Where to live - one commute to NYC, one to Huntington (Babylon: for rent, landlord)

[Crookhaven]

Originally Posted by twingles

I don't think you are going to find many towns/villages (just trying to head off Walter Greenspan) that are less "suburbia" than Huntington. It's often called "Manhattan East" because of its diversity, cultural offerings and nightlife.

SOunds like you might be happier in Queens..commute to Huntington wouldn't be too bad. I commuted from Huntington to Queens for awhile and it wasn't bad, and that was going with the traffic. No, I don't live in HUntington anymore, just a shameless plug for the old hometown.

Foul!

Ive never heard anyone call (or remotely consider) Huntington, Manhattan East. Thats absurd.

Nice area but the locals seem to have an inflated sense of self importance.

Huntington has plenty of competition these days.
Babylon Village for starters.

Croosk

[djdairyp]

Bayside Queens. The 'long island like' part of queens.

-Not Suburbia, but also not ultra compact queens like
-Good for young people, late 20's-30's kinda feel to it.
-Walking distance to a lot of things/rest/bars/park/ etc. provided you find a place near the train
-One of the best commutes to NYC you can get, about 20 or so mins.
- Longer to huntington, but its reverse flow so that makes up for it (maybe) depending on your capacity for driving distance and where in huntington you are exactly going

on the negative side, you pay NYC income tax which is a chunk of your income paying for nothing really as a renter. Renting in LI is nice since you don't pay city tax nor do you pay the property tax. This is factored into rent but generally rents are cheaper anyhow especially looking at illegal apts.

===========
-personally I think huntington is less suburbia than many other places on LI that are mostly just families raising their kids in the burbs and might be your best bet if you want to be on the island and outside suburbia in the vicinity of huntington. At least Huntington has a nice downtown with many bars, rest, and shops / etc. Farmingdale doesnt have much of a downtown, and huntington is bigger. Long beach is one of the only other contenders but that is really far for both and probably not a good choice. Glen cove might be a possibility of hand but gets a bad rep I think.

[dman72]

Originally Posted by miramera

Thanks, I could care less about beaches!

What about Hicksville?

Also---on a map, both Babylon and Farmingdale look to be in the wrong direction of the city....south of Huntington, rather than west.....is the commute into the city really better from Babylon or Farmingdale than Huntington??

The commutes are virtually the same from Babylon and Huntington. Babylon is a bit less Bourg-ee than Huntington Village, but Huntington Station is raunchy (where the trains station is) and Babylon is not. There are a lot of places to look between Penn Station and Huntington to look.

[dman72]

Originally Posted by djdairyp

Bayside Queens. The 'long island like' part of queens.

-Not Suburbia, but also not ultra compact queens like
-Good for young people, late 20's-30's kinda feel to it.
-Walking distance to a lot of things/rest/bars/park/ etc. provided you find a place near the train
-One of the best commutes to NYC you can get, about 20 or so mins.
- Longer to huntington, but its reverse flow so that makes up for it (maybe) depending on your capacity for driving distance and where in huntington you are exactly going

on the negative side, you pay NYC income tax which is a chunk of your income paying for nothing really as a renter. Renting in LI is nice since you don't pay city tax nor do you pay the property tax. This is factored into rent but generally rents are cheaper anyhow especially looking at illegal apts.

===========
-personally I think huntington is less suburbia than many other places on LI that are mostly just families raising their kids in the burbs and might be your best bet if you want to be on the island and outside suburbia in the vicinity of huntington. At least Huntington has a nice downtown with many bars, rest, and shops / etc. Farmingdale doesnt have much of a downtown, and huntington is bigger. Long beach is one of the only other contenders but that is really far for both and probably not a good choice. Glen cove might be a possibility of hand but gets a bad rep I think.

From what I've seen, Bayside is WAY more expensive than Huntington.

[Crookhaven]

Originally Posted by dman72

From what I've seen, Bayside is WAY more expensive than Huntington.

Indeed it is.

Crooks

[djdairyp]

Originally Posted by dman72

From what I've seen, Bayside is WAY more expensive than Huntington.

More expensive for buying, not as much for renting, they want to rent. I don't think rents are as dramatically different as housing prices until you get way out on the island.

I rented a newish two bedroom 2 blocks from the train for $1400 which i thought was pretty reasonable. My neighbor had a 1 bedroom in the same complex for $1150.

[dman72]

Originally Posted by djdairyp

More expensive for buying, not as much for renting, they want to rent. I don't think rents are as dramatically different as housing prices until you get way out on the island.

I rented a newish two bedroom 2 blocks from the train for $1400 which i thought was pretty reasonable. My neighbor had a 1 bedroom in the same complex for $1150.

In Bayside? Wow. If you can get a 2 bedroom there for 1400 2 blocks from the train, that's a no-brainer, but I find it hard to believe that's the norm.

[AlexisT]

Long Beach to Huntington would be a killer commute. Glen Cove has rentals, but forget commuting to NYC from there--the train service is a joke.

I'd also stick to Northeast Queens, preferably Bayside (Little Neck and Douglaston tend to be pricey, but you might luck out--quieter, though). This would make it easy to live with one car, which is hard on LI (unless you live practically next to the station).

Bayside is more expensive than Huntington, but there is a large range of housing in Queens and you should be able to find something suitable.

dman - from what we saw $1400 was a little low for a really nice 2BR in that location, but it's not an impossible rent. Bayside has the advantage of a lot of supply.

[djdairyp]

Originally Posted by dman72

In Bayside? Wow. If you can get a 2 bedroom there for 1400 2 blocks from the train, that's a no-brainer, but I find it hard to believe that's the norm.

This was 3 years ago, most places we looked at were in that same range at the time as well, and there was a lot near the train, though there was a bunch of crap apts as well.

My old roommate still rents there now 8 blocks from the train for a little under 1400. Not as nice a place but still ok.

Just looked on nyc craigslist and there are still a lot of places listed at and below 1500

[miramera]

Thanks for the Bayside suggestion, I think that might be a good location for us actually. Is that as far East as Queens goes? From the listings I've found, Bayside has many more renting options at all price points than Huntington.One other idea---what about Mineola??