Apartment hunting in Durham or Raleigh 28 yr/old young professional - unique places.. help! (Carrboro: apartment complexes)

[NewHorizonz]

What's up everybody - I'm 28 yrs old, single male, looking for a 1BR apartment ($600-$850) in Durham or Raleigh. I'll be working in Morrisville. I need some advice/recommendations on areas/neighborhoods to check out that fit most of my criteria below. Thanks for any help!

It would be nice if it were:

- Walkable, independent stores, cafes, breweries/pubs, local restaurants/food joints.

- Not too many college students

- Safe

- Not next to a strip mall or lots of chain restaurants. An area with character and not giant apartment complexes.

I'm thinking southeast Durham would be my best bet for commuting to Morrisville? As well as northwest Raleigh?

Thanks for the help!

[Francois]

Southeast Durham is generally considered the "sketchy" (or worse) part of that city. Not universally, but under no circumstances consider that area without visiting it and looking around, and you will see what I mean.

NW Raleigh is everything you say you don't want--chain stores, strip malls, big new apartment complexes slapped up quickly to meet the exploding growth (because yes, it is close to RTP). Very little "charm" or interesting businesses clustered together. Brier Creek is a nice area that's near a shopping center, but it is almost exclusively things like Wal-Mart, Target, chain restaurants, etc.

For the Independent vibe you want, you need to avoid the "newer" parts of any of the cities. Look near downtown Raleigh, especially along Hillsborough St. Carrboro also, or the Ninth St area of Durham. But all of these places will have at least SOME college students. It tends to happen that the "walkable areas to funky, independent businesses", at least around here, are always near the college campuses. So you may have a trade-off between "walkable to cool places" and "not too many college students" as well as "near to Morrisville" vs "not too many strip/chain businesses" because those things tend to be located together.

[NewHorizonz]

I'm glad I found out about southeast Durham area. I didn't really know that.. How far is southeast Durham considered? I'm considering places between there and Morrisville..

Carborro seems like a neat place but it also seems pretty far from Morrisville in terms of commuting..

I think west or north raleigh will have to do for now, until I get acquainted with the area.. I'm from Pennsylvania so I have no idea where to look..

Thanks for the info!