Jax area relocation (Jacksonville, Fort Myers, Orange Park: 2013, apartment complexes, rentals)

[ChrisA70]

Hey everyone. I have lived in many parts of FL since 1994. One place I haven't lived in or around is Jax/St aug. areas. What are the best areas to live, and where to avoid? I want my 13 year old daughter to be in a decent school also. I moved up to MA for the third time last Oct and it hasn't worked out well, that was strike 3 for us. I work in apartment maintenance/management which I can pretty much land anywhere in FL and work. I have been in Fort Myers the last few years, but I don't want to deal with the heat that far south in FL. I prefer the east coast of FL anyways.

Any help is appreciated.

[JBtwinz]

Originally Posted by ChrisA70

Hey everyone. I have lived in many parts of FL since 1994. One place I haven't lived in or around is Jax/St aug. areas. What are the best areas to live, and where to avoid? I want my 13 year old daughter to be in a decent school also. I moved up to MA for the third time last Oct and it hasn't worked out well, that was strike 3 for us. I work in apartment maintenance/management which I can pretty much land anywhere in FL and work. I have been in Fort Myers the last few years, but I don't want to deal with the heat that far south in FL. I prefer the east coast of FL anyways.

Any help is appreciated.

While Amelia Island is Northeast of Jacksonville the two resorts there are having job fairs this month for the first time in many years.....the Omni is a very large resort property and has a lot of management and property maintenance. The link is below.

Jacksonville is huge size wise, so you have a lot of areas to consider.......if you do a search on this board you will see a lot of those moving to the area are flocking to Saint Johns County for their schools.

The real-estate market really crashed and burned here and while it has seemed to bottom the rental market is white hot so job wise you should do fine. Good luck and welcome back to Florida...no snow here yet this year


Two Amelia Island resorts holding job fairs, hiring hundreds | jacksonville.com

[abvavgjoe]

Originally Posted by ChrisA70

What are the best areas to live, and where to avoid? I want my 13 year old daughter to be in a decent school also. .....
Any help is appreciated.

There are many threads on this type of thing, so I suggest doing a search, first of all.

Generally, the areas of town with the most crime are the Northside and the Westside. More specifically, the northwest quadrant within a few miles of downtown. Fsu813 will tell you the Springfield Historic District (just north of downtown) is a nice place to live, (and it has come a long way) but I wouldn't want to live that close to the carnage.

Here's a map showing the murders in 2012.




On the flip side, my personal favorite neighborhood is Riverside/Avondale. It's central, historic, walkable, reasonably affordable and vibrant. It's located just south of downtown along the river.

Can't help much on the schools, but I know St. John's County schools to the south are supposed to be good.

[fsu813]

Originally Posted by abvavgjoe

There are many threads on this type of thing, so I suggest doing a search, first of all.

Fsu813 will tell you the Springfield Historic District (just north of downtown) is a nice place to live, (and it has come a long way) but I wouldn't want to live that close to the carnage.

On the flip side, my personal favorite neighborhood is Riverside/Avondale.

You do realize the two areas you metioned, Riverside & Springfield have virtually the same crime rate, right? Riverside is a bit bigger, so you can adjust for the volume a little.

(Avondale's, a seperate neighborhood is lower).


Crime stats from 1 year ago today.

Assaults
Riverside 175
Springfield 152

Burglaries
Riverside 229
Springfield 143

Homocide
Riverside 1
Springfield 1

Property
Riverside 143
Springfield 100

Robberies
Riverside 29
Springfield 29


Also, "that close to the carnage"? Where do you think Riverside is? Hint: It's not encompassed by Avondale, sorry to tell you.

For the record, my favorite neighborhood is the Riverside & Avondale historic district as well. It's the best place to live Jax. San Marco and the Springfield historic district are similar to varying degrees, as is Murray Hill and Ortega. All good options.

But know the facts before you advise others. Spreading bad information isn't helpful for anyone.

[fsu813]

You are a jerk. There's a fact for you.

When the facts don't agree with you, it's not positive to resort to name calling.

