Making the big move from chi-town to atl.... (Atlanta, East Point: apartments, rental)

[mskim1124]

Hello all, i just found this site, so hopefully someone can help me out......whats a good area to move to????????

It is a great possibility that i will be starting a new job with dekalb county gov't---in tucker, ga. I am single female in her 30's/no kids.... Moving from chicago....the job starts feb 21st.... I just found out about this site. Any help will be appreciated.

I will be moving with family initially, for at least 3-6 months. Then i will be in the market for an apartment. I am not looking to spend more than $7-900.

Thank you in advance....

[ssankofa]

tucker itself is actually a good place, IMO.

[ecuresident]

For a single female, for $900 you could get an apartment almost everywhere, it really depends what you are looking for. From Downtown its only a 20 min drive.

[sith]

agree, a good place to live and should not be a problem with your budget for rent!

[mskim1124]

thank you all....I did some research, I may need to move quicker, my sister lives in college park....a bit of a distance....

[testa50]

College Park to Tucker isn't ideal but is hardly a bad commute by Atlanta (or Chicago) standards, at least temporarily.

Do you want to live intown or in suburbs? College Park is considered intown.

If you prefer intown living, take your time exploring the different neighborhoods starting from downtown heading eastwards: Old Fourth Ward, Inman Park, Grant Park, Cabbagetown, Virginia Highland, Poncey Highland, Chandler Park, Decatur--there are a variety of safety levels and price points, but these are all areas worth a look. Atlanta is a city of neighborhoods, so it's probably worth checking out a bunch of different ones and getting a feel for their unique character and choosing the one that appeals to you the most. $700-$900 will buy you different things in each area, but in all of these it should at least buy you an okay 1BR.

If you want to be closer to your sister, College Park gets a bad rap on here but for those of us who bother to go there and check it out, it's a decent enough place. There are some nice neighborhoods and a pleasant downtown strip with public transit. Ditto East Point and Hapeville--those are the "tri-cities" of Atlanta's south side. They are nice enough places but some people do not want to put their kids through the schools there. I would certainly not look at the nearby areas within the City of Atlanta proper--some of those areas are extremely rough, such as Cleveland Avenue & Metropolitan Parkway.

[ssankofa]

College park isn't bad in and of itself, but I have to respectfully disagree with the previous poster regarding the commute. I find traffic here to be a bear, particularly on the 285 and 400 highways - once they get jammed, they are jammed. So my philosophy is, if the possibility of a bad, or unnecessarily long commute for the distance that you'd be traveling is a potential problem for you, I'd opt to live as convenient as possible to places I intend to travel to on a daily basis. For apartments, I would recommend using Forrent.com or Apartments, houses for rent, find an apartment, search rental properties - Move.com they tend to have a good amount of info. Also, to note, a lot of apartments here will have specials if you call them. So, even if an apartment is listed at $1000, you may be able to get the price knocked down into your budget. You could also use an apartment locator service, but that would not be my first choice unless you are lucky enough to get a person who is willing to really listen to what you want vs trying to score commission.