Philadelphia and Atlanta metro comparison (move to, great, time)

[rainrock]

Originally Posted by phase4

Hold your horses here...Northeast philly is not a dangerous place. Sheeshhhh. Stay above Cottman Ave and you'll be just fine.

Lived and worked in Philly 48 years. I know every neighborhood.

If your around long enough phase4 you'll hear several characters describe Philadelphia as one continuos ghetto.

[athensvaasi]

Can you provide information about property taxes in Montgomery county and Chester county. I would be looking at home price between 300K and 350K. Thanks.

[phase4]

Philly is easy knock, but those that do need to get out and about more. As far as big cities go, Philly is relatively safe. Northeast Philly has alwasy been working class, but it's seen better days, escpecially the lower Northeast. But I am watching some improvement in the general area. The renters are leaving now that the profits are gone and the houses that were left to fall apart are starting to get picked up by people who will actually own them. This is especially true in the Castor Gardens & Busteleton sections. The areas in Mayfair and Tacony have stabilized. The lower Frankford section is still questionable, but it improves as you go north.

Roxborough is very nice as well. South Philly is tight and you have to know the neighborhood to understand where to live.

Generally, in comparison to say, Baltimore, Chicago, Boston, Washington or Detroit, Philly is the best choice for a decent living standard.

IMHO

Oh, yea..Philly is one big ghetto if you've never been here.

[PacoMartin]

Originally Posted by athensvaasi

Can you provide information about property taxes in Montgomery county and Chester county. I would be looking at home price between 300K and 350K. Thanks.

Municipality rates vary by huge amounts in Pennsylvania. Purchase price for a home is of little value, because the houses are assessed at some earlier year (roughly 20 years ago) but even that differs from county to county. Newer homes are generally assessed as much more valuable than an older home.
What I suggest that you do is to print this sheet Municipality rates in Montgomery County. Use the table as a guide to see which places have high tax rates. Then look at the actual taxes in a few places on zillow.

[bryson662001]

Because it is a much newer city, Atlanta’s infrastructure outside the immediate core is suburban in nature. Philadelphia is a real urban city with miles and miles of tightly packed urban dwellings around it’s center before you start to see suburban type development with front yards and tree lined streets. and driveways. Philadelphia has a large downtown (compared to Atlanta) with many stores, restaurants, museums and other attractions besides just offices and where 100,000 people live in hi-rise apartment houses and town houses similar to what you would expect to find in NYC. Philadelphia’s suburbs, where your interest seems to be are very much like Atlanta’s except that everything will be older. Philadelphia’s closest suburbs outside the city look similar to Midtown in Atlanta . The city itself looks like this. Notice that most of the houses are attached in rows and face directly on the street.

[PacoMartin]

Originally Posted by bryson662001

Because it is a much newer city, Atlanta’s infrastructure outside the immediate core is suburban in nature. Philadelphia is a real urban city with miles and miles of tightly packed urban dwellings around it’s center before you start to see suburban type development with front yards and tree lined streets. and driveways.

Atlanta Metro is by far the largest in geographic area on the East Coast. If you look at the statistics, Atlanta and Philly metro have similar populations, but Philadelphia has about half the acreage.

Pop 2010
5,965,343 Philadelphia-Camden-Wilmington, PA-NJ-DE-MD :2.945 million acres
5,268,860 Atlanta-Sandy Springs-Marietta, GA :5.337 million acres
24,862,452 New York-Northern New Jersey-Long Island, NY-NJ-PA + Philadelphia-Camden-Wilmington, PA-NJ-DE-MD :7.225 million acres

Another way to look at the issue is that the combined Philadelphia/New York metro areas are 7.225 million acres (35% bigger than Atlanta metro) and has close to 25 million people (vs 5.3 million for Atlanta).

Of course, the commuter train system in South East Pennsylvania is much better than Atlanta. If you spend your money on a smaller house with easy access to a train station, your life will be much more pleasant.

[BajanYankee]

Atlanta in many ways is an extension of West Philly. I can walk through Lenox Mall on a Saturday afternoon and see about 6 people I went to high school with. There are some good hoagie and cheesesteak shops and barbershops in Atlanta started by Philly transplants.

If I'm not mistaken, Musiq Soulchild, Eve and a few other musicians from Philly now call Atlanta home.

[chris123678]

I think this would better fit the city vs city section of the forum.

[athensvaasi]

PacoMartin dug up my 6 year old thread, but feel free to contribute. The thread is still relevant to me!

edit/add: And I have visited Philadelphia and surrounding areas 3-4 times since this thread was started. Enjoyed it each time.

[gwillyfromphilly]

Originally Posted by athensvaasi

PacoMartin dug up my 6 year old thread, but feel free to contribute. The thread is still relevant to me!

edit/add: And I have visited Philadelphia and surrounding areas 3-4 times since this thread was started. Enjoyed it each time.

6 years is a long time.