Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
Yes. I don't want more than a 15 or 20 minute drive with traffic included.
Don't move to Atlanta. :-)
I'm very lucky, because my commute is a grand total of 8 minutes, door to door. I am very much an anomaly, though, as most people are thinking in terms of 30-45 minutes for commutes.
I thought I was going to stay in Indianapolis permanently last year. The office park I was going off of one of the most congested exit ramps in the entire metro. Any place that I looked at had traffic as probably the top choice. I do not want to spend an hour each way idling.
I'm in a town of 50,000 in Tennessee now that only has light traffic for a little bit after 5 in certain areas of town. I wouldn't buy a home in the city I work in for various reasons, but traffic is negligible so not a consideration really.
I've always considered the commute when deciding where to live. I would rather have less space and have that short commute.
One thing to look for when you are considering the commute from any location is whether you have to drive past any schools. Believe me, this can end up being a major quagmire. I pass 2 schools down on a 2-mile stretch of local road. Since my commute is only about 12-15 minutes, the back-up down this road doesn't add THAT much to my trip. On some mornings it just feels like it does though.
Anyway, if you happen to be looking at homes on the weekends, you might want to make a point of checking out the neighborhood during morning and evening commute times. What seems like an easy commute when you're there on a Saturday, might actually be rather ugly on a weekday morning, with the right (or wrong) variables.
Anyway, if you happen to be looking at homes on the weekends, you might want to make a point of checking out the neighborhood during morning and evening commute times. ...
That's what I did. I started at the front door at 8:00 on a Monday morning and drove to work.
You have to, anything over 40 min is too much. We used to live in Darwin, Australia, and used to commute around 45 minutes, now that we moved to an apartment in Sydney our commute is down to 15 min, and it is great.
Yes, this is a significant factor for me. I won't do longer than a 30 minute commute, and any chance of a big traffic jam on a regular basis is a huge no. I also like when there is a grocery store along my commute. My day-to-day to do list is easier when I can pick up a few items on the way home from work.
My sanity is important to me. It doesn't take much to tip things in a bad direction.
I pity those who sit in traffic Every Day, even if it is only ten minutes a day.
Before I retired, my daily commute was sixteen miles each way on winding back roads in a Corvette. Hardly ever saw traffic, and this was during normal commute hours.
I just have to look at the haggard face of my 15 years younger colleague recently hired at our urban/downtown area firm who has a 60 miles each way commute in brutal Southern California traffic to know the answer to that question. Poor guy got laid off from a firm where he lives and where his wife has a sales territory towards an urban area in another direction, now has to suffer 1 1/2 hours (if he is lucky) to frequently 2 1/2+ hour commutes, EACH WAY, EVERY DAY!!! He is brutally honest in revealing how much his marriage and relationship with his kids is suffering.
I feel extremely lucky to have bought in a forgotten, rough around the edges urban neighborhood with a great historic housing stock 20 years ago that, in no small part to its central location, gentrified tremendously in a few years where small cottages like mine go for a princely sum. We can walk, bike, transit or a cheap Uber to just about all big city activities, and both of our commutes are about six miles away; 2-3 miles on busy freeway commuter traffic, with options for surface street routes readily available, for a 12 minute commute each way. It was all dumb luck and circumstances with our careers but I would never buy a place with a long- especially in Southern California- daily car commute (I could handle an hour transit commute if it was convenient.)
I still have to deal with traffic while on business trips to work sites - will have to leave here at 3:30AM on Monday morning to get to Beverly Hills at 6:00 for a site visit to a project, and then off to Inglewood for another- dealing with LA traffic, BLECHH!!! Fortunately it's a rare event but brutal enough for me to appreciate that I don't have to suffer through that every day.
Please register to post and access all features of our very popular forum. It is free and quick. Over $68,000 in prizes has already been given out to active posters on our forum. Additional giveaways are planned.
Detailed information about all U.S. cities, counties, and zip codes on our site: City-data.com.
Please register to participate in our discussions with 2 million other members - it's free and quick! Some forums can only be seen by registered members. After you create your account, you'll be able to customize options and access all our 15,000 new posts/day with fewer ads.
