Son Got A Job and Needs Help on Apartment Location (Bloomington: appointed, apartment complex)

[EALTP]

My son just got a job at Best Buy Corporate Headquarters, starting 9/8/08. I'm going to take him up for apartment hunting. Best Buy is located at 7601 Penn Avenue South, Richfield, Minnesota, 55423. He has an aquaintance that also works there. He indicated he has an appartment in Bloomington (France and 90th?) that is a 7 minute commute and no freeway.

So, a long winded way of asking for apartment complex suggestions. Is Bloomington a good place to start looking for a 1 bedroom apartment with an relatively easy commute to Best Buy (which I believe is located right off 494 and near where 494 and 35W intersect. Also, what apartment complex ammenities are critical in the area? Garage/covered parking?

Where do young (he'll be 23) single professionals seem to want to live?

Thanks.

[golfgal]

For the easiest commute stay west of 35W. France Ave area is fine. A garage is nice to have but not all that easy to come by unless he is willing to spend quite a bit on rent. What is his budget for an apartment? Usually apartment complexes in that area will at least have a parking lot so they don't have to worry about on-street parking. Bloomington is fairly suburban yet close enough to enough nightlife.

Where does he live now?

[EALTP]

Golfgal,

He's moving up from Iowa. He's from Urbandale and graduated from the University of Iowa. He enjoys golf, tennis, racquet ball, bowling, disc golf, fishing, video games, Iowa Hawkeyes, Green Bay Packers, and St. Louis Cardinals. The more or less typical 22/23 year old single white male professional college grad. The one person he knows from here that works at Best Buy is in apartments that are at about 90th and Frances I believe. I appreciate your feedback.

[nick is rulz]

Richfield is decent. I lived there for a few years.

[icequeen2008]

I know exactly where he is going to work cuz I work not too far from their. I think Bloomington is a great to live and they have many nice places for rent. I have lived here for 5 years and I love Bloomington. Their are several apartment by where he is going to work. He wont be disappointed. Good luck.

[Haver]

There are some dodgy apartments in both Richfield and Bloomington. There are some huge sprawling complexes at 63rd and Lyndale and 76th or 77th and Penn that used to be known as "Century Court apartments" but have since been renamed that have a bad reputation (mostly management-related). Other areas that seem to have bad management or petty crime issues are around 63rd street in Richfield near the hub shopping center and many of the units along the Cedar and 494 strips, and I've read in a Bloomington forum there's a particularly bad complex on 86th street but I don't know where on 86th. Also rentals around the Mall of America are to be avoided, there seems to be a concentration of poorly managed complexes there. Even though both Richfield and east Bloomington are reasonably nice places to live, it pays to do due dilligence. Conversely, I haven't heard anything bad about the area around 66th and Penn even though that area is a bit dumpy and outdated, so the complexes in that part of Richfeld are probably OK so long as you do the appropriate research. The further west and south you go usually the better in so far as Bloomington.

[Cruz Azul Guy]

Originally Posted by golfgal

For the easiest commute stay west of 35W.

Where does he live now?

How do you come up with this? Traffic going eastbound on 494 in the morning and westbound at night is some of the worst bumper to bumper traffic I've seen.

[golfgal]

Originally Posted by Slig

How do you come up with this? Traffic going eastbound on 494 in the morning and westbound at night is some of the worst bumper to bumper traffic I've seen.

So you don't have to CROSS 35W--doesn't mean you have to drive on 494 but if you stay west of 35 you can take back roads.

[Cruz Azul Guy]

Originally Posted by golfgal

So you don't have to CROSS 35W--doesn't mean you have to drive on 494 but if you stay west of 35 you can take back roads.

He'd be using 35W and/or 494 to get there from pretty much any non-local location. If he's east of 35W he'd be going against traffic so I'm going to have to strongly disagree with you. Living east of 35W would be perfectly fine.

[Haver]

Its just generally a good idea not to take any side street that crosses 35W, its a traffic nightmare, or it has been for 66th and 76th streets. And with all the construction going on right now trying to cross it *anywhere* is problematic. When its not the 35W/62 construction delays there is some other, unrelated construction delay from Lake Street all the way south to at least 76th, and any route that *doesn't* have construction on that particular day is jammed from the commuters bottlenecked from the other crossings. MnDot just doesn't want anyone to go east to west or west to east in the south metro along a five mile stretch. I don't know why they do it that way, maybe the construction firms want to keep all their resources centralized so they can move them about easier.

Edit: For my previous post on apartment complexes, also avoid the former century-court complex on 76th and Lyndale. I don't know anything specific about it but its the same management (or was...mighta changed hands) and same age and history of maintainance and screening policys, etc. It might be good since I've never read anything bad about it, but since its two sister-complexes are ratholes I've read nasty stuff about and actually lived in once for a month then better safe than well, you know.