Living in Lake Highlands (Dallas, Arlington: section 8, apartment complex, rent)

[PennyGWoods]

Currently I'm paying $565 a month in rent, and I'm thinking that for that amount of money, I can afford to move somewhere where I'm not hearing sirens every hour. I'm not really looking to move all the way out to Plano or Arlington, not until I'm ready to buy a house.

Has anybody here ever lived in Lake Highlands? I take karate out there and the area seems quiet and clean enough. I'd like to think that I can afford a nice apartment for the amount I'm paying now. I don't know anything about that side of town, other than it's a good place to send kids to school (I think), so I'm hoping for some hints and advice for a mid-20s single woman.

[Grainraiser]

Lake Highlands is a very nice neighborhood but I doubt if you can find anything for $585 a month. You would certainly be paying more than that for a decent place.

[FarNorthDallas]

What part of town are you paying $565? That's seems like a bargain to me.

[fisher33]

me too!

[PennyGWoods]

Originally Posted by FarNorthDallas

What part of town are you paying $565? That's seems like a bargain to me.

You must like the sounds or sirens and the occasional gunshot.

[FarNorthDallas]

Originally Posted by PennyGWoods

You must like the sounds or sirens and the occasional gunshot.

Only if the police tape doesn't block my car in.

[fisher33]

haha - no but really, that price does sound inexpensive. have you seen other places going for that rate?

[PennyGWoods]

Only in this same area. When I do this search for homes with the zip code of 75238 w/a max rent of $600, I get 19 choices. The thing is, I don't know what's considered the "rough" parts of LH, if any, and seeing that I wasn't even aware there were rough parts of Mesquite until I had to spend a night at a hotel on Hwy. 80 bridge (where I'd lived for YEARS as a kid), I thought it would be best to just ask. I moved out of state for eight years and came back, and I feel almost completely lost.

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[FarNorthDallas]

Yeah, there are rough parts of Lake Highlands, no question. There are some really bad apartments in the area. That one with the word Spring in it are bad, for instance. (I could only see the first 3 on the list since I am not registered to look at the complete list). The homeowners' associations are working hard to get the bad complexes torn down and demanding more police presence in Lake Highlands and they are trying to stop more complexes from being built because, ya know, they start off nice, but over time get bad. The area has way more apartment complexes than it should.

I think (and this is just from my experience) you are going to be paying $800 or more to get away from the bad old cheap illegal alien filled apartments that aren't even good enough for Section 8.

[PennyGWoods]

Well hell, in that case I may as well stay right here. I'm almost used to the 3 a.m. bass and hydraulics competitions, and if the couple across the gate actually breaks up, goes to jail or dies, that would eliminate about 30% of my headache right there. I can't believe they need more police in Lake Highlands. Take some of ours! There's always three-four squad cars here at any given time...unless something is actually wrong. (I've called the non-emergency number so many times that it's programmed in my phone.)

Though I do question what people consider the mean streets of just about anything here. I've heard people talk about how Mesquite is the ghetto (Town East Crips, fool!) and how Rowlett is starting to become run down. (Gee, I wish my digs could be as run down as Waterview Parkway.) But if the cheese/meth epidemic is what led to the sh*thole that is northern Mesquite, then I won't mock people as much as I do in my head when I hear about the mean streets of Sunnyvale.

Bottom line: I gotta start looking for a house. No matter when or where an apartment complex goes up, it's only a matter of time before it gets run down.