Advice needed: Emmaus, Schwenksville, Perkiomenville, Cooperburg areas? (Philadelphia, Allentown: mortgage, houses)

[AutumnSunset]

Hello everyone,

I have posted here before and found you replies very helpful. I am now looking to buy a house around late July. The areas I am looking at are Emmaus, Schwenksvillle, Perkiomenville, and Coopersburg. Any other suggestions are welcomed as well.

I am looking to be about a hour and a half max from Philadelphia, anywhere north or northeast of Philly.

I am looking for a rural area with a small farmette, but not all the way out in the boondocks. Any area that has about 2 + acres really, where animals are ok...a horse, a goat, some ducks, etc. I am not looking for a large farm.

My major concern is safety. I will be living alone so the safest places are my top priority.

I need something with a daily manageable commute to Philadelphia.

I am looking for property that is below $300,000.00 and taxes below $5,000.00.

I am currently retiring from one career and will be attending school in Philadelphia to become an RN and then working after.

[AutumnSunset]

I am on an iPad so I didn't get to finish my post but I wanted to say thank you in advance. Also I hope I am in the right forum.

Thanks again.

[AutumnSunset]

P.S. I am looking for areas that are middle to upper middle class.

[toobusytoday]

Frankly, I don't know if you can get that much land for $300,000 within that distance of Philadelphia. I would contact a Realtor and get your hands on the MLS service. In my area, near Coopersburg you can get a house for $300,000 but it's likely to be on less then one acre or it's going to be something that needs some work. I'm sure they are out there, but the amount of land you want is hard to come by in a middle to upper class area. In Southern Lehigh School district (Coopersburg) middle class homes start at $250,000 on 1/2 acre lots.

[Pa Dutch]

For that price range and amount of land, you may need to go further out from Philly. You could however try the Bally and Bechteslville areas of Berks county. You are pushing your 90 minute limit, but land is a bit cheaper there.

Possibly northern bucks county areas like upper black eddy and kintersville, but again, 90 minutes to Philly might be a stretch.

[AutumnSunset]

Thank you for the responses. Could you tell me or rank the locations I listed from most safest areas (or more desirable) to least? Also Macungie is also in the mix.

[toobusytoday]

I don't know Schwenksville or Perkiomenville at all so can't really comment. I live right outside of Coopersburg and we chose it very intentionally after looking at houses for a year and chose it over Emmaus, but we did that for our own reasons, mainly the school district. It will be difficult to find available land in Emmaus and Macungie because that area of the county went through a massive housing boom within the last ten years, but if you can find something, all are nice and safe places to live. Really, safety-wise all of the places on your list are great. They're small towns. Of the ones you listed, I think Emmaus has the nicest downtown.

I agree with looking Northwest of Philly instead of Northeast. You are looking at the some of the more affluent areas of the state when you stick to the the Eastern border because people that work in Philly and NYC live there. Berks county is beautiful, but to get affordable you have to go out a bit.

[alexiskai]

Something to remember when you're budgeting this stuff: if gas is $4/gal, and your car gets 25 mpg, and you commute every weekday, i.e. 250 days a year, and if your commute is 60 mi., which is roughly the distance from Emmaus to central Philly, that's ~ $5000/yr in gas. If you only get 20 mpg, it would be $6,000/yr. That's $500 a month on top of your mortgage payments.

So it's true that the price of land decreases as you get farther away from Philly, but the price of travel increases. And we haven't even included the increases in gas expenditures because your grocery store will likely be farther away, your hardware store, leisure activities, etc.

(price of gas)/(mpg) * (distance of commute) * (500 trips/yr) = annual cost of gas just for commuting

[Pa Dutch]

You can easily purchase a house in the areas you mentioned in that price range, but the amount of property is an issue. You might get lucky and find a fixer upper with the land and price, but it isn't the norm.

Schwenksille, perkiomenville and macungie are safest. Emmaus is also safe, but it isn't as rural as the other areas, and it does border Allentown.

[AutumnSunset]

Thank you for your responses. I am taking it all into consideration.

Any thoughts on Boyertown?