Help! Best Philly suburbs to live AND work in? (Philadelphia: rental, job market)

[Jane0218]

Help! We're moving up towards Philadelphia in about one month....

We're looking for suburbs of Philadelphia that we can live AND work in.

We would like to have access to Philadelphia for cultural/music/sports events, stuff like that.

There HAS to be a good job market where we are going, but that information is difficult to find for the suburbs. I've checked Cities Ranked and Places Rated, they just give aggregate of Philly plus suburbs numbers regarding jobs and unemployment.

Needless to say, we want a safe and fairly quiet area (not on a busy street).

We're looking to rent a 2BR (no kids, want an office area) for around 700-850. Is this reasonable?

My husband is looking to either (he hasn't decided yet) do LOCAL CDL driving or personal training. My background is in bookkeeping. I'd like to work for a municipality or college, if possible, but not if the commute will be over 30 minutes.

We're at a loss on where to look when we come up to look around and any help from the city-data.com community would be really appreciated!

[leighland]

Mainline is the easiest, close to transportation (the Septa R5 line, less than 30 minutes to center city) and everything you may need to drive to is around 20 minutes away. But the rents are more like 1275 a month for a 2 bedroom. The Mainline towns would be: Narberth, Haverford, Wynnewood, Ardmore, Bryn Mawr, and Villanova

[Jane0218]

Originally Posted by leighland

Mainline is the easiest, close to transportation (the Septa R5 line, less than 30 minutes to center city) and everything you may need to drive to is around 20 minutes away. But the rents are more like 1275 a month for a 2 bedroom. The Mainline towns would be: Narberth, Haverford, Wynnewood, Ardmore, Bryn Mawr, and Villanova

Thanks, but we're looking not to commute into Philadelphia.

We're looking for self-sustaining suburbs of Philly; towns where we can both live AND work in.

[BPP1999]

Try Conshohocken, Plymouth Meeting, King of Prussia, Horsham, Blue Bell. These areas all are in good schools, and easy access to jobs in each community.

Unfortunately (though fortunately for you) the job markets in suburban Philadelphia are often better than in the city.

[Jane0218]

Originally Posted by BPP1999

Try Conshohocken, Plymouth Meeting, King of Prussia, Horsham, Blue Bell. These areas all are in good schools, and easy access to jobs in each community.

Unfortunately (though fortunately for you) the job markets in suburban Philadelphia are often better than in the city.

Thanks BP for the help! We are truly at a loss for finding a place to live AND work that isn't in the city.
We'll check out your recommendations.
BTW, schools don't matter to us.

Anyone else with suggestions?

[stevo6]

Media, Westchester, Kennett Square.

[thesixth]

would be my suggestions. All in Chester County. Good luck!

[Jane0218]

Thank you for your help. Now we can start looking at rental prices for these areas and see if we can affford them.

As far as job opportunities being better in suburban areas of Philadelphia, as BPP wrote, does everyone else think this is true, too?
Are there suburbs that are more commerce related (i.e: office parks, distribution centers, etc)?

Even if the job opportunites are not are not 'better' (= more opportunities), it would be great if there are opportunities to work in the suburbs. That is what we are used to doing...
The suburbs can't all be bedroom communities, right?

[thesixth]

alot of people work in Phila & commute from the suburbs, but there are many, many others that commute within & between the suburbs. (and from Phila out to the suburbs)

If the PA suburbs of Phila were ever bedroom communities that was probably 35-40 years ago!

[rainrock]

Originally Posted by Jane0218

Thank you for your help. Now we can start looking at rental prices for these areas and see if we can affford them.

[b]As far as job opportunities being better in suburban areas of Philadelphia, as BPP wrote, does everyone else think this is true, too?

Even if the job opportunites are not are not 'better' (= more opportunities), it would be great if there are opportunities to work in the suburbs. That is what we are used to doing...
The suburbs can't all be bedroom communities, right?

I believe Center City Philly is the biggest single job center at about 27% with emphasis on professional careers(banking,law,hospitality,health care)

The Pa. suburbs have about a 43% share of jobs in the metro. Ground zero would probably be King of Prussia/Chesterbrooke and branches off from there.West Chester,Malvern,Conshohocken,Radnor,Plymouth Meeting,Fort Washington,Horsham are big job centers.