Rockford IL good or bad (Roscoe, Rockton: apartment, rent, condo)

[IcantSELLmyHouse]

You can buy a house in Rockford for $14,900
$14900 207 JEFFERSON ST




3 BEDROOM 1 BATH
1108 SQ FT 1 CAR GARAGE


VACANT. SOLD AS IS. NO SURVEY. NO DISCLOSURE. BUYER TO VERIFY ALL INFO. FUNDING VERIFICATION IS REQUIRED. ADDENDUMS TO FOLLOW ACCEPTED OFFER. SELLER REQUIRES PROOF OF FUNDS TO SUBMIT OFFER. MUST HAVE PRE-QUAL FROM COUNTRYWIDE.



What a Deal No Thanks!!!!!

[Drover]

Chances are the current homeowner bought the place recently for about half that. As bad as this sounds, Pittsburgh ghetto real estate is so worthless that you can buy whole houses for as little as $3,000. This is created a kind of "scraping-the-barrel" real estate speculation where someone scoops a house for 3 to 5 grand, turns around and puts it on eBay, and some sucker pays 10 or 15 grand for it, thinking they got themselves a bargain. Do that enough times and you can make a decent living at it. I wonder if much that goes on in Rockford.

[aragx6]

Check out some of the houses for sale in East Saint Louis. Here's one for $2500: Single Family Home - 5442 ROSEMONT, EAST SAINT LOUIS, IL, 62204 - Realtor.com

You can barely get a car that runs for $2500. Yikes. You could probably get that much in scrap out of the house.

[FormerStocktonian]

Like I have said time and time before. You get what you pay for. Especially in that area. Jefferson Street? Are you Serious? Might as well make a Will out now.

[TBoseman]

My husband is accepting a job in Rockford but after reading the post, I'm concerned about the schools and crime. I have a son starting high school next year, so I'm interested in a neighborhood with nice housing, good schools, and friendly neighbors with children our sons age. Can anyone recommend anywhere? My son has been in private school in the past but I wasn't happy with the sense of entitlement some of the children (and parents) seemed to have in private school so I would prefer a high quality, safe, high school. Please help. You may email me at tam1840@aol.com. Also, we are moving from NC so I'm wondering about if there is any prejudice against semi-southerners?

[Drover]

For one, the cultural prejudice is a little bit of a one-way street (northerners versus southerners) because we don't have waves of southerners moving up here such as is happening the other way around. To the extent that there is a cultural prejudice (and it's not very deep), it's found in urban areas like Chicago and Milwaukee and the Twin Cities. Rockford isn't on the same level of -- let's call it what it is -- snootiness.

For another, it's really only Rockford proper that is struggling. You will be able to find several very safe, very nice communities with good schools in the Rockford area. Some of the communities have been mentioned a few times in this thread, but to re-summarize, check out McChesney Park, Roscoe, Rockton, Loves Park, and Cherry Valley. I don't really have any specifics on schools, but two resources to check out for that is schoomatters.com and greatschools.net .

[miss220]

Originally Posted by TBoseman

My husband is accepting a job in Rockford but after reading the post, I'm concerned about the schools and crime. I have a son starting high school next year, so I'm interested in a neighborhood with nice housing, good schools, and friendly neighbors with children our sons age. Can anyone recommend anywhere? My son has been in private school in the past but I wasn't happy with the sense of entitlement some of the children (and parents) seemed to have in private school so I would prefer a high quality, safe, high school. Please help. You may email me at tam1840@aol.com. Also, we are moving from NC so I'm wondering about if there is any prejudice against semi-southerners?

You should move to Schaumburg which is about a 45 minute drive. Rockford is the worst, It's very poor here and I'm from Detroit and I have never seen so many poor areas in such a small vacinity. The schools are the worst. My landlord is a retired teacher and she advised me not to out my daughter in this school system because they are graduating at a 25 percentile.Rockford long time residents are very unpleasant to outsiders too. I know people from new york, alabama, st.louis, indiana and memphis that hate it here and feel the same way that I do. As soon as my contract expires I'll be leaving feeling like I have just awaken from a VERY bad dream.
Why did you leave NC. I'm looking forward to moving to Charlotte in a few months.

[arpschneider]

Originally Posted by IcantSELLmyHouse

You can buy a house in Rockford for $14,900
$14900 207 JEFFERSON ST




3 BEDROOM 1 BATH
1108 SQ FT 1 CAR GARAGE


VACANT. SOLD AS IS. NO SURVEY. NO DISCLOSURE. BUYER TO VERIFY ALL INFO. FUNDING VERIFICATION IS REQUIRED. ADDENDUMS TO FOLLOW ACCEPTED OFFER. SELLER REQUIRES PROOF OF FUNDS TO SUBMIT OFFER. MUST HAVE PRE-QUAL FROM COUNTRYWIDE.



What a Deal No Thanks!!!!!

I see houses going in Decatur for 1/3 of THAT price, without all of the restrictions that were listed in that ad.

I don't think Decatur could possibly have anything worse on "ghetto" than Rockford does.

[arpschneider]

Originally Posted by Drover

Chances are the current homeowner bought the place recently for about half that. As bad as this sounds, Pittsburgh ghetto real estate is so worthless that you can buy whole houses for as little as $3,000. This is created a kind of "scraping-the-barrel" real estate speculation where someone scoops a house for 3 to 5 grand, turns around and puts it on eBay, and some sucker pays 10 or 15 grand for it, thinking they got themselves a bargain. Do that enough times and you can make a decent living at it. I wonder if much that goes on in Rockford.

House flipping is going on all over the country. Rockford has no "corner" on that activity! There are books written like "House flipping for Dummies" that cover the subject quite nicely.

[exberwynite]

I am not from Rockford and have noticed that Rockfordians tend to turn away from outsiders (ie Chicago suburbanites). I also noticed that private school attendees stick with their own kind and don't leave their circle. Makes it hard for us, in a subdivision where more kids go to private than public.