Thinking of moving. (Seattle, Spokane, Tacoma: to rent, condo, home)

[VancouverKing17]

Hello. Washington is a great state alot of great cities, there are some bad ones but most are great. Vancouver isnt bad its 1 hour away from the Pacific Ocean. The columbia river is right beside it. There's alot things to do in vancouver. But the population is pretty big there are 143560 of us here. We dont recieve storms, we had a tornado yesterday but it was a 0F1 it wasnt big. We have alot of great apartments, houses, and trailers.. I lived in vancouver for 28 years and really its a great place.

[Stevenml155]

Hello, I like you love the sunny weather and like small towns -- I went to College in Seattle and then lived/worked in Spokane for about 5 years. Huge difference in the amount of sun in these two areas - much more in Spokane, but you do get the snow. I then worked lived in Wenatchee area, even more sun than Spokane, but again snow. I now live and work in Kennewick area and I love it! Way more sun than anywhere I've lived in Washington state, little rain, snow for maybe a week to two weeks total in the winter if at all ( I watch this a lot as I'm an avid golfer and I can play year round here! ) and again, tons of sun. Hot and dry in the summer which I like being from SoCal. My wife agree that this is the best weather in all of Washington state, if you want sun, little rain and mild weather. Here it was 58 degrees and sunny in January and my buddy and I were golfing - while it was pouring rain in Seattle and snowing in Spokane -- I love this place!

Good Luck!

[Stevenml155]

$2000 gets you a really nice home in the Tri-Cities area as well -- 1000 month will get you a great apartment. We are at the confluence of the Columbia, Snake and Yakima rivers and that is what keeps it so mild here.

[Negotiator75]

I have decided to play fair (Thanks Scirocco22, you made sense): In all fairness to the Seattle area, you can find cheap homes in nice neighborhoods. Cheap as in between $250,000 and $315,000

For example if you are looking for 3 bedroom 2 bath & 2 car garage homes that are about 2,000 Sq Ft, in a good safe area with decent public schools, then here are some cities for you to research:

• Federal Way
• Covington
• Kent
• Tacoma
• Gig Harbor
• Port Orchard
• Maple Valley
• Puyallup
• Bonnie Lake
• Fairwoods part of Renton
• Auburn

Kent, Covington, Auburn & Maple Valley commutes to Seattle are about 45 minutes to 1 hour when leaving at 7am. Traffic is always heavy on I-5 northbound from Tacoma up until Renton and then it frees up for a bit. But then hits the major slow-down when you get to Boeing Field. That is the heavy crawl until 10am or so.

Port Orchard you have the choice of taking the Ferry which is about $249 a month roughly for 1 car and 1 driver to board the Southworth ferry. The other choice is to take Route 16 south to Tacoma and drive around to I-5 North. For this give it a 2-3 hour average commute time in the AM and the Tacoma NArrows bridge charges $6 to cross it round-trip I believe.

Leaving Federal Way, Puyallup, Tacoma & Gig Harbor would all be roughly a 2.5 hour commute to Seattle when leaving around 7am. Gig Harbor drivers have to pay the Tacoma Narrows Bridge toll too.

Renton would be about 30 minutes or so in the AM for a commute. The roughest drives would be highway 167 and 405 but once you get past the "Renton S Curve" you are home free until you hit Boeing Field area. That is the usual slow down area.

Of course using the HOV lane no matter which way you are coming from can GREATLY save you some time. Also there is the Sounder commuter rail that you can take.

Things to be aware of & know:

• Burlington Northern & Union Pacific railway tracks - freight trains pass right down the middle of the Valley. This pretty much cuts through the middle of Kent, Auburn, Pacific, Algona etc. Keep that in mind when home shopping
• Realtor.com hides the addresses of the homes mainly because they want your Realtor to be involved. So a good work-around is to use the Windermere.com website, they have the MLS number and address. They have a great way for you to print out flyers of each home you want, and yes with the address. So you never have to talk to anyone until you are ready. I cant speak for how good the company is but they do have a great website for the PNW. Just a tip

If you want the best schools & best neighborhoods:

