Where to live in Delaware County, PA? (Philadelphia, Chester: high crime, house prices)

[pauljhester]

I currently live and work in Delaware, but plan on moving to Delaware County, PA in the next year. The main reason is that I want to be closer to Philadelphia, but be able to commute to Delaware for work. I have heard good things about the Media area, but there are so many bureaus and townships, that its hard to narrow things down.

Here is my criteria:

1) Within a 30 minute commute to Wilmington, DE.
2) Within a 10 - 15 minute drive to Philadelphia.
3) Average homes ranging from $200,000 - $300,000.
4) Preferably a town where there is some sort of nightlife.
5) No urban or high crime areas.

Someone previously provided me the list below thinking that these towns might meet my distance criteria, but I am unclear as to what the following towns are like. Any insight would be helpful. Feel free to comment on the towns below and or suggest any other towns. Thank you.

Haverford
Marple
Media
Middletown
Morton
Nether Providence
Upper Providence
Newtown
Rose Valley Springfield
Swarthmore

[toobusytoday]

Media. It's the only town with a sort of night life from those choices. A better choice IMHO would be in West Chester, Chester County. Actually, I don't think you can get to Philadelphia in less then 30 minutes, probably more, from either of those places. The nightlife and distance have me stumped. Not sure you can have both of them.

[Sassygirl18]

Media's awesome but you won't find a lot of houses in the $200-$300K range.

[chessimprov]

Your best bet is to live near a piece of nightlife and be willing to commute to it for your price range, so places near Media may be suitable.

Haverford- has some interesting places such as Head Nut and probably others I don't know about

Marple- nice suburb, great school district, I like the people there a lot
Media- already answered
Middletown- don't know
Morton- seems quite working class, but still a safe area.
Nether Providence- don't know about
Upper Providence- don't know about
Newtown- same as Marple, and they are next to each other
Rose Valley- not sure on specifics, but they share a school district with Media, so I expect prices to be pretty close to Media.
Springfield- you might find something small worth considering, nearby malls
Swarthmore- most places very expensive. there might be a bit of a nightlife cause of the university, but if there is, certainly not as big as Media. at least you got the nearby malls

[alisat]

Middletown and Upper Providence are part of the Media area - as defined by the Rose Tree Media School District. Middletown is pretty spread out - further to the south and west in Media - borders Aston/Concordville areas. Upper Providence is the northern/eastern part of Media - borders Broomall, Marple, Springfield. When people talk about the "walkable" part of Media - the Trader Joes, restaurant and shops part of Media - they are talking about Media Borough. Although for example I could walk into the borough from where I live in Upper Providence - but that's just b/c of the proximity of my home - can't be said about all areas of UP or Middletown. Media has a number of nice restaurants and bars for nightlife. They also have a number of "themed" nights where all the bars/restaurants have live entertainment of a genre - the weekend of 10/17 was Jazz after Dark and all the restaurants and bars had jazz entertainers. On Wednesdays during the summer they have dining under the stars and they close off State Street and the restaurants set up tables on the sidewalks and street and people dine al fresco. Very nice. Also, in addition to the restaurants/bars there are very nice little shops - kind of artsy - and crunchy. And they have lots of family friendly activities - today there was a halloween parade - there's a Christmas Parade - and they have all sorts of street fairs.
Location wise, you could technically get into Philly in under twenty minutes - without traffic and if you were heading to the airport. To actually get to center city you're looking at closer to 30 - but then again, you're also looking at under two hours to get to OC if you go to the Jersey shore. And, frankly of the places you've listed above, Media's probably the closest/quickest ride into Phila. You could be in Wilmington in under 30 minutes.
In general, the schools are very good here. The people are terrific. The house prices are fair for the area - you could find something in your price range - but it might be on the smaller side and/or need a fair amount of work. But again, I don't think you'd find homes in the other areas you've listed that would be significantly lower priced.

Hope that helps. Good luck. Come check out Media.

[Boompa]

Originally Posted by pauljhester

I currently live and work in Delaware, but plan on moving to Delaware County, PA in the next year. The main reason is that I want to be closer to Philadelphia, but be able to commute to Delaware for work. I have heard good things about the Media area, but there are so many bureaus and townships, that its hard to narrow things down.

Here is my criteria:

1) Within a 30 minute commute to Wilmington, DE.
2) Within a 10 - 15 minute drive to Philadelphia.
3) Average homes ranging from $200,000 - $300,000.
4) Preferably a town where there is some sort of nightlife.
5) No urban or high crime areas.

Someone previously provided me the list below thinking that these towns might meet my distance criteria, but I am unclear as to what the following towns are like. Any insight would be helpful. Feel free to comment on the towns below and or suggest any other towns. Thank you.

Haverford
Marple
Media
Middletown
Morton
Nether Providence
Upper Providence
Newtown
Rose Valley Springfield
Swarthmore

None of the above with the criteria given Springfield Delco or Ridley maybe

[chessimprov]

Oh yeah, I didn't read the one part carefully "average homes." You'd have to settle for a smaller place and not be too choosy.

[SXMGirl]

I rented in Rutledge for a while and loved it. There is no night life, but you are in walking distance to the train. I just looked at Realtor.com and found a great house for 285. Most are Victorians, some in the original condition. If I could get my husband to leave DE, we would be looking at that home. It is a safe area (I would not be looking at Morton) and only has about 600 residents. It took me less than 30 minutes to drive to my job in DE and is only about 20 minutes into Philly by train. Near the airport and you can walk to Baltimore Pike if you don't want to drive.

[daboywonder2002]

im late here. but if you wanna be closer to philly. why not just move to claymont delaware? they have some nice houses there

[gr33nboy]

lansdowne is not on your list. but it should be. granted, some homes hover at the low end of your range, but it is an amazing 1-mile square burough that is really proactive, civic-minded, and full of the arts. it has a lot of older, larger victorian style homes, but for much less than the areas mentioned above.

drive to center city in 12 minutes. the train takes 16 minutes to downtown, and 8 minutes to the University of Pennsylvania stop...with tons of great nightlife. and you can reach the airport in less than 20. for a small borough, they have their own symphony orchestra, arts festival, film group, theatre group, great live music events, farmer's market and it is a no place for hate. it was rated a top place to live in 2007. the local cafe won a best-of last year in the philadelphia region.

i'm partial because i lived there for a couple years. miss it tremendously. people will claim city-creep, but just not true. culture-creep, maybe. close to the city, but not in it.

want more info? write me at Moderator Cut: Posting a private e-mail address on a public forum is not recommended.
thanks.