Moving from Cleveland to Tampa...suggestions for housing/social networking needed (Orlando: for sale, to rent)

[kobraboy]

Hello!

We are moving from Cleveland to Tampa at the end of August. My wife is going to be working close to the University of Tampa and I am a software architect (still looking for positions).

We are a fairly active family and enjoy going to restaurants and interesting places. I and my wife both play tennis, yoga, run, and cycle. I am originally from India and my wife is from France and we now have a 2 year old daughter as well.

Given all this what would be the best place to live? We are looking to rent a 3 bedroom, 2 bath house/condo/townhome in South Tampa area without much success. Where else can we look? We also need to find a daycare for our daughter.

Is there a website that shows the names of all Tampa neighborhoods on the map?

What Google or Yahoo! groups are there as far as social networking goes?

Thanks!

[amber patterson]

We like Lithia, Fl in an area called Fish Hawk Ranch. They have a web site. Many people commute to S. Tampa from here. There is even a bus at 6:00am I believe. Good luck.

[kobraboy]

Hi Amber,

Thanks for responding. Seems like we are looking at similar things. The locality does look nice. We are flying down there this weekend and will take a look-see.

However, my wife was talking to her future colleagues and they said to be careful about traffic from those parts.

We'll see...keep you posted.

[tampaguy03]

Tampa Neighborhood Map: http://www.tampagov.net/dept_Neighborhood_and_Community_Relations/files/Neighborhood%20Map_3_1_07.pdf (broken link)
My favs include Beach Park, Sunset Park, Culbreath Bayou/Isles, Hyde Park, Davis Islands, Golfview, Bayshore Gardens, Bayshore Beautiful, Ballast Point. I live in Bayside West.

Tampa Neighborhoods Page: Neighborhood and Community Relations

Lots of active families live in the Tampa Palms, New Tampa areas. Its not the ebst commute to downtown during rush hours, and the roads are very congested in those areas, but everything is brand new, lots of parks and recreation, but also chain restaurants and retail.

What did you not find in South Tampa?

[Schilly]

My suggestion is to rent for a short while until you find where you will be working. The Tampa Bay area is VERY spread out, you could end up working an hour away from your wife. You may love Westchase, buy there and find that you have a job in one of the large corporate centers in Brandon (which is close to downtown Tampa, but a looonnng way from Westchase during rush hour). The same rationale may apply if you would choose Lithia/Valrico/Brandon (or anywhere in New Tampa/Wesley Chapel) and end up commuting to Westshore/St. Pete, etc.

As for the Fishhawk comment above, I work in downtown TPA a couple of blocks from the UTampa main campus and live in Valrico (about 2 miles north of Fishhawk). My drive time is a little shy of 30 minutes each way during rush hour. I've posted previously that traffic has substantially reduced since the end of 2006 when a non-stop expressway was built between downtown Tampa and Brandon. Many outside of our area are still unaware of its existence.

As for the guy who insists on bashing everything about Tampa, I'll sum up my two cents by saying my family loves it here. Our street is full of people who moved to Florida from elsewhere and they all seem to love it as well.

Good luck!

[kobraboy]

Thanks for all the opinions.

tampaguy03: We are looking to rent a 3 bedroom/2 bath house in South Tampa that will accept a large dog...and we did find a couple yesterday that are worth checking out. Thanks for the links as well.

Schilly: We are planning to rent for about a short time until we figure out the city, where our friends are etc and then buy. I checked out Fish Hawk but that seems to be for sale only. Good to hear about Valiro, we are driving from Orlando on Thursday and do want to check out a possibility there.