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Hey All! Any help, insight or advice you can provide would be much appreciated.
I just graduated from the University of Arizona, and it looks like I will be moving up there to work for Cerner. It is going to be a huge change for me, because I have never been further east than El Paso, TX. I have shopped around, albiet only online and through the apartment magazine Cerner gave me, and have a good idea where I want to go. I want to live somewhere near Cerner, in North Kansas City. Does anyone have any advice as to what places are good/not good up there? I am looking for both apartments and houses. As for price, anything less than $1000/mo will do.
I will be coming up in late July to check places out with my fiancee, who hasn't stepped foot out of AZ her whole life. We will only be up for 3.5 days, and need to secure a place to live for when I move up in September.
We are staying at the Plaza, because I figured she'd like all the stores and such, but does anyone have any suggestions as to what we can do (after house searching all day)? I was thinking of checking out the Power and Light district, because my recruiter said that was pretty cool.
Oh, one concern I have is that I found this site while looking for crime data. It seems KC has quite a bit of crime, which is a little unsettling for me because my job will require a lot of travel - which leaves my fiancee at home alone. It the stats just overstated or located to one area really?
Hey All! Any help, insight or advice you can provide would be much appreciated.
I just graduated from the University of Arizona, and it looks like I will be moving up there to work for Cerner. It is going to be a huge change for me, because I have never been further east than El Paso, TX. I have shopped around, albiet only online and through the apartment magazine Cerner gave me, and have a good idea where I want to go. I want to live somewhere near Cerner, in North Kansas City. Does anyone have any advice as to what places are good/not good up there? I am looking for both apartments and houses. As for price, anything less than $1000/mo will do.
I will be coming up in late July to check places out with my fiancee, who hasn't stepped foot out of AZ her whole life. We will only be up for 3.5 days, and need to secure a place to live for when I move up in September.
We are staying at the Plaza, because I figured she'd like all the stores and such, but does anyone have any suggestions as to what we can do (after house searching all day)? I was thinking of checking out the Power and Light district, because my recruiter said that was pretty cool.
Oh, one concern I have is that I found this site while looking for crime data. It seems KC has quite a bit of crime, which is a little unsettling for me because my job will require a lot of travel - which leaves my fiancee at home alone. It the stats just overstated or located to one area really?
Thank you in advance for your help.
Someone like you should go with the Plaza area. The commute to Cerner is not too bad from there and there are plenty of people similar to you who live around the Plaza.
Someone like you should go with the Plaza area. The commute to Cerner is not too bad from there and there are plenty of people similar to you who live around the Plaza.
On a side note, feel free to send me a private message if you have any general questions about Cerner; I am very familiar with the company. I moved from Boston to KC to work at that company.
North Kansas City and the rest of the region North of the Missouri river is called "the Northland". Most of it is pretty nice and your typical midwestern suburb. There are some rough patches closer to the river and the further north you go, the more upscale it will get.
I have lived in the Northland my entire life and would never life anywhere else in KC. I see no reason to as the Northland has anything you could ever want. It is clean, quiet, low crime rates, great schools, reasonable housing cost, reasonable property taxes, lots of access to shopping, parks, easy access to highways, and as long as you never get to far north it is about a 20 minute drive to anywhere you would want to go in KC.
If you are wanting a more urban setting, I would recommend the plaza area or some of the lofts on Grand between Power and Light and Crown Center. If I were going to live downtown, I would probably choose to live on Grand in that area.
The area right around Cerner is pretty cruddy really. Although the Cerner campus is very nice.
It's not a bad area, just low income and industrial.
I'm not quite reading what you are looking for. Sounds like you might be looking for something suburban in nature. If that is the case, then most of the Northland would be good. If you are looking at apartments, I would try to stick to the I-29 corridor. There are some nice apartments west of 29 along Parvin that would be very close to Cerner. If you go up further north, there are plenty of nice complexes along I-29 at most exits such as 64th, 72nd, Barry and Tiffany Springs.
There are also a lot of apartments near 169 and Barry as well as I-35 and Barry or I-35 and MO-291.
Basically just stay within a few miles of the HWY 152 corridor and you will be fine. I prefer the area near 29 by Zona Rosa, but it's all fine in that corridor.
Crime is really not an issue in the Northland. But do stay away from the apartment complexes along I-35 around Vivion, Antioch, Brighton and even some in Liberty. There is a lot of section 8 places in there.
If you want something more urban, I would look into the River Market area or the Plaza area. Both are very nice urban districts with lots of urban housing. You might not be "city" enough for area like Midtown, Westport or even the Crossroads. It's more "gritty" and in some cases there is more crime.
The area right around Cerner is pretty cruddy really. Although the Cerner campus is very nice.
It's not a bad area, just low income and industrial.
I'm not quite reading what you are looking for. Sounds like you might be looking for something suburban in nature. If that is the case, then most of the Northland would be good. If you are looking at apartments, I would try to stick to the I-29 corridor. There are some nice apartments west of 29 along Parvin that would be very close to Cerner. If you go up further north, there are plenty of nice complexes along I-29 at most exits such as 64th, 72nd, Barry and Tiffany Springs.
