Moving to Medford/Ashland Phoenix/Talent Questions (Central Point, White City: house, school districts)

[JKA]

We are planning to move to the Ashland/Medford area. Phoenix and Talent seem to have very low housing prices. Are there problems with these towns? Flood Plain, Crime, Cattle Feed Lots, Paper Factory, wrong side of the tracks ???

Thanks

[PNW-type-gal]

I'm not sure I'd call Talent's housing prices low (for city properties you are looking in the +300k region, anything less is probably 1,000sf or less and in so-so shape), but it is on the edge of Ashland and that keeps prices up. Over the years both cities have become basically "bedroom" communities for Medford and Ashland, but that is not at all how they started. Talent has a very small but cute "central town" section along Talent Ave, Phoenix is just lined up along Hwy 99.

I-5 is quite close and anything on the east side of Hwy 99 (Pacific Ave) is going to have highway noise. The lumber mills (there are no paper mills) are in north Medford/Central Point. You can go up on FEMA's website to look at flood maps, but in the last 70 years there have been 2 floods, both of which were sort of "perfect storm" events. Flooding is not usually an issue unless you live right on one of the smaller creeks.

Areas to avoid: much of west Medford (west of I-5), parts of White City, parts of Central Point. Most of Talent and Phoenix and Ashland are fine, along with much of East Medford. If you have kids in school (or soon to be in school) there are certainly better school districts.

Where to pick depends on a lot of things. Ashland has a lot of amenities but it carries a huge price premium for them. It is nice in that it doesn't have a lot of big-box type stores, most things are local, but that also means expensive - a lot of the stores in the Plaza area are geared toward deeper pockets. If you look around and the amenities are not the type you are looking for, then the price premium might not be worth it. If you like what Ashland has to offer, then it is a great pick - lots of things are just a quick walk away. The price premium for a small older house in Ashland near everything, compared to a small older house in a nice part of East Medford starts at around +$150,000 and goes up rapidly.