Fort Collins to Aurora (Denver, Westminster: houses, rental, job)

[VegasJen]

Hi all,

My husband and I are looking to relocate from Vegas to CO next month. We are flying into Denver tomorrow for interviews. My husband has an interview in NorthGlenn and I have an interview in Aurora. I'd like to move to Broomfield or Westminster, since I've heard pretty good reviews on this site. However, my husband wants to move to Fort Collins (the company he's interviewing with also has a store there.)
So, I'm assuming that since FC is like 60miles from Aurora, it would be pretty out of the question to drive that far everyday.

So my first question is..
About how long would it take to drive from Broomfield to North Aurora?
Westminster to N Aurora?

What about Broomfield to FC?

My husband wants to live in a small town..preferably in the middle of now here..that is within a reasonable distance to his job. (Northglenn or FC)

Hope this doesn't sound rediculous. I've never been to CO, so I'm pretty clueless as to where to start looking. Also, does anyone know of any websites that show rental houses? That would help a bunch.

Thanks!

Jen

[suzco]

You can get a good start looking through the index threads for the Colorado forums:

Colorado Index Thread
Denver Index Thread
Fort Collins Index Thread

[Katiana]

Originally Posted by VegasJen

Hi all,

My husband and I are looking to relocate from Vegas to CO next month. We are flying into Denver tomorrow for interviews. My husband has an interview in NorthGlenn and I have an interview in Aurora. I'd like to move to Broomfield or Westminster, since I've heard pretty good reviews on this site. However, my husband wants to move to Fort Collins (the company he's interviewing with also has a store there.)
So, I'm assuming that since FC is like 60miles from Aurora, it would be pretty out of the question to drive that far everyday.

So my first question is..
About how long would it take to drive from Broomfield to North Aurora?
Westminster to N Aurora?

What about Broomfield to FC?

My husband wants to live in a small town..preferably in the middle of now here..that is within a reasonable distance to his job. (Northglenn or FC)

Hope this doesn't sound rediculous. I've never been to CO, so I'm pretty clueless as to where to start looking. Also, does anyone know of any websites that show rental houses? That would help a bunch.

Thanks!

Jen

I would take suzco's advice and look at the indexes. They may well answer your questions. No, you are not being ridiculous. Many people come here hoping to live in a "small town in the middle of nowhere" that is a reasonable driving distance to their job. Unfortunately, those places are few and far between. There are more in the Ft. Collins area, particularly to the east, but none are an easy drive to Aurora. You probably don't want to spend the better part of a couple hrs commuting each way. Even Broomfield to Aurora or even Westminster to Aurora is a pretty long drive. You will get a better feel for all this once you have visited here.

[Rumblebelly]

Small town in the middle of nowhere. I know how he feels. It's hard along the front range, especially with seeking a short commute. Suburbs are pretty much everywhere.

Fort Collins is nice, very cool place to live but a long drive from Northglenn. If he can land a job there, he should take it if he can support the household. It's a great place to live, especially in the historic downtown area.

For commuting south to the Denver area for work: Berthoud wouldn't be bad but a bit of a ways away, that's a cute town south of Loveland. Loveland is really nice but it'll be a drive. Erie is kinda cool too but quite small. Longmont also has a nice downtown, smaller than Fort Collins. Firestone is okay, Lafeyette you might wanna check out, same with Louisville.

Do a google map search and look for towns with tight grids, if you want neighborhoods that are older and "historic"...I'm just guessing that you are leaning that way.

[tfox]

Fort Collins is out of commute distance to anywhere in the Denver area. Longmont is about as far as you'd care to go from FC, and even that is a lengthy commute.

[RangerDuke08]

Originally Posted by tfox

Fort Collins is out of commute distance to anywhere in the Denver area. Longmont is about as far as you'd care to go from FC, and even that is a lengthy commute.

I drive from Fort Collins to Denver about twice a week and it indeed is too far just 2 days alone, it's doable but you can spend $10-$20 a day on gas depending what you drive if you commute from Denver to Fort Collins. Fort Collins isn't that big of a city, has a small town feel to it, Longmont and Loveland are just South of it, a lil smaller.

Traffic is pretty bad during rush hours going from the East-to-West side of Town, I can tell you it took me about an hour from Westminster to N. Aurora during rush hour, prob a lil more from Broomfield to N. Aurora during rush hours.

I can't tell you which you'll like more, Westminster/Louisville/Broomfield/Lafayette has quite a few high-tech businesses, Colorado Mills Mall, close to Boulder and close to Denver, and Fort Collins/Longmont/Loveland more of a small town feel and probably a lil less expensive.

[cobeachgirl]

I commuted from Fort Collins to Denver downtown almost daily for 3.5 years and can honestly say I would never do it again, especially at the current gas prices. I-25 between Ft.C and Denver is quite a dangerous drive, at least it was when I used to drive it 4 years ago. I couldn't tell you how many times I had seen Flight for Life land on the highway, hence closing the hwy temporarily, for horrible accidents. It is a very high speed hwy, with a speed limit of 75mph, and folks easily go 90, no problem, all leaving little distance between one another. Not to mention that it took 1 hour + back then (to arrive downtown by 8am), in perfect weather. Throw in a snowflake or two and you're looking at 2hrs+ or not getting there at all.

Like a previous poster said, doing the cross-town commute is going to be at least an hour in rush hour, if not more, esp in snow. Snowstorms typically double commute time around here, for those of us that have to use the highway.

[VegasJen]

Thank you for the replies. My husband and I did a little bit of driving around while we were there on Wednesday. I really like Westminster and Broomfield. It doesn't seem like it would be too far from where I might work. We only spent a few hours there, we're hoping to go back in a few weeks to check out apartments and houses for rent. I'm so excited to move..everyone there was so nice. It's such a nice change from the crazy people of Vegas.

[Katiana]

You're welcome. Have a good move!

[VegasJen]

We are going back to Denver this weekend to search for houses to rent. I have a stupid question, does Westminster, Broomfield, etc. all have seperate newspapers? Are the classified ads the best place to look? I've found a few websites that have been of some help, but I'd still like more options. If anyone knows of any good websites besides rentals.com and hotpads.com, I'd really appreciate it!

Thank you.

Jen