Roanoke Area - Houses w/Land - Neighborhoods (Richmond, Lynchburg: apartment, renting)

[suzun]

My husband and I are looking to relocate to less expensive area than San Francisco. We are both artists and want to buy combined living and studio space. I'd like to find out more about the Roanoke area. Any leads?

[GradVT06]

Originally Posted by suzun

My husband and I are looking to relocate to less expensive area than San Francisco. We are both artists and want to buy combined living and studio space. I'd like to find out more about the Roanoke area. Any leads?

not to sound too short-- but try a realtor. It's just simply your best bet, especially for long distance communication.

[suzun]

thanks. I'm at the point of identifying a location that I want to explore further in person.

[GradVT06]

I can say you're more likely to find something like that in Salem or Roanoke County rather than Roanoke City. Something to consider is possibly renting an apartment and get to know the area better first, it will give you the best option for getting a feel of the area. Or, pay the cost of at least a trip or two to meet w/ an agent or someone else who knows the area and drive around with a map and get oriented and familiar with the area. There's Blacksburg/Christiansburg about 45 minutes away, or at the north end of Roanoke is Boetourt county as outlying areas to Roanoke itself.

[Georgia]

Rowandtoke is a very nice area, less Orange Avenue of course.
Tanglewood is nice and so is the outlying county.
I prefer Lynchburg and Bedford.
You can't go wrong there. Great part of Ole Virginnie

[moderator cut]

[PaperTrail]

You've probably already done a search on these boards, but there was a pretty heavy discussion about Roanoke within the past month. Here's the link:
http://www.city-data.com/forum/virgi...oanoke-va.html

What GradVT06 said is a good suggestion, you'd probably be best off getting an apartment first...especially since you're coming from so far away and don't know the area that well. My fiancee and I are getting married in Roanoke and we're planning to move there in the near future. She's originially from SW Virginia, but hasn't lived there for a couple years now. Even though we've both gotten to know the area very very well through several visits and our wedding prep stuff, even we're planning on renting an apartment for about six months before we settle on a home to buy. It's really the best and surest route to go.

All that said, I think Roanoke is amazingly beautiful, and I'm looking forward to moving there. The mountains and the people are great.

[peach49]

Hello my hubsand and i are thinking about moving to roanoke area.could you tell me the good and bad about roanoke.

[Steven2149]

I lived in Roanoke for about 3 years and grew up about 2 hours southwest of Roanoke. Roanoke has a very nice medium sized city charm or character to it. The mountain location is very attractive. There are quite a few recreational opportunities in the region. I felt that there was a pretty adequate amount of dining opportunities there. My family and I love dining out. There were a few hole in the wall types, which are some of our favorites. It is a great place to go on a long sunday drive, if you want. Might I suggest Homeplace in Catawba. Fantastic food in an unbelievable setting. It sits at the top of Catawba mountain in the middle of an old farm. Shopping is okay I guess. I'm not really into shopping, but you have Valley View Mall and Tanglewood mall, which is older and past its best days. There are several nice neighborhoods to check out... Grandin Road, Salem, Old Southwest Roanoke, most of South Roanoke County is nice.... blah, blah, blah... Now the not so good things about Roanoke. Roanoke has traditionally worked hard... very hard, at preserving its history. In doing so, they have been very anti-growth. The NIMBY (not in my back yard) sentiment has caused many problems for public projects, private projects and so forth to move forward. This attitude has steered many prospective employers away from the area and into other regional areas such as Charlotte, Greensboro, Richmond, etc. The predominant employment sectors in the area are healthcare and manufacturing. This is typical of many rustbelt cities. I'm not saying that Roanoke is rustbelt, but it has a lot in common with some of those type cities. That said, unemployment is low, BUT, there aren't a wide variety of high paying jobs in the area. The airport basically is useless other than business travel. That is about all I have bad to say about the area. I'll end this on a few more good notes.... Salem Avalanche, minor league baseball team, Mill Mountain star and Zoo, Blue Ridge Parkway, Smith Mountain Lake, Downtown Roanoke... a jewel of a downtown, Roanoke Civic Center.. hosts many concerts and other events, the area is reasonably close to other major cities such as DC, Richmond, Baltimore, Charlotte,

[peach49]

how is crime there? is this a goodtime to retire? is this a good area to buy a mobile home?

[Steven2149]

Aside from the employment situations, I would say that quality of life is hard to beat in Roanoke. Crime is very low. I was a police officer in Roanoke County for 3 years. One of the sectors that have been driving the economy in recent years is retirement. The whole southwest Va region is honing in on retirees. It's been described as not too far north and not too far south. I'm a way off from retirement, but I think it would be an ideal place to retire. If my memory serves me correctly, I don't believe that there are many mobile homes. I think most people that have them probably live in one of the outlying counties (Craig, Botetourt, Floyd, Franklin, maybe Montgomery) Land is quite cheap in all of those areas, and you could probably get an acre for 15 - 20k give or take a little. If you are looking to retire there, I would also suggest taking a look a little further south in the Galax, Carroll County, Grayson County areas. You are 1 hr 30 minutes to 2 hours from Roanoke. Land is extremely inexpensive there (you can find land for 5k any day of the week). There are many more mobile homes and dealers in that area.