Recommendations on where to live, hobbies? Job moving Lynnwood, $73k/yr (Seattle: apartment, skateboarding)

[fillmore241]

Hey - can you help recommend west coast lifestyle choices for me? Primarily, I need a place to live. Secondarily, I need to figure out what hobbies are/are not financially viable. Single male, $73k salary.

Interests:
- Lots of hobbies, and so quite a bit of material stuff
- I like rural places and outdoors activities (free?)
- Will need friends in the area (free)
- I like concerts ($20), skateboarding (free?), other "hipster" things (free?)
- Firearm enthusiast ($10-$20/hr)
- Like playing guitar (free)
- Like working on my cars ($$)
- Probably will pick up surfing ($$ cost to get to coast?)
- From Adirondacks in NY, huge fan of mountains, trees, and quiet scenery (free)

Ideally, I'd buy/rent a cheap house in a mountainous "middle-of-nowhere": Play guitar / start a band and not bother neighbors. Legally/Safely shoot guns off the back porch. Also w/ easy rush hour commute to Lynnwood. Easy off-hour commute to Seattle (skateboarding) or the coast (surfing) on weekends.

What is realistic? I realize there's no best of all worlds, so I'm open to creative suggestions. E.g.; Move to Seattle proper, downsize (sell) things, "opposite" rush hour commute to work, offers skateboarding and social life, drive to the middle of nowhere when I need to get away from the business.

Is anything I'm mentioning outlandishly expensive or a huge pain in the neck (surfing / taking the ferries?)

[amaiunmei]

What city will you live in?

What city will you work in?

What is your commute tolerance (i.e., the longest commute you can stand)?

Is that comment about shooting guns off the back porch real?

[fillmore241]

Not sure where to live (or if I need roommates)

Working in Lynnwood.

Currently takes me 45 minutes to commute my 10 miles in DC :-(. I can continue that if necessary; but 20 minutes would be lovely.

Originally Posted by amaiunmei

Is that comment about shooting guns off the back porch real?

It was serious, but maybe not realistic. I don't know the area so I figured I'd throw it out there and see what people said. It actually happens in rural NY and WV. I've always heard that Washington has really rural areas, so I wasn't sure if that's a thing there (or if it's socially unacceptable). I'd prefer not to freak anyone out.

[lucy1965]

Originally Posted by fillmore241

It was serious, but maybe not realistic. I don't know the area so I figured I'd throw it out there and see what people said. It actually happens in rural NY and WV. I've always heard that Washington has really rural areas, so I wasn't sure if that's a thing there (or if it's socially unacceptable). I'd prefer not to freak anyone out.

Start here: Recreational Shooting Snohomish County

[amaiunmei]

Originally Posted by fillmore241

Not sure where to live (or if I need roommates)

Working in Lynnwood.

Currently takes me 45 minutes to commute my 10 miles in DC :-(. I can continue that if necessary; but 20 minutes would be lovely.



It was serious, but maybe not realistic. I don't know the area so I figured I'd throw it out there and see what people said. It actually happens in rural NY and WV. I've always heard that Washington has really rural areas, so I wasn't sure if that's a thing there (or if it's socially unacceptable). I'd prefer not to freak anyone out.

I asked because you can definitely get more of a rural feel if you want, but the commute tolerance has to be relatively high for it to make sense.

Live in Snohomish County, for certain. If you want a shorter commute, stick to the western side of the county (Lynnwood, Mukilteo if you want water views, and/or Everett) as the aforementioned cities are all on major transportation corridors. However, if you want a more rural feel, head east. Maltby, Monroe, and Snohomish would be other good options.

If you were serious about your gun comment, my advice would be to live in or near Tulalip (near Marysville). The tribal lands tend to be heavily wooded.

Hope that helps!

[Ira500]

The town of Snohomish sounds like it might fit. Fairly easy commute to Lynnwood. Lots of farmland and woods around. Not quite so rural that there's nothing to do( there are restaurants, bars, bakeries, etc) but it's not suburbia.

[homesinseattle]

Monroe would be a good fit. Affordable, commuting options, easily reachable to mountains.

[fillmore241]

Thanks! This has been really helpful. Snohomish sounds great. I'll see what I can find.

Shooting excluded, would that open up any more urban/suburban suggestions?

Renting/buying a house is what I'm mainly thinking so I can play music loudly and work on my cars if needed.
- Is it hard to find houses for rent here?
- Any value in buying (less expensive than DC) versus renting (as expensive as DC)?
- What is the approximate cost / month in areas you're recommending? (is Seattle proper much more expensive than Snohomish?)

[CrazyDonkey]

As has been mentioned, commuting from Monroe, Snohomish, etc., can be difficult. Highway 2 is a mess.

Being able to fire guns off your back porch (which I take to be a desire to live in a rural area with no close neighbors) and "friends in the area" are somewhat contradictory, unless talking about buddies made at the gun range. How many cars will you need to work on? If interested in a dating-social scene, concerts, skateparks, "hipster" gathering places, etc., you don't want to be marooned out in the sticks. Throw in the desire for less than a soul-destroying commute and more than just one something's got to give.

I'd suggest renting a house (I'd say apartment, if not for the "working on cars" thing) in the general Lynnwood area, itself, and then use it as a base for exploring where else you might want to live, what kind of social mix you want, what are and aren't doable commutes, and what activities you might want to be closer to. Realize that the Puget Sound area and the Adirondacks area of Upper NY are very different places.

Note: You can live in more urban areas here and still not be more than one to three hours (if traveling outside peak commute periods) from mountains (hiking, camping, climbing, downhill skiing, cross-country skiing, snowshoeing, off-roading, etc.) and water (the coast, the Sound, lakes, etc., for surfing, swimming, fishing, kayaking, canoeing, sailing, boating, etc.). The best surfing is at Westport, which is about 145 miles from Lynnwood - the quickest route is straight down I-5, then west on SR-8/US-12.

[mkarch]

Lynnwood hobbies?

Get a Camaro and soup it up.