Neighborhhod stereotypes (Seattle, Issaquah: for sale, house, neighborhood)

[sean98125]

Originally Posted by Ira500

Ballard: Old Stereotype: Elderly Scandanavians driving an old Buick at 5 MPH with the seat belt dragging outside the car, and cheap restaurants specializing in bland boiled vegetables.
New stereotype: Younger folks driving newer Volvos, and expensive restaurants specializing in free range wild harvested Pan Asian fusion sorrel in a raspberry creme fraiche.

How about "Younger folks driving around at 5 mph while talking on the phone and checking email on their blackberry."

[allforcats]

Guess it's time to think about dinner.... wonder what's fraiche today?

free range wild harvested Pan Asian fusion sorrel in a raspberry creme fraiche.

Be still my heart!! Have I told you today, Ira, how much I love you??

[Woof]

-Belltown: trendy young people, artists, welfare people and some addicts.

-First Hill: driveover land between Downtown and Capitol Hill. Harborview Hospital, good place to go if you are having a heart attack, have been shot, or were mangled in an accident. Very nice cathedral there. Generally younger people live there, as rents are slightly lower than some other areas.

-Capitol Hill: Qu**r Capital, Mutant Quarter.

-Downtown (Pioneer Square) Bums 'n' execs. Tourists. Not many people actually live in Pioneer Square itself.

-International District - Bums 'n' immigrants.


-Issiquah: family place. Outdoorsy people, lots of good hiking and I assume good biking. A considerable amount of big box shopping.

-Northgate: families and boring people.

-Tacoma: bone thugs and gangs. Some gentrification. I think it's nicer on the outskirts, or so I've heard.

[ElektroDragon]

How could the home of the Museum of Glass have thugs and gangs? It looked nice when I visited. What are "bone thugs" anyway?

[Woof]

The Museum of Glass has anti-thug powers?

A bone thug is an especially hardcore thug.

[70Ford]

Issaquah is really, really White. As in White People. There are 3 kids in my son's class who aren't Causasian or are 1/2 and 1/2 like my boy.

Three.

Coming from Atlanta....it's quite a change. Heck, in my high school in South Georgia, it was like 40 percent white, 40 percent black, 20 percent hispanic and one asian girl.

Issaquah is not the first place I've seen a teen driving a BMW. It is the first place I've lived where it seems EVERY teen drives a BMW, Mercedes or Porsche. Or at least a pretty nice, new car.

It's sort of wild to realize that quite a few of your neighbors make $100,000 or more a year....on a single income.

[Condorll]

Originally Posted by 70Ford

It's sort of wild to realize that quite a few of your neighbors make $100,000 or more a year....on a single income.

Most people here do, don't you?

[CFiona]

i'll give it a shot...I've lived here 12 years (I'm 27 now)

-Belltown - restauratns and clubs on 1st Ave, most apts i know of are on 4th and are $$$ but mostly 20s and 30s live here to have access to clubs and bars. Bars here are know to be more "dressy"
-Downtwon Bellevue - there is no real nightlife in Bellevue, the mall closes at like 10 and most restaurants do to, so no dancing or anything, so living in downtown is sort of weird...but i'm sure if you do its $$$ (like $1200/month for 1 bedroom)
-Bellevue (crossroads) - I'd agree with the Russian comment from before, but its in a nice clean way. but also some nice apt just north of X-roads (north of 520) because of Microsofties
-Kirkland - YUPPIE totally. The kirkland "strip" is like 1 mile and the clubs are bars here af full of very young and very pretty people. 24-hour fitness with floor to ceiling windows so people check each other out while they work out. =) The gym is next to a TGIF and movie theatre, so there is lots of checking out! The further east you go the less you see that..it bleeds into Redmond...
-Capitol Hill - DIVERSE!! Tattoo parlors, salons, piercings, restaurants galore and good bars, very welcomign for all times (well the yuppie belltown types might want to wear jeans and not all black to capital hill!!!)
-Fremont - cute, lots of dog walkers and joggers, bars here are not real "clubs" but bars and pool halls so crowd can be easily from 21 - 35. also very $$ because of premo location
-Wallingford - suburb of Fremont
-Downtown (Pioneer Square) - no one should live here
-International District - sorta creepy
-Lake City - the closer to seattle the creepier. My friend lived here in an apt next to University Motor Home part and a motor home caught on fire!! But her apt was nice and but the neighbors were sketchy. the closer to Kenmor the better
-Redmond - suburbs, no nightlife, shopping, target, best buy, big mall with restauratns REI, Gene Juarez, etc. $$$$ housing.
-Issaquah - yuppy expensive new construction and development. PRETTY, but also new construction is doing a lot of clear cutting =(
-SoDo - yuck i dont know anyone who LIVES here
-West Seattle - nice, older development, but nice neighborhoods, inconvenient to get to and from
-Northgate - has a big mall and Target, so shopping, lots of apartments. difficutl area cause it ranges from gross 99 to I-5 to Lake City Way which are all traffic and strip malls and suck
-Shoreline - Hwy 99 sucks, but has some nice neighorhoods. Older development/houses, but some quite neighborhoods
-Tacoma - repuation to stink, something about the first sewer system? I've also heard suburbs are nice like University Place?
-Everett - reputation to be stuck in 80s, Boeing blue collar workers. Hwy 99 is pretty gross, lots of billboards and stripmalls. East-side is nicer, suburby Snohomish County

[Condorll]

CFiona,

I have lived here for 12 years as well, and looked all over the Metropolitan area included the Eastside before I bought a home. I settled in West Seattle.

Why?

West Seattle is like a small town, not to much traffic, countryish, great neighbors, a mix of families and singles and many of the homes have views, either territorial or water, some both.

One of the main reasons I picked West Seattle is that one can do their grocery shopping within a 1 or 2 mile radius in stores such as Metropolitan market, Thriftway, Safeway, QFC etc. There is a Whole Foods being built here now and I hear Trader Joes might be coming to the area. West Seattle is definately "up and coming" as a trendy area with good restaurants and some nightlife and plenty of free parking everywhere.

In off hours, you can get from West Seattle to Downtown in about 10-12 minutes with practically no traffic, during rush hour maybe 20 minutes max. From 6:00am to 9:00 am you can go south to SeaTac airport with no traffic in about 15-18 minutes. From 5pm to 8 pm you can get back to West Seattle in the same time from the Airport, 15-18 minutes.

For people working Downtown, or South in the SeaTac airport area, West Seattle is an excellent choice.

Since West Seattle is an older established neighborhood, you can find some new or recently built homes (I did) where they tore down the existing home and built new ones. I think West Seattle will have one of the higher appreciation rates in the area for this reason.

So, for Singles or Families, West Seattle is an excellent choice for calm small town living, with upscale grocery shopping and restaurants, reasonable property taxes, only minutes from the downtown Seattle core and easy access to the airport.

[ElektroDragon]

Originally Posted by Condorll

Most people here do, don't you?

So my $65K big company East Coast IT job could turn into a $100K IT job just like that?