Moving to Detroit - Best Places to Live? (Ann Arbor, Troy: environment, real estate)

[acrawfd]

Hi all:
I have a job offer from a company located in the Detroit Metro area and was wondering where would be a good place to live. I have heard that most people live in the suburbs like Bloomfield, Birmingham, etc and commute daily but I would like to obtain other suggestions.

At present I am looking for a rental - if I like my job and decide to stay I may be in the buyers market in the future.

Any suggestions?

[Coldjensens]

How old are you? What is your budget? What kind of atmosphere are you looking for (Urban, suburban, rural, earthy, snooty, quiet, fun, etc). Do you have kids/are schools a concern? where is your ob located and how long of a commute are you comfortable with?

[Dexterguy]

You can find house rentals all over Metro Detroit right now. Downtown is a nice place to rent, but is not for everyone "very urban". The south-west suburbs have cheap real estate right now, but are not very nice places to live.

When you are ready to buy the nicest Suburbs of Detroit are the Grosse Pointes, most of the burbs all the way up Lake St. Clair are very well kept up and very beautiful with the lake just minutes away. To the North, Birmingham, Bloomfield Hills, Bloomfield Twp, West Bloomfield Twp, Beverly Hills, Troy, and (a bit cheaper) Royal Oak are all nice Oakland county burbs. To the West, Northville and Plymouth both have Downtowns and are beautiful places to live. All that I have suggested are approx. 45-1 hr from downtown Detroit. Except Grosse Pointe(s), they are only mins. from Downtown. Good luck house hunting!!

[rebelrobyn]

hi, was reading your answer to someone else's question and you sound like you know quite a bit...soooo...i'm hoping to move to michigan,(cross my fingers i get the position i applied for) anyway some of your questions and my answers are, husband and I are in our late 50's ok 55 and 59 this year, we don't party, or drink, but we do like to go out to eat..been looking on the web at houses up to 150,000, found some in university district, voigt park sub, and ford park...are these good safe areas? these houses ranged in sq feet from 2000 to 3500 as opposed to similarly priced houses in oak park (where i would be working) those houses barely were 1800 sq feet for the same price.. the job will require a lot of travel (50%) to indiana and ohio...everyone says rent first where would be good...haven't read much good about hamtramck which is where the person in my prospective office lives..any suggestions would be greatly appreciated thanks, robyn

[Bhaalspawn]

I suggest keeping out of the City of Detroit itself. If you're budget is $150,000, then you probably won't be able to find anything large in the really nice areas, like the Oakland County lakes country (Commerce, West Bloomfield, Bloomfield Hills, White Lake).

However, the Detroit Metro area is a large area and you probably don't want to live real far away from your job site. What city will it be located in? It's hard to give you a good answer without knowing where exactly your job will be located. Oakland County? Macomb County? West of the city in Wayne County? Downriver (south of the city)?

[cardwellave]

I would look into Wyandotte and Grosse Ile. Very nice Downriver suburbs. Wyandotte has that small town in a suburb atmosphere where you feel like you're in a quaint little town but in essence only a few minutes from all the luxuries of suburbs.

[Slappy san]

Originally Posted by acrawfd

Hi all:
I have a job offer from a company located in the Detroit Metro area and was wondering where would be a good place to live. I have heard that most people live in the suburbs like Bloomfield, Birmingham, etc and commute daily but I would like to obtain other suggestions.

At present I am looking for a rental - if I like my job and decide to stay I may be in the buyers market in the future.

Any suggestions?

Where is the job located. That information would help.

[corruption]

Originally Posted by Dexterguy

You can find house rentals all over Metro Detroit right now. Downtown is a nice place to rent, but is not for everyone "very urban". The south-west suburbs have cheap real estate right now, but are not very nice places to live.

When you are ready to buy the nicest Suburbs of Detroit are the Grosse Pointes, most of the burbs all the way up Lake St. Clair are very well kept up and very beautiful with the lake just minutes away. To the North, Birmingham, Bloomfield Hills, Bloomfield Twp, West Bloomfield Twp, Beverly Hills, Troy, and (a bit cheaper) Royal Oak are all nice Oakland county burbs. To the West, Northville and Plymouth both have Downtowns and are beautiful places to live. All that I have suggested are approx. 45-1 hr from downtown Detroit. Except Grosse Pointe(s), they are only mins. from Downtown. Good luck house hunting!!

What does "very urban" mean or what exactly are you trying to imply with this comment?

[Coldjensens]

Originally Posted by Dexterguy

You can find house rentals all over Metro Detroit right now. Downtown is a nice place to rent, but is not for everyone "very urban". The south-west suburbs have cheap real estate right now, but are not very nice places to live.

When you are ready to buy the nicest Suburbs of Detroit are the Grosse Pointes, most of the burbs all the way up Lake St. Clair are very well kept up and very beautiful with the lake just minutes away. To the North, Birmingham, Bloomfield Hills, Bloomfield Twp, West Bloomfield Twp, Beverly Hills, Troy, and (a bit cheaper) Royal Oak are all nice Oakland county burbs. To the West, Northville and Plymouth both have Downtowns and are beautiful places to live. All that I have suggested are approx. 45-1 hr from downtown Detroit. Except Grosse Pointe(s), they are only mins. from Downtown. Good luck house hunting!!

Well almost anyway. To the South and a bit west of Detroit you will find Wyandotte and Trenton both of which are great places to live, as well as Grosse Ile which is the absolute best place to live in Metro Detroit (just an unbiased option that anyone not a fool will agree with).

Wyandotte is somewhat artsy has a quaint old fashoied downtown that is very walkable and it is right on the Detroit River. There are some great buys there.

Trenton is small and cute. Not as refined or exciting as Wyandotte. Less city like. I think that Trenton is cheaper.

Either one is less than half an hour from Downtown if you are reasonably close to the freeway entrance.

Grosse Ile is an island. Awesome place to live, especially for families and older people. However for $150,000 you are mostly going to be looking at condos. There may be a few smaller houses in that price range once you get off the water. You add at least ten minutes to a trip downtown to get across the bridge from G.I. to Trenton or Wyandotte.


If you go as far as an hour from Detroit, you may want to look at Ann Arbor as well.

[Klassyhk]

Well I don't know what that particular poster meant but "very urban", I'll leave that for him/her to explain. Generally, when people have said very "urban" about a place and I later drove or visited the area it was very inner city Black neighborhood (lower-income to mid-lower income) as opposed to an upscale Black neighborhood. Urban neighborhood are very, very "active" environment with plenty of people and children out and about walking, talking, laughing, sitting, driving, youth on bikes, people driving, music heard in various places. It's not a quiet and quaint area. The term "urban" doesn't have to be considered offensive, if that type of environment is a person's cup of tea, it is what it is. However, for those whom it's not their cup of tea they may not want to live or visit there so it helps when someone "honestly" informs them of the neighborhood so they can save themselves the trip. It's no differently from saying "very suburban" or "very rural". All of these are terms that can be used to imply many things negative or positive depending on the speaker. It's simpler to use concise language that everyone understands (suburb, urban, rural) without having to go into all the demographics and economic stats in order to explain the type of people who make up the neighborhood.