Pls recommend a great city in WA - no commute necessary (Seattle: transplants, real estate)

[DiggityDawg]

So, my family is thinking of moving from Texas to the PNW for more moderate weather, better views and more outdoor things to do. I've been reading through a lot of these discussions and have some good ideas. We have two kids in middle school. Here's what we're looking for:

- easy, quick access to mountain biking, hiking and running trails without having to drive
- 4 bedroom around 2500-3000 sqft under $650K
- great schools
- don't want acreage but also don't want to be able to reach out and touch a neighbor's house
- a safe central downtown area
- easy access to decent restaurants, shopping and kids activities like dance, music, sports
- we work from home so not necessary to commute by car or mass transit
- being close to a ski area is not a priority
- a city/town that's not too small - maybe 50K people or more
- we'd rather have a gray, wet not too cold winter than a cold, snowy one
- it would be nice to be within a 1 hr drive or so of a major airport.

So far we have Issaqua, Snoqualmie, Vancouver/Camas on our short list. Btw, also considering Ashland and Corvallis OR. Any other suggestions?

[509]

I think you have too many things on your list for people to respond. I will take them in order and hopefully the information will be helpful for you.

1) Outdoors...It is my professional opinion that these are the top outdoor recreation towns in Washington and Oregon.

Spokane
Clarkston-Lewiston
Wenatchee
Bellingham
Corvallis
Eugene
Bend

That is for ALL outdoor recreation opportunities.

If your limiting yourself to hiking, mountain biking, and running trails from town.

Wenatchee
Bellingham
Eugene
Bend
Spokane

2)I believe in all areas you can get a 4 bedroom home for under $650.

3)Schools. All schools in the US are above average. However, really almost all of Oregon is below average with the exception of Corvallis and Eugene. Spokane has some good private schools.

4)Safe downtown. Pretty much all of them.

5)Decent restaurants, shopping, and kids activities

All are pretty good for reestaurants and shopping, but for kids activities:

Eugene
Wenatchee
not sure about the rest, I do know about the two cities above. Wenatchee has AAUW swimming, Short Shakesperians, etc. etc. etc.

6) work from home....Wenatchee has 1Gbps internet. I believe Eugene has decent public internet, not sure about service to private homes. I believe the internet in the other towns is typical for the rest of the US, which is code for awful.

7) all towns are 50,000 or more. Spokane is the 100th largest metro area in the US.

8) Gray wet, rather than snowy

Drop Bend and Spokane. But think hard about snowy and more sun. The weather is awful in western Oregon and Washington. It ties Maine for cloudy weather. East of the Cascades Wenatchee and Clarkston-Lewiston are wet rather than snowy, though they do get snow. But from Thanksgiving through President's Day the weather is just as awful as western Washington and Oregon. Much, much, much better right before and after those dates. Dramatic change.

9)Spokane has a major airport. All the other towns have feeder airlines to major airports. Those in todays world are much easier to fly out of than a major hub. For example, in a 1/2 hour you can fly out of Wenatchee and be in Sea-Tac. Clearing TSA takes five minutes in Wenatchee. Parking takes two minutes. So your quicker and more comfortable to fly out of a secondary airport in the Northwest than Sea-Tac or Portland. Spokane and Portland are both nice airports. Sea-Tac is a nightmare.

I would drop Issaquah, Snoqualmie, and Vancouver/Camas from your short list as well as Ashland.

Hope this helps and gets some discussion going so you can make a good decision.

[509]

Oops, forgot you probably should search the internet for outdoor forums for those towns....

here is the Wenatchee forum: http://www.justgetout.net/wenatchee/

Spokane: Out There Monthly | The Inland NW Guide to Outdoor Adventure and Outdoors | The Spokesman-Review

And Bend....Outdoors & Recreation News, Trail Guides, for Bend & Central Oregon

Hope you find some others in the towns your interested in living.

[DiggityDawg]

509, thx for taking the time to give me that thoughtful response. Much appreciated!

[StealthRabbit]

I agree with 509,

But I would drop OR all together. You have middle school kids, OR has poor school funding, WA offers free college instead of HS, via Running Start, so.... I would keep my choices near a community college or a U that accepts Running Start in areas that a CC is not available.

