Philly lower priced Real Estate (Philadelphia: crime, houses, neighborhoods)

[ertily]

Ok, I know this is opening me up to 'it depends' and jest, but I have wondered this for a while....
If you go to Realtor.com and do a search for single family homes in Philadelphia under $100,000 you get oodles of pages of listings, mainly row homes. Just perusing them at random I can tell most look rundown and crappy. However some look alright. I don't know Philly neighborhoods, but if you map them, the listings cover all over the city. They are not concentrated in just one neighborhood. So tell me, are those pages of hundreds of listings all in the slums and dangerous? If so, it would appear the entire city is in the slums. Enlighten me.

[bryson662001]

"It depends". The houses less then $50K seem to be mostly in "slum" neighborhoods in North central Philly and a small getto area of South Philly. Once you move above 50K you start to get into more working class neighborhoods along the river or in West or northeast Philly. Don't forget that most of these little row houses are more than 80 years old and have one bathroom, tiny rooms and no land. The newer rowhouses that are bigger and more expensive tend to be found in far northeast Philly and some pockets of far south Philly. In other words it's the old story. You get what you pay for.

[micheleiannella]

Well once being from South Philly, I must say that the city has changed. But there are many wonderful location to still live and under $100,000. If looking in south phill I would look at home from the numbered streets from 10th to 21st. There are many little streets in between that offer good neighbors and people who love where they are.

[ajb842]

I would agree with the above post. I would also recommend finding someone very familiar with different Philadelphia neighborhoods and taking a drive. This way you can see if you are comfortable in different areas. In general, there's no shortage of crime or poverty in Philadelphia, so inexpensive areas often reflect this but they don't have to. I've had friends in sections of North Philly where the houses looked pretty run down, but there was a sense of community in the neighborhood and everyone seemed to get along well. Patients of mine also come from various sections of the city and watch out for each other,so it really does "depend". However, if you're looking for an inexpensive home in Philadelphia, I would personally check out the northeast sections of Philadelphia first because I personally would feel more comfortable. Zipcodes 19111, 19116,19115 should be good. If there is a home less than 100K you are more likely to have a fixer-upper than a serious safety concern, but this is only my opinion. After that, I would check out 19119 but be careful, some sections of Germantown are still not too hot, but the area is being built up and will probably be a good investment.