plan on moving to portland

[jutowa123]

hello all. so i am planning on moving to portland in the future. when exactly is still in the air. so im looking for advice on where to look for housing. every city has a part of town thats not so great do to crime and what not. so are there any parts of town that i should just avoid? and are there parts of town more suited to bikes than others? a bit of info and what im looking for no car, like good beer, vegetarian, and a dog owner. any help is greatly appreciated any links are cool too. thanks everyone.

[zpl]

Where to move in Portland is hard to recommend without more info. What kind of housing are you looking for? A single-family home, condo, or apartment in a complex? What's your housing budget like? How convenient do you need to have access to downtown Portland?

Someone will probably get on my case for saying this, so take it with a grain of salt - I'm painting with a broad brush. I think of places East of I-205/100th Ave to be the consistently sketchy parts of Portland. Between 60th and 100th there are good and bad places to live, and I'd recommend closely researching the neighborhoods there. West of 60th I tend to think of as "close-in" Portland where things are more reliably safe and you have convenient access to get your errands done without relying as much on your car. If you're willing to pay the premium for housing near a Max stop, that can make car-free life much easier.

North Portland is a mixed bag and recent gentrification there can create big differences between "good" and "bad" neighborhoods.

You might find this site useful for learning about Portland neighborhoods:

http://www.portlandbridges.com/portland-neighborhoods/

I'd also recommend this book on moving to Portland:

http://powells.com/biblio/1-9780912301778-6

Hunt around on Portland Criaigslist to view housing listings. During peak moving season (summertime), it can be a very competitive rental market, so be prepared to fill out an application on the spot.

That's the most general info I can think to give you now. Having moved here in January from the East Coast, I'd be happy to answer any further questions by email.

Scott

[q`Tzal]

Seriously go to PortlandMaps.com
http://www.portlandmaps.com/detail.c...55000&y=680000 will at least get you to a map page so you don't have to guess a street name.
From the map you can see crime data as a whole or broken down in to 28 categories. When you zoom in close enough you can get individual incident information.
But PortlandMaps provides much more than crime stats.
Water utilities, tax maps, zoning, elevation, property info (very in depth public info), garbage hauler data, schools and so on. All of it public data that used to only be available over the phone or by going in to a government office. Oh, you can also view it in Google Earth.

Check out Trimet, our public transit organization in the Portland metro area. If you are going car free and want quick access to public transit take a look at the system map(http://trimet.org/pdfs/trimetsystemmap.pdf) and plan accordingly.

More as I dig it out of my links file...

[jutowa123]

thanks for the info. i have no kids so schools, i dont care about. i would prefer apartment, studio, or 1 bedroom houses. here in texas we have lots of homes that have small guest houses in the back, these are perfect little single guy type pads and they are cheap too. so thats kinda what im aiming for. as for cost i am willing to pay more to live in a nice neighborhood. i just dont want to live in a trailer park or the gun toting gangsta ghetto. not that im above it. i just have music equipment and photography stuff to worry about. i am planning on taking a trip up there asap to check it out for myself. so im just trying to get a feel for the area first. thanks again

[shnshni]

I live in kenton, its awesome. A lot of very friendly people, quite cheap, really close to the MAX line, good bars, eats, etc. All the neighborhood roads are great for biking and there are many arteries with well-marked bike lanes. In my humble opinion, I would avoid east of 100th st. The west side of the river is almost always a little more money than the east side. Living near the MAX line (interstate ave) is great. St. Johns seems really cool, its far from downtown but they have grocery stores, bars, a bike shop, movie theater...if you didn't have to go to school or work downtown you would never have to leave. Anyways. Its all about north Portland. Far southeast is cool and cheap too. Everywhere's great, nothing seems very scary. Just don't go too far east, simply because there's not as much beer and eats (its all fast food, etc). In my experience.

[Cruizer]

East side of the river is best for biking and not quite as expensive as west side. So north, close-in northeast and close-in southeast are all good. Don't overlook Sellwood just because it's at the southmost part of the city. It's a great place to live and you have the Springwater Trail for biking downtown.