Best areas to live in Manassas, VA (Herndon, Manassas Park: rentals, townhouse)

[svanzandt]

My husband and I are moving Virginia in June from California and we are looking to move to the Manassas area. He will be working on base at Quantico and I am going to be working in Herndon. Manassas seems to be right in the middle, so we thought that would be best. I have read some posts about it online and people say that it is "ghetto", is that true? Or are there some areas that are better than others? Or is there another area near by there that would be nicer and wouldn't cause an extremely long commute for either of us?

[msjack]

If you do a search there are a lot of threads about this. I would agree that some parts of manassas are ghetto, but not all. I would stay away from Georgetown South, Irongate and Coverstone neighborhoods. Point of Woods used to be nice, but I heard it has gone down in recent years. Not sure if you'll be renting or buying, but there are some nice areas of manassas left. They have done a lot of building in recent years. I can't comment on the commute to herndon, but my husband used to be stationed at Quantico and we lived in Haymarket and his drive was about 45 minutes, but he left at 5am. So from manassas depending on where you live it would be about the same give or take 10 minutes. I'm not sure how the parkway is later in the morning, if he'll be leaving later. Good luck!

[tgbwc]

You could live in a Manassas zip code and not actually be in Manassas. We used to have the Manassas zip code 20112, lived off of Route 234, and were only about 4 miles off of I95.

[choff5]

Originally Posted by tgbwc

You could live in a Manassas zip code and not actually be in Manassas. We used to have the Manassas zip code 20112, lived off of Route 234, and were only about 4 miles off of I95.

Yes, be sure to know what school division you are in. Virginia is set up that cities and counties are separate school districts so there is a City of Manassas school district and surrounding it is Prince William County school district, but will have a Manassas address. There is also the City of Manassas Park, a third separate school division right beside Manassas City. I am not that familiar with the reputation/quality of each, others can cover that, or search old threads.

[svanzandt]

Well, we don't have any kids and will not have any for quite a while, so we aren't concerned about schools right now. We are looking to rent for right now. We have a dog, so a place with a yard would be nice, but we don't want a huge, expensive house. Probably a townhouse. If any one has suggestions for resources to use to find rentals, I would appreciate it!

[Bigfoot424]

Most townhomes have small yards. If you want room for the dog you'll likely need a sfh. It might work better if you post some prospects and we can advise from there.

[oneasterisk]

I would actually try to live closer to Herndon, just because the commute to Quantico usually isn't that bad. You'll hit more traffic going towards Herndon. Also if you're looking at a small dog, a TH's yard isn't too bad.

[tgbwc]

Originally Posted by svanzandt

but we don't want a huge, expensive house. Probably a townhouse. If any one has suggestions for resources to use to find rentals, I would appreciate it!

What is your price range? What do you consider not "expensive"?

[svanzandt]

We would like to stay in the $1600 range, but might go up to $1800. Willing to spend that much, but would like to keep it under that.

[gomason]

Manassas is hardly ghetto. It is an urban area with immigrants which makes some suburbanites nervous. The general rule of the thumb is that you want to stay west of Sudley Road though.

I would recommend that you look for houses near the intersection of Sudley Manor Road and Ashton Avenue. There is a huge neighborhood with reasonably priced homes for the DC area. This would be convenient for you because it's only about 45 minutes to Herndon and 30 minutes to Quantico during rush hour. You could go even further down Sudley Manor if you want a newer neighborhood (and further commute), although I don't really consider it to be Manassas.

There are also some nice subdivisions off of Hastings Drive in the actual city of Manassas. They are more pricey with bigger yards and Single Family Homes, however, your commute would be a nightmare. You would be looking at about an hour commute during rush hour. Your husband would be closer to Quantico though.

Based on your budget, the area near Ashton and Sudley Manor would be a lot more affordable.