Where should we move??? (employment, living in, cost of)

[portlandshaws]

Hi---
I'm a 35 yr old woman with a husband and a 3yr old daughter. We live in Portland OR, where I grew up. I absolutely love living here but my husband has always had a hard time and is talking about moving. He's black and hates that there's no diversity here. What's it like living in the DC area? Is it easy to make friends? Is it ridiculously expensive? Please help!
Thanks

[LIS123]

You'll get better responses if you provide information about your employment and his currently, what employment they'd seek here, housing budget, interests, willingness to commute, number of cars, etc. It's a tough question to answer and vague responses may not help much.

[dcsfanatic]

Originally Posted by portlandshaws

Hi---
I'm a 35 yr old woman with a husband and a 3yr old daughter. We live in Portland OR, where I grew up. I absolutely love living here but my husband has always had a hard time and is talking about moving. He's black and hates that there's no diversity here. What's it like living in the DC area? Is it easy to make friends? Is it ridiculously expensive? Please help!
Thanks

Easy to make friends? Some will answer with an emphatic no but I've never had problems.

Ridiculously expensive? Not SF or NYC expensive, but expensive.

Diversity? One of the areas main strengths.

[CaseyMac]

I think you will definitely find it more diverse here than in the Pacific NW. I read somewhere that one could assume the following in terms of most expensive places:

1) NY
2) LA and SF
3) DC
4) Boston and Chicago

As you see DC ranks pretty high up in cost of living. Arlington, Virginia has a lot of Portland's environmental/liberal crowd and you might find it familiar there. Takoma Park, Maryland also has that too and is sometimes termed Berkeley East.

Hope this somewhat helps. Please keep in mind living near you work is a major, major advantage here!!! Best of luck with your move.

[njmom8]

There is great diversity, interesting people from all over the world.

It is quite expensive!

It is hard to make friends- unless through work- most are very career oriented...

Good luck!