Where to Live in Oakland if Working in Downtown SF? (Piedmont: rentals, neighborhoods)

[checkup]

What areas/buildings? What range of rent am I looking at?

Looking for a place that is within 30min by either BART or car, and is itself a nice area to live (lots to do and see, vibrant, safe, etc.)

Rent range can go as high as 3k/month, but I'm considering the move because rents in Oakland appear to be 1/2 of SF; so I'm optimistically thinking 1.5-2k/month

[mayorhaggar]

For BART access, mainly only Rockridge and the Temescal, but stay east of Telegraph in the Temescal. Lake Merritt is cool but the nice areas to live are mainly north or east of the lake which is pretty far from BART, but you can always take a Transbay Bus or suck it up and walk to the LM station. Piedmont Ave is decent too but also kind of a hike from BART, but there's buses there too. For rents, I dunno, everytime I look at Oakland rentals it seems like there's less inventory than there used to be, and prices are definitely higher. Should be able to get a 1 or 2br in these parts of Oakland for around $1200 to $2000...Rockridge would be most expensive, and Lake Merritt the least expensive of the areas I listed.

Also check out the casual carpool system, it's good for getting to downtown SF in the morning for free or $1 a ride, saves you $$$ in the long run. Then at night you can take BART back home.

[jade408]

The Transbay Bus is a great commute. You always get a seat, and the view on the bridge is nice. Way more enjoyable than BART during commute times. So you don't need to live really close to BART in order to commute to downtown. Personally, I live in Piedmont Ave. I used to commute to SF and took the bus or casual carpool.

[ssmaster]

i think The Grand between uptown and lake merrit would be pretty nice
The Grand Luxury Rentals
4 blocks to bart
2 blocks to lake merrit
with in 2 blocks of hawker fare,ozumo, plum ,ikes sandwiches, bakesale betty,lukas, pican.(i'm getting hungry listing these places)
walking distance to whole foods.

[ssmaster]

Originally Posted by jade408

The Transbay Bus is a great commute. You always get a seat, and the view on the bridge is nice. Way more enjoyable than BART during commute times. So you don't need to live really close to BART in order to commute to downtown. Personally, I live in Piedmont Ave. I used to commute to SF and took the bus or casual carpool.

i wish you hadn't mentioned the transbay buses with ample comfortable seating and wifi access.let's keep that on the down low.

the idea that some neighborhoods have a bus that does a loop in the neighborhood and then heads directly to sf financial district with plenty of seats and wifi access.not that great .forget you read about it .just move along.

[jade408]

Originally Posted by ssmaster

i think The Grand between uptown and lake merrit would be pretty nice
The Grand Luxury Rentals
4 blocks to bart
2 blocks to lake merrit
with in 2 blocks of hawker fare,ozumo, plum ,ikes sandwiches, bakesale betty,lukas, pican.(i'm getting hungry listing these places)
walking distance to whole foods.

The Grand has no AC. 16 floors and faces the sun. Oh and the front desk people are really rude. So you would be pretty hot all year round. When I toured the Grand, the place was a little warm, and it was around this time of year.

Try the Uptown, I hear they are nicer. Or Domain by Alta.

[ssmaster]

Originally Posted by jade408

The Grand has no AC. 16 floors and faces the sun. Oh and the front desk people are really rude. So you would be pretty hot all year round. When I toured the Grand, the place was a little warm, and it was around this time of year.

Try the Uptown, I hear they are nicer. Or Domain by Alta.

i did not know about that
domain by alta seems really nice but the area is not as lively as the area around the grand.

[jade408]

The block the grand is on is pretty quiet at night. Heading a little more west is better.