Does Spring Hill or Gardner Totally Suck? (Overland Park, Kansas City: real estate, apartment)

[movingsux]

The reason I'm asking is because I'm currently renting in Lenexa and I want to buy a house, but all the houses that I have seen in Northern Johnson Co are tiny and dark. They all have tiny bedrooms, kitchens designed by midgets for midgets, moldy bathrooms and most of the time they smell like cats or cigarette smoke.

I'm looking at Gardner and Spring Hill in the hopes of possibly moving there, because they have some newer houses in my price range.

So what's annoying about Gardner and Spring Hill besides the fact that they're 20 milies away? I need specifics. How many people are driving around in monster trucks? How many middle-aged dudes spend every weekend cruising around town on their motorcyles so they can show off their huge beer guts? Do you have any looney tunes who like to burn stuff like couches in their front yards? Do the neighbors let their dogs run wild through the streets? Are their huge gangs of marauding raccoons that eat your trash? What about Opossums? What exactly are the rodent/vermin/insect problems you encounter on a regular basis while living in Gardner or Spring Hill?

Are there freaky spiders? What about weird stinks? Any weird manufacturing companies or anything? What about the noise levels? Do the neighbors tend to drink all evening and then scream all night? Are there railroad tracks running thru the middle of town?

Do they have good grocery stores? Like what if I wanted to buy an organic free range Chicken and a pound of Parmesiano Reggiano? Would there be a store there that would have that sort of thing?

If you're Catholic, do you like the Catholic Church in Gardner?

Thanks for any info you can share with me.

[TinaMcG]

Wow, are you sure you want to live in rural JoCo? LOLLOL! I live in unincorporated Olathe, a few miles north of Spring Hill. I shop in Spring Hill and sometimes in Gardner. There are lots of foreclosure properties in both areas, I think, so if you're serious about buying, hold your agent's feet to the fire and make sure you know if the properties are in pre-foreclosure.

Spring Hill is pretty run down in the older sections and ticky-tacky suburban in the newly developed areas. As for shopping, you have gas stations and a Price Chopper, and that's about it. There is a terrific BBQ place (K&M) and yeah -- roaming dogs. It's legal in this area for dogs to roam. I'm on to the county commissioners about that all the time. If you live anywhere near the Spring Hill animal hospital on Webster St., be prepared for incessant barking in off hours. They lock up dogs in an outside pen, and the poor things howl their heads off. I think it's a town that could be called 'quaint' if it had an intensive restoration. I wouldn't want to live there. If I had to choose between the two, I'd probably go with Gardner, but not near the high school. It's huge and it's probably pretty noisy around quitting time.

[cyerby]

Originally Posted by TinaMcG

There are lots of foreclosure properties in both areas, I think, so if you're serious about buying, hold your agent's feet to the fire and make sure you know if the properties are in pre-foreclosure.

What does pre-foreclosure mean? Is it a bad idea to buy a house that was foreclosed on?

Thanks!

[GraniteStater]

Originally Posted by TinaMcG

Wow, are you sure you want to live in rural JoCo? LOLLOL! I live in unincorporated Olathe, a few miles north of Spring Hill. I shop in Spring Hill and sometimes in Gardner. There are lots of foreclosure properties in both areas, I think, so if you're serious about buying, hold your agent's feet to the fire and make sure you know if the properties are in pre-foreclosure.

Spring Hill is pretty run down in the older sections and ticky-tacky suburban in the newly developed areas. As for shopping, you have gas stations and a Price Chopper, and that's about it. There is a terrific BBQ place (K&M) and yeah -- roaming dogs. It's legal in this area for dogs to roam. I'm on to the county commissioners about that all the time. If you live anywhere near the Spring Hill animal hospital on Webster St., be prepared for incessant barking in off hours. They lock up dogs in an outside pen, and the poor things howl their heads off. I think it's a town that could be called 'quaint' if it had an intensive restoration. I wouldn't want to live there. If I had to choose between the two, I'd probably go with Gardner, but not near the high school. It's huge and it's probably pretty noisy around quitting time.

Gardner is very conservative, and is becoming like the small town version of Olathe. The average age is only 28 in Gardner which is much lower than the state average. It is an exurban bedroom community in the KC metro area.

[TinaMcG]

Originally Posted by cyerby

What does pre-foreclosure mean? Is it a bad idea to buy a house that was foreclosed on?

Thanks!

Pre-foreclosure means the home isn't foreclosed -- yet. But it probably will be. In Kansas, the mortgage company or lender has to petition the courts to foreclose on a property. This can take awhile, and in the meantime, the homeowners can try to sell the property. We never wanted a home that was being foreclosed because of the high risk of undisclosed problems it might have -- a fear that proved to be true in our case. We were never told this place was being foreclosed, even though we asked. Our RE agent was pretty bad at supplying accurate information. So in the end, we paid too much for a home that had a persistent leak that cost $9000 to fix and took 6 months to diagnose. It was intentionally hidden by the desperate sellers, who are now bankrupt. We don't have much recourse to go after them.