Camas / Vancouver has lots of potential to meet your ctriteria, but Bellingham and Wenatchee have excellent advantages too. Probably Olympia or Near Bremerton, tho I avoid traffic / masses of people so would not work for me.

I keep a place in Hill Country Tx, for the 280 days / yr I prefer to be gone from Wetside PNW. 33 yrs of drizzle has not been a favorite for this outdoor farm kid (grew up in Colorado, but chased away by TX and CA $$ and transplants many yrs ago.)

[DiggityDawg]

Curious why you guys recommend taking Issaquah/Snoqualmie area off the list. Is it because of traffic? what looks like a real estate bubble?

[amaiunmei]

Originally Posted by DiggityDawg

Curious why you guys recommend taking Issaquah/Snoqualmie area off the list. Is it because of traffic? what looks like a real estate bubble?

Issaquah and Snoqualmie are too expensive for your list.

[509]

Originally Posted by DiggityDawg

Curious why you guys recommend taking Issaquah/Snoqualmie area off the list. Is it because of traffic? what looks like a real estate bubble?

Why would you live in a huge metro area and deal with all the traffic, noise, crowding, air and light pollution?? And for that you pay a premium price!! If you don't have to do it....

I am also allergic to clouds and rain. I lived west of the Cascades for eight months and will NEVER do that again. IF dark, dreary, dank weather doesn't bother you and you can get away from the urban liabilities it is nice to be on salt water.

I do have a friend that lives in Snoqualmie/Carnation. Lots of growth and bad roads look like a lethal combination. Also currently non-existent internet. I did store my tent trailer over there for four months and it was covered in green slime after just that short period of time. It is wet over there!

If you are insisting on western Washington Olympia is not a bad town. It is on the very edge of the metro mess. Capitol State Forest is close to town and has mountain biking and hiking trails. Nice downtown, good bookstores it is probably the ONLY western Washington town that I could even contemplate living.

Don't know how expensive Bainbridge Island is, but a short ferry ride from downtown Seattle. That seems like a good combination between town living with yet access to downtown Seattle. Granted Portland has a much nicer downtown area, but you can't take the ferry to it!!

I would recommend flying into Portland, renting a car and driving around the towns on your short list. Late September or early October would probably give you a sense of the weather.

I know what your going through...I retired from the Forest Service so we moved a lot. Fortunately, I also traveled to all these towns on business and got a sense about them. And even then, we ended up in one community that we wanted to move OUT after only a couple months.

You are blessed to be able to live anywhere you want. Good luck in your search.

[poopskooper]

I agree that Olympia would seem to meet some if not most of your requirements.

Although Olympia's downtown is relatively level, walkable, quaint in certain areas, and close to both the nice waterfront area and the capitol campus, it has had a problem lately with the homeless. It's still a nice downtown area and even as boomers, we frequent it regularly and feel safe.

The Olympia School District was rated 11th in the state in a recent study (five of the top ten were in King county, however) and has always had a good reputation.

Olympia's population is right around 50k but the adjoining cities of Lacey and Tumwater have a population of about 45k and 20k respectively, it makes the greater Olympia area over 100k in population. Consequently, it will have all the amenities and access to the activities you're looking for.

Sea-Tac International is about an hour away but through the very congested Tacoma area. Therefore, even though it's less an hour drive at midnight, it will be much longer than an hour during the day.

You should be able to find a house of the size you're looking for at around that price range. Sandy can chime in more on that.

If you want gray and wet instead of cold and snowy, stay on the west side of the Cascades.
~amanda

[Bees46]

Eugene is a bit bigger than you are looking for, but since it is its own metro area, it has everything you need and very little sprawl. I find it a great place for kids, there are so many kid- and family-friendly events we can't do them all.

The schools are a mixed bag, but with your budget you can be sure to buy in one of the better districts. I have to outsource some extras (music is lacking at the grade school level, for example) but overall we are happy with the schools.

Corvallis is nice too. I don't know Washington as well, but we like Olympia. Fun little downtown, good schools.

Good luck!