Edwardsville area vs towns near St peters,mo (St. Louis, St. Charles: for sale, to rent)

[bernerscotty]

Looking for nice town near Edwardsville with plenty to do,somewhat open-minded. Need areas that are easy to maneuver with many things to do. Retirees
Any ideas appreciated!

[flynavyj]

Hmph, around Edwardsville…nearest would be Alton, IL. But further south maybe Shiloh, O’Fallon, or Belleville, IL.

In Illinois, things get rural pretty quick. That may be what you’re looking for, and if looking for a real “small town” vibe, maybe even Milstadt, IL would fit the bill. I don’t really hang out in those areas much, used to ride through many of them when i had a motorcycle, but otherwise they’ve never been on my “chart”.

Near St. Peter’s, MO (obviously on the opposite side of St. Louis) you could find more options. O’Fallon, MO is a massive area, but has stuff to do, Cottleville could definitely work as well. Old town St. Charles may be the best bet for things to do, mom&pop small shopping, and restaurants, live music, and festivals. If i was retiring and wanting to be near more “activities” that would likely be my top pick.

If you’d like a “stepford wives” vibe for a living community, you could always check out New Town in St. Charles, MO…it’s north of St. Charles by a little bit, but they have a historic “mainstreet” vibe down their canal street, some shops, wine bars, a couple restaurants, amphitheater, and activities for residents. Folks do kayak and fish in the lakes in the subdivision, and houses are often smaller and could work well for a retiree (small yards, minimal cutting, etc). But don’t know if a “planned” community like that would fit your desires or not.

[bernerscotty]

Thank you for the input!

[STL74]

While open minded and St. Charles county just don’t go together, I do think Old St. Charles is very cool and would be a decent choice to buy a house and retire in walking distance. In St. Louis county, Kirkwood, Webster, and Maplewood offer those downtown type areas where you can find things to do. Kirkwood would have the most to do.

I don’t know enough about Illinois suburbs. I’ve always felt like Edwardsville is the nicest IL suburb, but Alton has a super cute downtown area too and I think there are some marinas on that part of the Mississippi if you are in to boating.

[MUTGR]

Originally Posted by bernerscotty

Looking for nice town near Edwardsville with plenty to do,somewhat open-minded. Need areas that are easy to maneuver with many things to do. Retirees
Any ideas appreciated!

I was in Edwardsville today. Nice town, Why not in Edwardsville, rather than near Edwardsville?

Lots of people prefer Missouri for lower taxes, etc., but if you want to live in Illinois Edwardsville is a nice area.

[SnazzyB]

Originally Posted by flynavyj

Hmph, around Edwardsville…nearest would be Alton, IL. But further south maybe Shiloh, O’Fallon, or Belleville, IL.

In Illinois, things get rural pretty quick. That may be what you’re looking for, and if looking for a real “small town” vibe, maybe even Milstadt, IL would fit the bill. I don’t really hang out in those areas much, used to ride through many of them when i had a motorcycle, but otherwise they’ve never been on my “chart”.

Near St. Peter’s, MO (obviously on the opposite side of St. Louis) you could find more options. O’Fallon, MO is a massive area, but has stuff to do, Cottleville could definitely work as well. Old town St. Charles may be the best bet for things to do, mom&pop small shopping, and restaurants, live music, and festivals. If i was retiring and wanting to be near more “activities” that would likely be my top pick.

If you’d like a “stepford wives” vibe for a living community, you could always check out New Town in St. Charles, MO…it’s north of St. Charles by a little bit, but they have a historic “mainstreet” vibe down their canal street, some shops, wine bars, a couple restaurants, amphitheater, and activities for residents. Folks do kayak and fish in the lakes in the subdivision, and houses are often smaller and could work well for a retiree (small yards, minimal cutting, etc). But don’t know if a “planned” community like that would fit your desires or not.

The nice thing about New Town is...their activities, shops, stores, etc are accessible by walking. And it's right close to St. Charles, and maybe 20 minutes from Alton, IL Alton is a cool town, IMO.