Buying a home that has already been foreclosed can mean purchasing at auction on the courthouse steps or buying it from a bank that's been stuck with it. It's a harrowing experience that I would never want to get into, though people who know their way around real estate might find it profitable.

Now, about that free range chicken and parmesan, I sympathize. Good parmesan at a decent price is very hard to find in the KC metro area!! I still have my friends send it to me from Chicago. Free range chicken is readily available. I buy it at Steve's Meat Market in Desoto, which also has some of the best steaks I've ever had.

[Versatile]

I doubt that you will like it out of town ANYWHERE. No matter what state. You have so many conditions. Find you a bettter apartment or house in town. Spare yourself, friends and the new neighbors from your unhappiness from moving to a small town anywhere and then being miserable.

[KansasDB]

Hey, an idea for you from "outside the box". Look at townhouses in Overland Park. Such as near 97th and Nall (can't think of the name of the place, but go west half a block from Nall. You can buy a nice townhouse for around $109,000 or so.

[kcmom]

Umm...If you are asking a question like that I am not sure you are smart enough to live in Gardner. There is money in this town, just take a drive around the subdivisions, not everyone here lives in a trailer with six run down cars and a pack of dogs. Look at the schools, they are great. If you are looking for something cosmopolitan, don't come here. I still make my trips to Whole Foods for groceries every month or so, but we do have a Price Chopper which is getting better at carrying more varied items, you just have to ask. We used to live up north, and truthfully I prefer it there, but there is a sense of security and safety here that we didn't find there. Property taxes here are high, though, the highest in the state I believe. That cheap house may end up costing more than you think.

[littleowl]

Yeah, judging from your post (I still can't tell if you're being facetious or not, but I'll just assume that you're serious) you'd absolutely love it down in Gardner. I'm sure you could go to the local convenience store and pick up an acai berry smoothie along with your free range chicken and parmigiano-reggiano. There's also a Waldorf school in Gardner, so you can send your nori and soybean eating offspring there so they can learn about basketweaving and the summer solstice and secular humanism. It's so cosmopolitan down there that it's like a Great Plains extension of Tribeca.

Just take a house in northern Johnson County, rip out the cat pee-stained carpets and get rid of the moldy tile. Don't sacrifice your surroundings for extra square footage- it's stupid. And think about where you want your kids to go to school. All private schools are in or very near Kansas City proper, and the publics with good reps are all around that area also. Would you rather send your kids to Shawnee Mission East, with an excellent International Baccalaureate program and reputation for sending kids to good schools, or Gardner-Edgerton (which I'm sure has an excellent vocational tech program)? And if you don't have kids, why do you need a big house anyway?

Originally Posted by movingsux

The reason I'm asking is because I'm currently renting in Lenexa and I want to buy a house, but all the houses that I have seen in Northern Johnson Co are tiny and dark. They all have tiny bedrooms, kitchens designed by midgets for midgets, moldy bathrooms and most of the time they smell like cats or cigarette smoke.

I'm looking at Gardner and Spring Hill in the hopes of possibly moving there, because they have some newer houses in my price range.

So what's annoying about Gardner and Spring Hill besides the fact that they're 20 milies away? I need specifics. How many people are driving around in monster trucks? How many middle-aged dudes spend every weekend cruising around town on their motorcyles so they can show off their huge beer guts? Do you have any looney tunes who like to burn stuff like couches in their front yards? Do the neighbors let their dogs run wild through the streets? Are their huge gangs of marauding raccoons that eat your trash? What about Opossums? What exactly are the rodent/vermin/insect problems you encounter on a regular basis while living in Gardner or Spring Hill?

Are there freaky spiders? What about weird stinks? Any weird manufacturing companies or anything? What about the noise levels? Do the neighbors tend to drink all evening and then scream all night? Are there railroad tracks running thru the middle of town?

Do they have good grocery stores? Like what if I wanted to buy an organic free range Chicken and a pound of Parmesiano Reggiano? Would there be a store there that would have that sort of thing?

If you're Catholic, do you like the Catholic Church in Gardner?

Thanks for any info you can share with me.

[littleowl]

Oh and by the way, they don't take too kindly to the Catholics down there...to them, we're Mary-worshipping, rosary-bead-wearing, child-sexual-abuse-supporting, transubstantiation-obsessed minions of Satan. I mean, as a (lapsed) Catholic, I've apparently never accepted Jesus Christ as my personal Lord and Savior, so I'm doomed. And since the Pope doesn't see a problem with evolutionary biology, they'll never accept us.