New here, transferring to Bonners Ferry, lots of ?'s (Boise: rent, hotels)

[Sage of Sagle]

Originally Posted by memomfive

SandPoint sounds big enough for us though your right that is not a big city. How far away is CDA from Sandpoint? I've been trying to do more research on BF, but am finding it hard to find much. I think my family & I will want to rent for a short time before buying to give us a chance to look around more, but I'm not finding anything on rentals in that area.

Basically 50'ish miles from SP to CDA. And another 30'ish from SP to BF. So nearly 80 miles from BF to CDA for major shopping, entertainment, etc. Not too ugly in the spring/summer/fall, but a LONG 2 hours in the winter.

With all the auto repair shops around CDA, you may want to look at several of the outlaying areas which are "commutable" to CDA. For example, we live 15 miles south of SP, so we're only 35 miles to CDA and several of my neighbors commute there for work, BUT Sandpoint is our "hometown" where all our other family activities happen. May want to look for work in CDA, rent somewhere 10-30 miles away (it will be cheaper and more rural), and spend several months really getting a feel for the area.

[memomfive]

Actually, Troy or Libby were other places we were looking into possibly living. But your right, the economy is not good there either & Montana seems to have a lot more liberalism. My husband is use to long commutes. Most of our marriage he has had to travel an hour one way to work, but that's in Missouri & Kansas. It's not quite as bad here as I'm sure it is there. I will look more into other areas around CDA. I don't like to live in cities of that size, but when you have to work they have the most possibilities.

[memomfive]

Sage, could you tell me a little more about Sagle? I read on their site that they are a tourist attraction. Do they get a lot of tourist? I use to live near Branson Missouri & the tourism is crazy over there. I'm not much for the constant flow of people everywhere. We had to learn the back roads to anywhere we wanted to go just to avoid the traffic.

[Sage of Sagle]

Sagle a tourist attraction? I think we're being confused with Silverwood (the theme park 25 minutes south of here). About the only tourist attraction in Sagle is Round Lake State Park or the Bird Aviation Museum (which is VERY cool).

Sagle is rolling hills, forests, farm land, ranch land, minimum 5 acre lot size. We're the whole south/west shore of Lake Pend Oreille up at the north end. Sagle is part of unincorporated Bonner County (so property tax is low), but only major roads are paved, and we have few government services (our fire department only has a couple full timers...the rest are volunteer). Out here we rely on neighbors, so we work together to keep our neighborhood roads plowed and maintained, etc.

Sagle has about 3000'ish residents. We don't really have a "town"...we basically use Sandpoint as our hometown. Groceries, sports, middle school and high school, farm/ranch supplies, etc. Sagle's "town" is a wide spot in highway 95 with a Conoco, the Sagle post office, a couple businesses, and that's it. So when someone from outside North Idaho asks where I'm from, I tell them Sandpoint.

FYI...Bonner County is very homeschool friendly. We homeschoolers have the legal right to have our kids be part time students whenever/however we want. My kids play sports for the high school, and have done AP classes there as well. Lake Pend Oreille School District has been pretty good about making it smooth for us to use the public system (which we obviously help pay for with our taxes) as we need it.

[Toyman at Jewel Lake]

Originally Posted by Sage of Sagle

...Sagle's "town" is a wide spot in highway 95 with a Conoco, the Sagle post office, a couple businesses, and that's it...

Hey, don't forget the new Pizza place (Brodys?)

[memomfive]

Thank you Sage. Sagle being unincorporated is probably why I'm finding very little information about it. The sight I did find was representing more than just Sagle. It sounds like a great mix of solitude with activity not too far away. I love the neighbors working together part. You don't find that kind of attitude everywhere. As for the homeschoolers, is there an actual group around there? I'm glad to hear that Bonner county is so accepting of homeschoolers. Do you know if there are any naturopathic doctors in Sandpoint or CDA?

[Sage of Sagle]

Sandpoint has its fair share of holistic healers, health food stores, various natural healing folks, etc.

The neighbors working together isn't by default a warm fuzzy thing. In my neighborhood there are 3 of us that do 100% of the road maintenance and plowing. The others don't contribute a thing (and won't). So when we get past that frustration, our system work fine.

We're not part of any co-op group. So I can't help you there, sorry.

[gracekellyzip]

Hi, we are looking at moving to the Bonners Ferry area Spring of 2012. We are also looking at Troy, Montana or possibly Libby (yes, I heard about the asbestos) and was wondering which is cheaper as far as rent and overall cost-of-living--Montana or Idaho--and how these towns might differ as far as community. Is it fairly easy to find a 2 bedroom house for rent for 600/month in Bonners Ferry? There isn't much online of course because Bonners Ferry is small although I did find Alert Property Management website which has some listings can't seem to find much else.

[Clark Fork Fantast]

Check out the Nickel's Worth every week--it covers North idaho and NW Montana, although I really haven't seen many ads for MT. But just scrolling through the rental houses I found these two:

Welcome to Nickel's Worth!

ELMIRA 2 BEDROOM, 5 acres with creek, insulated detached garage/ shop/ storage. Wood and propane heat, washer, dryer, $695 plus deposit. 208-290-1992

3 BEDROOM, 1 1/2 BATH downtown Bonners Ferry, $625 month. Boundary Rental Management, 208-290-8176

So that looks doable.

I hope you've visited the area before even thinking about making a decision! I can't weigh in about the cost of living in NID vs. NW MT, but based on two years research and visits before we bought property in Clark Fork, I'd suggest Bonners because of the easy access to Sandpoint, and the beautiful location with the Kootenai River spreading out to the north. Troy just seems very small and somewhat closed-in; tall trees, not much of a view even if the Kootenai runs through it. Libby seems like a nice place, but our main problem with Libby was that it is far from a big airport. From Bonners you can get to Spokane airport in less than two hours. Personally I really like the Moyie Springs area in-between Bonners and Troy.

[cmk3]

I know this is an old thread - but haven't gotten any responses on a new one I posted. Did you end up doing a rental when you moved? How did you go about finding your rental? My husband is job searching in Northern Idaho and may have an interview in Bonners Ferry in the next couple weeks, so I'm doing some prospective looking. I've checked Craiglist and there are a handful (if even) listed in Bonners. We currently have a 4wd Expedition with studable tires - if we went ahead and studded them, would a commute from Sandpoint to Bonners be reasonable? We currently live in Boise - moved here from the DC area years ago. We've dealt with long drives to work - but they've involved cars sitting still forever.