St. Louis gay couple considering New England (Providence, East Providence: real estate, foreclosures)

[dbminmo]

We are a gay couple considering moving to CT, MA, or RI from St. Louis and need help in picking a community to settle in. I renovate homes to sell and He may be attending UCONN/Storrs, Harvard or Yale for his Doctorate, our other option would be near Los Angeles at Claremount.

Our main criteria is finding elder day care that provides transportation for my mom whose 92 and has mild Alzheimer's that lives with us. We would prefer a rural, family friendly community, "pun intended" within a half hour to hour of a particular Univeristy.

Our housing needs at first would be to buy a decent duplex he could live in and then a 300k-600k home we both would move into once I'm able to liquidate assets in Missouri.

My work needs would be a ripe market for renovating homes to sell. Ive been reading through the New England threads and am concerned about taxes, their affect on renovated home sales, the commute to these areas and the like.

Thank you in advance for any advice you may have to offer.

[professorsenator]

Originally Posted by dbminmo

We are a gay couple considering moving to CT, MA, or RI from St. Louis and need help in picking a community to settle in. I renovate homes to sell and He may be attending UCONN/Storrs, Harvard or Yale for his Doctorate, our other option would be near Los Angeles at Claremount.

Our main criteria is finding elder day care that provides transportation for my mom whose 92 and has mild Alzheimer's that lives with us. We would prefer a rural, family friendly community, "pun intended" within a half hour to hour of a particular Univeristy.

Our housing needs at first would be to buy a decent duplex he could live in and then a 300k-600k home we both would move into once I'm able to liquidate assets in Missouri.

My work needs would be a ripe market for renovating homes to sell. Ive been reading through the New England threads and am concerned about taxes, their affect on renovated home sales, the commute to these areas and the like.

Thank you in advance for any advice you may have to offer.

Are you familiar with Atria? Welcome to Atria Senior Living Group, dedicated to improving assisted living.
It is a national company that operates nursing homes/assisted living facilities in a variety of places in New England. Our family's matriarch spent her last years at an Atria facility and it was very high quality.

That said, frankly your field of interest is too large without more guidance. New Haven, CT and Cambridge, MA may only be 135 miles apart. But they're worlds apart from a New England perspective.

BTW, the housing market in Boston has taken a nose dive. Sellers have been slow to lower their prices and I think buyers are scarce. Furthermore, the economy is pretty lackluster. It's probably a tough place to flip houses right now.

On the plus side, this area is pretty tolerant and you should easily find a welcoming community. Two of our very best friends are gay and lived in Kansas City...and they were miserable. Came here, bought a nice house in the Boston 'burbs, and are now happy as clams.

[jakedog1]

The East Side of prov would be a good place to start. It is $$$ but there is a good mix of single and multi family homes and condos. This is not to be confused with East Providence (which borders Barrington- a pricey family suberb) East Providence has traditionally been a good place for flipping houses since many families get priced out of Barrington and the houses have been pretty cheap and rundown in EP. All of Rhode Island has been in a HUGE housing price increase since oh? 2000-1998 maybe? therefore the 'boom' is over and one will have to look hard and do their homework to make a good living flipping (but believe me there are TONS of houses to be renovated around here)
The East Side and Prov which is just over the hill are diverse and should generally be gay friendly, I don't know for sure since its not my lifestyle but the gay couples I have known seem generally happy and unpersecuted. There is a tremendous concentration of Universities in Prov and on the East Side which adds to the arts, culture and overall openmindedness of the area.
Overall the market has been slowing but the prices are still very high for what you get all over RI.
Additionally there is a top notch assisted living place on the East Side- I think its on Blackstone BLVD? all you need to know about RI real estate is on one site run by the state assoc. of realtors- I don't know if I can post it here but you can probably googgle RI Living- and come up with it.
Good luck- the majority of RIers are not backassward knownothings as this forum might suggest. People just really keep to themselves and mind there own business, which might come off as aloof, snotty or cold, but I assure you if you need help digging your car out of a snowbank- someone you barely know will be there with their shovel .

That is to say I would suggest living on the Eastside and renovating in East Providence- also bristol, and aquidneck island- (newport, middletown, portsmouth) which has pretty stable prices, could use some sprucing up. Generally the houses are in serious need of cosmetics (inside and out)- if you are more into urban renovation there seem to be more foreclosures going on in the urban (pawtucket, south providence etc) areas surrounding the city. Don't know what the ROIs are around there since scary neighborhoods are not my thing.