There are also a lot of apartments near 169 and Barry as well as I-35 and Barry or I-35 and MO-291.
Basically just stay within a few miles of the HWY 152 corridor and you will be fine. I prefer the area near 29 by Zona Rosa, but it's all fine in that corridor.
Crime is really not an issue in the Northland. But do stay away from the apartment complexes along I-35 around Vivion, Antioch, Brighton and even some in Liberty. There is a lot of section 8 places in there.
If you want something more urban, I would look into the River Market area or the Plaza area. Both are very nice urban districts with lots of urban housing. You might not be "city" enough for area like Midtown, Westport or even the Crossroads. It's more "gritty" and in some cases there is more crime.
kcmo pretty much hit the nail right on the head with that answer. If you are a software engineer, you may also want to consider some of the south and east suburbs like Blue Springs or Lee's Summit, Cerner has an engineering campus that is just off 435 in that area, making those neighborhoods a favorable commute.
kcmo pretty much hit the nail right on the head with that answer. If you are a software engineer, you may also want to consider some of the south and east suburbs like Blue Springs or Lee's Summit, Cerner has an engineering campus that is just off 435 in that area, making those neighborhoods a favorable commute.
He is working at the NKC campus according to this post. If he is, living in Lee's Summit or Blue Springs would be a waste of time and money. The Northland has identitical traits and will save the time commuting and gas money.
Coming from Tucson, I'm surprised you're worried about crime. That city is pretty notorious for their level of crime--especially being close to the border. Anyways, some people on this forum keep pushing North KC or the suburbs. Some areas of south Kansas City are not bad. I've had relatives who lived for decades south of Gregory Blvd, and they never had problems with a lot of crime. The Linden's Hills neighborhood, the Bannister mall area, and Raytown, are all fine in my book. So it's OK to live in the city.
Sorry for my extremely late response, I have been quite busy.
Quote:
Originally Posted by windhoek7
Coming from Tucson, I'm surprised you're worried about crime.
Tucson has a lot of Auto Theft, but Kansas City has a lot more violent crimes. Based on the crime data from this site, the crime index is 40% higher in Kansas City (598.9 - Tucson VS 839.1 - KC)
Quote:
Originally Posted by kcmo
The area right around Cerner is pretty cruddy really. Although the Cerner campus is very nice....
Thanks I will keep that in mind and check out the places you mentioned. One of my friends hooked us up with a rental agency, so hopefully we can find something when we head up there in a few weeks. I think we are leaning more towards a house now, but going to check all our options.
Thanks everyone for your input! I really appreciate it and it has been very helpful!
Don't get all worked up on crime in KC. KC is a big city and has some pretty nasty areas that produce 90% of those crime stats that effect the stats of the entire city. You will not be looking in any areas of the city that even have remote crime problems. There will be slightly higher crime rates in areas south of the river like the Plaza vs the Northland, but nothing out of the ordinary for a dense, urban, mixed use and busy area. The chances of anything happening are very slim.
Just don't sell crack at 39th and Jackson and don't pick up prostitutes on Indep Ave. and you will be fine.
One thing you will notice about KC is there is a lot of ghetto. Most large older midwestern cities (KC, StLouis, Memphis, Cincy, Cleveland, Detroit etc) have a lot of ghetto and blight because the cities tend to be more suburbanized and racially divided compared to large cities on the coasts or newer cities like Denver or Minneapolis.
Sprawl creates ghetto as it's cheaper in towns like KC to just leave property and let it rot and build on a farm field ten miles out than it is to redevelop an existing developed property. While many cities were rebuilding their urban cores in the 80’s and 90’s most people in KC wanted to live away from the city. KC is full of people that are only one generation from the farm. The city is full of people from rural towns that are intimidated by the city while places like Denver and Seattle tend to be populated with people from other large metro areas. This is by far KC’s biggest challenge. The general culture of the people that have migrated to KC over the past 40 years is primarily the rural states around KC. So many people in KC would just assume live in Salina, KS than a metro of 2 million, but KC is where the jobs are.
Compare that to Boston or Denver or San Diego or Seattle where real-estate is very valuable, traffic is bad and people want to live closer to the city. That's why those towns have very little ghetto and blight.
Having said that, most of the metro area is fine and in the past ten years, the urban core of KCMO has come back to life. It's still not on par with most large cities because so much of the city was in a state of decay, but very large portions of the city have come back and are giving the suburbs some competition.
KC is just now starting to compete with cities like Denver or Atlanta or Minneapolis for young professionals that want to live in a more urban and interesting city, not just some suburb, while for the past 20-30 years, you couldn’t get young people from other large cities to even consider KC.
Sorry about the rant, I just thought I would explain some of the reasons for the blight and crime in KC. It’s mostly attributed to low density sprawl, white flight etc.
I truly think KC has turned a corner and is ready to really compete with places like Denver, but then the city goes and elects a hillbilly mayor, won’t build a transit system etc and I really start to wonder if the city ever will reach its potential.
But it’s come a long way.
So, again, don’t worry about crime. The areas you will be looking at are fine.
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