I don't know where you got those crime stats showing Historic Springfield has less crime than Riverside, but I made 3 crime maps from the JSO website. I pulled up agravated assaults and murders for the last 6 months, from 7/1/12 to today, 1/6/13. It sure looks like there's more crime in and around Historic Springfield than there is in Riverside or San Marco.

(1) This is the official JSO crime map tool, where I retrieved that info. Have fun: COJ.net - Crime Statistics/Crime Mapping

(1) The area on the map you identify as the Springfield historic district, is not. It includes large parts of other areas to the North, South, East, & West that are not part of the that neighborhood.

(2) When you pick and choose the subsets of crime types to best prove your misled point, you come up with the map you presented. When you simply select ALL assault & homocides during the last 12 months, you come up with these maps:

Riverside historic district


Springfield historic district


San Marco


An impoortant note is that the vast majority of these are between criminals or the homeless, and those who hang out with them. Very few involved your "normal" middle class citizen, per se. And there are VERY FEW random assaults and homocides in Jacksonville period, and especially in these 3 involved & active communities. Otherwise, for example, noone would want to live in Riverside (after all, it's covered with orange assault markers), but it's probably THE most popular neighborhood in the city right now.

Where would YOU rather live?

Probably which ever area appealed to me the most. Thankfully, all of these cool neighborhoods have had the best 10 years of their existance, since the 1940's. All are doing well, have received the most (by far) positive local, state, national, and international press than any other area of Jacksonville, and have a very bright future. : )



HOWEVER - - -

To give the poster a decent, substantative reply...

Hey everyone. I have lived in many parts of FL since 1994. One place I haven't lived in or around is Jax/St aug. areas. What are the best areas to live, and where to avoid? I want my 13 year old daughter to be in a decent school also. I moved up to MA for the third time last Oct and it hasn't worked out well, that was strike 3 for us. I work in apartment maintenance/management which I can pretty much land anywhere in FL and work. I have been in Fort Myers the last few years, but I don't want to deal with the heat that far south in FL. I prefer the east coast of FL anyways.

The general NW quadrant of Jacksonville has almost uniformally bad crime. Most everywhere else is fine, with specific rough spots here and there. Although may enjoy the 3 neighborhoods abvavgjoe highlighted, as do I, you won't find many large apartment complexes there. Those are historic areas, and thus only have a handful of the huge suburban-style complexes. Instead, they have a lot of smaller rentals. If you're looking for large complexes that hire their own full time maintenance person, look near Baymeadows Road, Southside Blvd, Kernan Blvd, etc.

[ChrisA70]

LOL. I thought it was only in the SWFL threads everyone bickered.

So south and east would be a decent area. I have applied to a couple properties in the area, perhaps I can DM you guys and ask if they are in a good area? What about Orange Park?

Yeah I have been on CD for years, I know how to search threads, I just got lazy, and some threads are YEARS old. Current info makes more sense.

Thanks for the replies.

[ChrisA70]

When looking up rentals on Craigs. What is "Southside"? "westside"?

[fsu813]

Originally Posted by ChrisA70

LOL. I thought it was only in the SWFL threads everyone bickered.

So south and east would be a decent area. I have applied to a couple properties in the area, perhaps I can DM you guys and ask if they are in a good area? What about Orange Park?

Thanks for the replies.

Pretty much every general area is ok, besides the specific Northwest quadrant (imagine Jax divided up into 4 equal slices). There will be rough spots you wouldn't want to live in the rest of Jax too, but those are pretty obvious.

[fsu813]

Originally Posted by ChrisA70

When looking up rentals on Craigs. What is "Southside"? "westside"?

That's subjective.

This is a VERY general (and not totally accurate) map showing areas of town. But it gives you a general idea, at least.

[abvavgjoe]

Originally Posted by fsu813

That's subjective.

This is a VERY general (and not totally accurate) map showing areas of town. But it gives you a general idea, at least.

Nice map! Seriously. I would shrink downtown to the bottom 20% of the area marked as downtown. Other than that, good to go. That's a great map for someone looking to move here.