[tw71]

Hi! For what it's worth? I just moved to Alton, IL about a year and a half ago. (Lived out in Western Maryland for 8 years or so before that, but wanted to move back to the St. Louis, MO general area since that's where I was born and raised.)


Alton, IL wasn't even on my radar initially. But as I started talking to realtor friends when I was getting ready to move, I discovered Alton was kind of a "little known hot-spot" for inexpensive smaller houses. My goal was to buy something with cash that I could get moved in to, and then to spend time and money fixing it up over the next year. I'd say that with a $50,000 or so budget, you can easily find properties in Alton that need some work, but are worth fixing up. If the total cost to renovate it winds up setting you back another $30-40,000? You're still going to break even or come out a bit ahead, as far as what it would sell for when you're done.


There are a number of nicer, larger properties for sale too, if you have a larger budget and a "fixer-upper" isn't your speed.


Alton is definitely working hard to revitalize their downtown area. In just the time that I've lived here, I've seen new places open such as "Flock" (a food truck park that's in the first of several phases of construction). Right now, it's basically a decoratively lit lot with a large garage structure on it. Up to 4 food trucks at a time can pay to rent slots to offer their food there, and they have a small bar in the garage area with tables and chairs set up. Eventually, they're supposed to try to add some green space around it like a real park setting for people.


The first Christmas I was there, they had 4th. street all lit up with Christmas lights, courtesy of Netflix. They'd just won some kind of contest Netflix does where they pick several smaller cities or towns to come in and decorate for the holidays.


Other notable places include "Post Commons", a coffee house they made out of their old post office downtown and Bluff City Grill (a really nice restaurant and bar that has their own parking garage, with the upper deck often used for live concerts and special events or weddings). Old Bakery beer company (in the old Colonial bread bakery) is also good, and they have a mini museum of some of the Colonial bread days inside it.


To be honest with you? I find Alton to be a polar opposite of a place like Cottleville, MO though. I have friends who live in Cottleville and am very familiar with it. Cottleville does have a nice little downtown strip of restaurants and a new outdoor wine bar. But it has more of your "cookie cutter" subdivisions of newer homes and they recently declared it a "golf cart community", widening the sidewalks so golf carts can travel on them. It has some serious parking issues in its "entertainment district" and you'll see they don't get a lot of outsiders going to their restaurants or shops for that reason. On a busy Saturday night, you'll likely see cars circling around repeatedly, looking for that one open parking space, and people dropping their friends off in their golf carts. IMO, Cottleville really only got built up in the early 1990's, by younger people who wanted to move west of St. Louis to buy a brand new "starter home" and start/raise families there. Now, many of those people are old enough so their kids grew up and moved out, so they've got a growing interest in the town adding things to keep them occupied/entertained. (The focus there used to really be on its schools for the kids.)

[tw71]

I also wanted to mention IL and taxes, since that *always* comes up!


When I lived in Missouri, people constantly trash-talked life on the IL side of the river because of the "high taxes". What I've actually found has been a bit different. It's terrible if you live someplace like Chicago, with their huge sales tax on everything and high property taxes, etc. But in a place like Alton (part of Madison County, IL)? It's much more reasonable. They let me pay my property tax in 4 monthly installments from September-December, vs demanding it all in one lump payment. (Unlike Missouri, they don't charge personal property tax on your vehicles either. You do pay more for tags and titling them, but seems like a wash to me.) And when I got the letter in the mail saying my vehicle was due for an inspection, it was free of charge. Gasoline was traditionally more expensive in IL than MO, but Alton is so close to the MO border, it was never a big issue to just drive across the bridge to one of several gas stations right on the other side. And in the current situation? With IL freezing their usual gas tax increases through the end of the year, it has made prices really comparable to prices in St. Louis. I started buying gas locally for the first time.

[takemeaway60]

I'm interested in Ste Genevieve, MO area for my retirement. Son lives in Troy, MO. So want to be close to him. Wentzville looks good, Weldon Springs. O'Fallen, St. Peters, St. Charles is too congested for me. That area has lots of trails, bike paths and still close to city living.