Help Me Move To Oregon...please?

[sevenpixies]

Originally Posted by Silverfall

If you want to be near a college then it's the Portland Metro area, Eugene or the Mid-Willamette Valley. These are all pricer areas, with the Mid-Willamette valley being the cheapest.

I grew up in DeKalb, Illinois and lived in Illinois for 22 years. I have lived in Oregon since then, 16 years, and would never move back. I still laugh when people talk about the humidity here. It is NOTHING compared to mid-west summers. Summer and fall are great, and I have no issue with the rain. WAAAAY better than freezing and shoveling snow. It's all a matter of perspective, I guess.

I live in Salem Oregon, and I would think that Salem, Keizer, and Silverton would be good choices. North Albany also has great schools. No university in Albany, but not a bad drive to Corvallis or Salem. There are several smaller towns surrounding Salem that might work, but since you are asking about elementary schools, I encourage you to look at the best areas for that.

In Salem you would want to look at homes in the 97302, 97306,97304 zip codes. Keizer is 97303. There are affordable homes in those areas.

Salem does get occasional flooding in SOME AREAS, right on mill creek. Oregon also has occasional landslides, and minor earthquakes, but nothing like the mid-west.

I do miss the lightening storms of the mid-west. Our lightening out here is insanely boring, but we get a lot of rainbows compared to the mid-west.

As for water quality brought up by someone else. The Willamette here in Salem is considered fair, and it gets to poor by the time you hit Portland. I think South of Eugene is when the water quality of the Willamette returns to excellent. Salem had a large mill on mill creek for many years when it was first settled and they are still finding residual chemicals in it. It's not a river you play in. BUT the Santiam river is not far away, and the water quality there is excellent.

I encourage you to come join us. It's really great here.

I grew up in salem and silverton and just recently returned. I too spent some time in the midwest and there is NO hummidity here as compared to there! ha! I don't recommend salem because there are still a lot of problems there, drugs and riff raff...the best place would be silverton. It is turning into a tourist own wich means it HAS to be kept clean. I like that. I went to elementary there and the I have great memories of that school (eugene feild). If you need to shop, salem is 20 minutes away with two malls and every store you could need. Salem has a University, i believe it majors in criminal justice or something similar and a community college: chemeketa. I attended chemeketa for three years and it was great. Although i would rather go to a university it is a cheaper route to get credits out of the way if you need to transfer.