Northshore School District and Lake Washington Districts have a great reputation for small class sizes and best overall education for your kids. 3 bedroom, 2 bath and 1 car garage is the norm with about 1,300 to 1,700 sq feet @ 450,000 average. Here are some cities to house-shop for:

• Kenmore
• Bothell
• Kirkland
• Woodinville

Kenmore, Bothell, Kirkland and even Woodinville close to Seattle and very upscale, and clean areas. You can use the 522 floating bridge to cross Lake Washington to drive around on 405 to I-5. In morning coming from these areas, expect about a 1 hour commute to downtown. Going home at 5 is the worst, so alot of people like to stay at work until 6pm where traffic does get lighter. So one good thing to consider is to have a 9 to 6 work schedule or something in that sense. This would save you time. One thing to note is that currently there is NO tolls or anything to worry about coming to/from these areas. But they are talking about starting to charge around $6 toll in the coming years on 522.

If you want the absolute best in just about everything, and price is no issue:

• Bellevue
• Redmond
• Sammamish
• Mercer Island
• Issaquah (parts of it near Sammamish)
• Newcastle

[swsha4]

Originally Posted by Negotiator75

If you want the absolute best in just about everything, and price is no issue:

• Bellevue
• Redmond
• Sammamish
• Mercer Island
• Issaquah (parts of it near Sammamish)
• Newcastle

If money is no object, living right in the city can be even nicer. I recommend north Seattle and the commute is a zip! Ballard, Fremont, and Wallingford are excellent and very safe neighborhoods.

[WhiskeyPapa]

I grew up here in Washington state and haven't seen a part of the country that I like better.

While there are many nice areas, I'm afraid that meeting your requirement of sunny 3/4 of the time is not very realistic. For sure, most of Western WA wouldn't fill the bill. Based on the experiences of friends and family who haved lived here and moved on, it wasn't so much the rain that got to them, it was the gray skies.

In thinking about your list of requirements, I'd recommend checking out the following towns: Walla Walla, Sequim and Wennatchee. They have more sun than most places up here; they aren't as crowded as the larger cities, they have good amenities/recreation, and decent health care in the general area.

Good luck!

[Kim Emmons]

We became a City in 1997. Most residents that make up the population of 19,000 came to Maple Valley Washington because of the outstanding schools. The district name is Tahoma School District. It would not be a waste of your time to check out the stats on our schools. We still have the small town feel. Many business leaders get involved in numerous community events. We have a fishing derby, Maple Valley Days, Fourth of July celebration and many many more. Most of the festivities take place at our beautiful Lake Wilderness Lodge. If you want more info on Maple Valley, just ask.

[Stevenml155]

Kennewick is listed at the top of quite a few lists for most sun in the US -- I know it's in Washington, but lots of sunny days here!

[SeattleExpert]

wow mikec34, that is an AWESOME post! i think a lot of natives take this place for granted - why? probably because they love it so much here they've never ventured out to get a taste of what is really out there. my family moved here from hawaii... and i absolutely LOVE this place.

a few years ago i flew down to arizona (in august - big mistake!) to pick up an 1976 bmw 2002 and drove it from phoenix to las vegas, through southern california all the way back home. and i can tell you this. as SOON as we entered washington it was quite literally a breath of fresh air. i kept hearing myself say "LOOK AT HOW GREEN EVERYTHING IS!" and "LOOK AT THESE WIDE OPEN ROADS!" and "OH MY GOSH, SMELL THIS AIR!" so crisp so clean! my husband is a tattoo artist and we live right smack dab in the middle of the city on capitol hill. one of his co-workers has been to every single one of the United States AND has traveled overseas to multiple different countries. out of ALL the places he has been, he landed here in seattle. he says it is hands down the best place he has been.

i don't think people who even visit washington get a real feel of what it is like to actually live here. yeah we get some dark, cold months - but i always laugh when summer comes and we all start praying for rain because it's too darn hot! we get the best of all 4 seasons, and not any single one is too extreme.

[ckc4re]

The Tri-Cities is the best kept secret. Over 300 days a year of sun. We are in the desert.....yes, I said desert. So, in our part of the state, we have all four seasons. Great growth, low housing prices, low crime.