Researching Other Places to Live

Wife commutes 75 miles a day, takes her about 40 minutes each way. But she's travelling clear across the city, and a little more.

Sky_Render wrote: I live just north of Hagerstown. So, yes, it does take me 45 minutes to get to work in the morning.

Move to Thurmont, cut your housing costs and commute time roughly in half.

I find it strange that everyone here seems to think I'm hiding something or that things "don't add up."

I haven't seen anyone indicate they think you're hiding anything. But a number of folk are familiar with the area, and don't see things the way you are describing them.

foxtrapper wrote: Move to Thurmont, cut your housing costs and commute time roughly in half.

I would consider that if I wanted to stay where I am. But the whole point of this is looking for another job elsewhere and wanting to get an idea of what housing costs and commute times would be for other locales.

I can tell you, living in Towson and driving to downtown (canton) Baltimore every day is interesting, some days it takes about 20 min to do about 18 miles others its been over 2 hours.

Only issue Is (and this is the issue I'm having) all the best jobs are closer to the cities and in turn means more traffic issues, now being an engineer there are probably plenty of opportunity's in outskirt suburbian towns (ellicot city, silver spring and the like) so just see what company's are where and plan from there

Wait, so you want to move and get another job, but you don't want to leave your general area

Sky, did you and pheller switch logins for the day or something?

By "general area," I mean Maryland/DC/Baltimore area. Or Virginia.

Geez, I just wanted advice on how to research places to live, and everyone gets on my case.

Sky_Render wrote: By "general area," I mean Maryland/DC/Baltimore area. Or Virginia. Geez, I just wanted advice on how to research places to live, and everyone gets on my case.

I think it's because people are confused by what you want, where you're trying to look, etc.

Datsun1500 wrote:

z31maniac wrote:

Sky_Render wrote: By "general area," I mean Maryland/DC/Baltimore area. Or Virginia. Geez, I just wanted advice on how to research places to live, and everyone gets on my case.

I think it's because people are confused by what you want, where you're trying to look, etc.

It's not confusing. He wants to find a place in the Baltimore/DC/NoVa area with a good job, cheap housing, and short commute. It doesn't exist, but that's what he's trying to find.

Confused by the impossible?

Sky_Render wrote: I live just north of Hagerstown. So, yes, it does take me 45 minutes to get to work in the morning. I find it strange that everyone here seems to think I'm hiding something or that things "don't add up."

I can't speak for everyone, but some of us don't want you gigolo'ing on our turf, unless we're getting our "managerial" fee.

Now, in the words of Walter White, "Stay out of my territory."

But seriously, I feel your pain. SWMBO and I are looking at jobs in Frederick, but only pay a little over 500 a month for our apartment in Hancock.

A move to Hagerstown or Williamsport means we will pay around 800 a month for a similar place, but we will save the difference in fuel costs...

If you can tolerate the job but hate the drive, paying more for housing is worthwhile.

Look around Mt. Airy on 70. You could always drive into Baltimore later if you found a job there.

If you hate the job and hate the drive, find a new job.

Datsun1500 wrote: It's not confusing. He wants to find a place in the Baltimore/DC/NoVa area with a good job, cheap housing, and short commute.

It's confusing to some of us because when suggestions for how to fix at least some of it are offered, he rejects them, saying that's not what he wants.

He's been given suggestions for how to explore things like housing and commutes, but rejects them and then complains because no one will tell him how to explore things like housing and commutes.

Sky, check your facebook messages.

It would also help to know what kind of engineer you are, and what kind of work you'd like to do. I'm not in your area so I can't provide much help (if you wanted to move to Minneapolis my engineering firm has been doing tons of hiring recently) but others may be more local.

Datsun1500 wrote: It's not confusing. He wants to find a place in the Baltimore/DC/NoVa area with a good job, cheap housing, and short commute. It doesn't exist, but that's what he's trying to find.

Agreed. I have lived in Frederick since 1966. The good jobs exist in the area but are not anywhere near cheap housing and will require a long commute from that cheap housing.

Yesterdays local paper had a article about rental cost in Frederick County. Of the 24 counties in MD Frederick ranks 6th highest in median rental cost ($1209/month). Interestingly the county ranks 21st in the percentage of people who are paying more than 35% of their income for rent.

Racer1ab lives in Hancock and said moving 25 miles south to Hagerstown would raise his rent from $500 to $800. Moving another 25 miles south will raise his rent another ~$400.

As Foxtrapper has said there are parts of Frederick County where the rents are lower but that will still mean a 15-20 mile commute into the City of Frederick. I know, I did that for 28 years.