is appreciated. Oh, one more thing...the Domain at Brewer's Hill...or Brewer's Hill in general: is this a decent area? Thanks!

[Bong477]

Locust Point would be my top pick for a relatively quiet, safe, close to harbor hospital. Its right next to Federal Hill which would be the next best imo. Based on your desire for "quiet and safe" Locust Point is better in that respect.

[basheesh]

Thanks for the tip. We've tried looking at Locust Point but can't seem to find anything to rent (other than a handful of pretty expensive places.) Is that mostly a neighborhood where people buy? Also, am I right in assuming there are only two apartment buildings in all of Federal Hill and Locust Point, 101 Wells and Harbor Hills?

[medfieldbum]

Yes, there are only really the two professionally managed apartment buildings in FH and LP. The rest are privately-owned or managed small properties in rowhouses, typically.

[Bong477]

Managed apartment complexes are indeed limited.

I didn't have trouble locating rentals (on craigslist) in either federal hill or locust point. We came in a bit under our budget which was $1800 max for a 2-3 bedroom rowhouse with a parking pad. The cheapest I found a place that I'd even consider living was I think like $1250 (this was 1.5 years ago).

This may be a little too early to actually find a place to start renting in mid June, but its definately a good time to check out the city and figure out where you should be looking.

[basheesh]

Originally Posted by Bong477

This may be a little too early to actually find a place to start renting in mid June, but its definately a good time to check out the city and figure out where you should be looking.

I was thinking the same thing about the privately owned houses, which makes me think I'm going to have to go with a managed building because we are coming up this month and want to be able to sign a lease. At this point, we are really eyeballing The Redwood, but we plan to visit quite a few places. Going to try to look at some row houses that are due to open up in June too. Did manage to find a couple on Craigslist that weren't insanely priced.

[Bong477]

You can look in the suburbs too... its pretty easy to get to harbor hospital from I-95 and traffic isn't too bad in general, especially for typical intern year commuting hours. Ellicott City and Columbia have several managed complexes and fall into the "safe" and "quiet" categories.

I'm personally not a huge fan of the area around UMM (which is where several managed buildings, including the Redwood) are located. I work there everyday so I'm familar with the area. They are fairly expensive first of all. You'll need a parking spot for your car(s), not sure if they are included in rents or not. Its close to the touristy stuff in the harbor, but in terms of grocery stores, neighborhood eateries, etc it isn't an area with a lot of stuff you're going to want to walk to and its definately more boderline in terms of sketchiness. The area itself isn't bad really... I'll walk to my car at night without any real concern for safety, but its not far (3-4 blocks if that) from areas I wouldn't want to be at night.

Check it out for yourself. Unless its impossible to do because you live in California or something, its probably best to make 2-3 trips here before you sign a lease.