Relocating to So Cal. looking for advice :) (Long Beach, Vista: apartments, lease)

[web99992002]

Hello,

My wife and I are looking to relocate to Southern California.

I'm a home health Physical Therapist and I'm starting a job August 15th.

My wife is an ICU nurse and has an offer in Long Beach (for a September start), but really is hoping to get an offer at UCLA (Santa Monica, interview is on August 13).

Since I need to look for apartments now. Where is a good place to look? Moderately priced 2-3 bedroom apartments. Perhaps somewhere in the middle between Santa Monica and Long Beach as we don't know yet where she will end up. She doesn't like to drive too far (hoping for a 30 min commute). As for me, I love driving and would not mind a longer commute.

She applied for night shift positions. so her shift will probably be 7pm to 7:30am.

Thank you.

[DCMann2]

What is your budget?

[web99992002]

I can afford max of 2500$ a month for rent.

[RosieSD]

Start with these sites:

Apartments.com
Zillow.com
Trulia.com
Craigslist (watch for scams)

You might want to consider a six month lease initially, which would give you time to get settled and figure out what locations would be best for your work commutes.

A useful site to check local crime for specific addresses is crimemapping.com/ Be sure to set the date range to the last six months; the default setting only shows a week's worth of data, which will be deceptive. I'd recommend running a search on your CURRENT address before hand, so you have something for comparison.

Finally, since you're going to be working in the general LA area, you might post your question in the LA forum above, where you're likely to get more specific answers about neighborhoods to consider than here in the general California forum.

Good luck with your move, and welcome to California.

[55182]

Traffic is BRUTAL on the West side, which Santa Monica would be part of. If your looking for a 30 min commute then you will have to stay very close to Santa Monica, Mar Vista, Venice, or the marinas. The West Side can be some of the more expensive housing around LA. As to Long Beach and staying within 30 minuets I would stay in Long Beach or just East, like Seal Beach or Signal Hill. West of long Beach and parts of Long Beach itself are less than savory so look around.

[Bert_from_back_East]

Most two-bedroom units in the neighborhoods around the VA Hospital in Long Beach are, generally, in the $2,400-2,800 range.