I'm moving to SEATTLE!!!

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
1

Yes yes yes! I’ve already called my family and friends and screeched their ears off in excitement, but I need to tell someone else. That’s where this thread comes in!

We’ve been hoping and planning and crossing fingers for years, and it’s finally real. We love it there. We never want to leave when we visit. It’s a hot-spot for both our careers. It seems like a wonderful area to raise kids. It’s gorgeous. The people are friendly. Downtown is busy. I could sit on Alki point and stare at the mountains for the rest of my life. AND NOW WE’RE MOVING THERE FOR REAL OMG! We live in NY state now, and in 5 weeks, my husband is starting a new job in Seattle. My job is portable, so I just have to take off time for the move. So much to do!

He’s interviewed for two jobs in Seattle over the past few months, and while he didn’t get the first one (that was a let down) he just got a very generous offer from a large company based there.

My husband has talked with their internal HR/Recruiting office and gotten an offer propsal and all the information through email, and had a very long discussion on the phone last night. He’s talking to them on the phone again tonight to give them a definite yes, then ask for a formal written offer. (What he’s got is 99% safe, I mean, it’s detailed and in writing, but there were a few minor details like his start date that they worked out on the phone. He’s not cutting any ties with his current employer until he’s got somthing rock solid in his hands. This advice comes courtesy of my father, who was a professional recruiter for a few years.)

He feels bad because he’s got a good solid job here, and he’s pretty crucial to his team at work here. (He always gets told “Don’t go on vacation!” and “Things fall apart without you here!”) He feels really valued and respected by his co-workers, and his job isn’t bad, but…we’ve been planning on moving out of here since college, and this is the best move for his career and our long term plans.

The compensation and relocation package is…well, it’s fucking amazing. We…we…it’s fucking amazing. Amazing. They’re paying for moving, putting us up in temp housing, augh!!! I’m so excited! We’ve got so much stuff to pack and decide and plan and…and…I just can’t contain it all.

This is mundane and pointless for everyone else, but hardly for us. There was lots of screeching and jumping up and down in my house last night. :smiley: I’ve got lots of stuff to do today, but I’ll be back to the thread later with lots of questions about cross country moving and Seattle in particular.

2

Congratulations! I moved here about 12 years ago with no job prospects at all, and Seattle hasn’t let me down yet. I love it here.

3

Are you good at trivia? :slight_smile:

4

Better hurry, our 3 weeks of summertime are almost gone! :slight_smile:

5

Quick peek between appointments.

Thanks, E. Thorp. We first visited in 2005, and everything we learn about it makes it seem like the perfect spot for us culturally and professionally.

Trivia? Uh, I used to be, but not much anymore. Kinda rusty.

GargoyleWB, after 7 years in Rochester, I’m sure that Seattle will seem practically tropical to us. At least there won’t be much ice on those steep roads, right? (Right?)

Here’s a question for you Seattle dopers–I’ve noticed there are quite a few–we’re looking for a rental place with 3 bedrooms and 2 bathroms. (My brother-in-law will be living with us for a year after we move there, after which my husband and I might buy a house if everything falls into place.) We’ve scoured apartments.com, move.com, rent.com, etc. over the past year and while we have some places in mind, advice from locals would really help. My cousin lives in Capitol Hill, and he likes it, but we haven’t found many property rental companies around there. How are private rentals in your experience? When we looked into houses for rent, lots of landlords seemed pretty flaky, and there were quite a few that only wanted 3-6 month leases, had heavy pet restrictions, and wanted a deposit + first & last month’s rent. And they were just as pricy as the rental complexes. Crazy talk. (Our price range is up to $1800/month rent. Maybe $2000, but that’s stretching it. Mind you I’m pulling that out of thin air because I’m not looking at our latest estimates right now.)

Where’s a good location for three 20-somethings who don’t want to live in a hole and want enough money left over each month to eat and pay off college loans? We’re prepared for long commutes–we like Issaquah, West Seattle, and Ballard.

As for location, I work from home, and my husband will be working downtown. My BIL says he’ll deal as long as the rent’s reasonable.

6

Not often, but for e few days each year when it happens it shuts the city down. The local news crews will run out to film a half-frozen mud puddle and declare “Ice Storm 2008!” special coverage. No biggie, everyone adjusts. I live on a grade with some sharp turns, and can usually count on a half dozen “snow days” to call in sick to work.

7

I’d suggest Ballard. The commute is ideal for getting downtown, and you never have to touch the I-5 mess. The area has old character without being rundown, and there has been a steady influx of new cafes, restaurants, and younger culture the last 5 years or so. Beware the elderly skandinavian drivers :wink:

8

In terms of a commute to downtown, Ballard would be great. It’s a pretty straight shot. Plus, that’s where we play pub trivia every week!

Issaquah would be a loooong commute. West Seattle wouldn’t be bad, depending on where in West Seattle and where in downtown. West Seattle is kind of up-and-coming – I think it would be a fun place to live.

We live in Interbay/Magnolia, which is just south of Ballard, and it’s great. Interbay is sort of an in-between neighborhood – not much of a destination, not too charming, but very conveniently placed – so you might be able to find some good deals here.

I’m afraid I can’t help on the renting specifics, since we own our condo. I know that when we were renting apartments 5 years ago, 1st-and-last-months’ rent was standard. We didn’t have any pets then so we didn’t care about restrictions.

Good luck! And let us know when you arrive. :slight_smile:

9

Congratulations! I am a former Seattlelite now living in the South, but Seattle remains my favorite American city.

I would second the vote for Ballard if you’re looking for a good place to live in the city. West Seattle is really cool, but the commute can be a PITA because all traffic has to funnel across that one bridge. Issaquah is the burbs – nice, but the burbs.

Check out the neighborhood map here. This is my take on some of the neighborhoods listed. I am painting with a super broad brush here; these generalizations won’t be universally correct, and other people’s mileage will almost certainly vary.

Downtown – they’re really working at urban renewal for the chief residential area of downtown, which is Belltown (north downtown). It has condos, clubs, restaurants. It’s obviously completely centrally located, but can be pretty sketchy at night. If you’re okay with the occasional hobo sleeping in your entry way so long as you can stumble home at 2 a.m., Belltown may be for you.

The areas listed on the map as “Cascade” and “Interbay” are mostly industrial/light industrial, not residential.

Capital Hill and the next hill overto the south, First Hill, are nice – it’s where many in the gay community live, which IMO makes for a more vibrant and fun neighborhood. Further south and you edge into the Central Area, which is the most economically disadvantaged area in Seattle. No neighborhood in Seattle is truly bad, but I wouldn’t want to live in Central.

Queen Anne is quieter, more family oriented, more expensive and less hip than Capital Hill; Magnolia is like Queen Anne, only more so. The more desirable area to live on Queen Anne (“on” instead of “in” because Queen Anne is another hill) is the southside, facing downtown. The northside is fine but not as desireable. Ballard is across the ship canal from Magnolia/Queen Anne; it has a history of being more working class, but it now a very nice neighborhood with many young families and singles who want to live in town but still have grass and parks and residential streets. Fremont, which is not listed on the map but would be on the north side of the ship canal between Ballard and the University District, is very self-consciously hippy and fringe, as much as anything is hippy and fringe in Seattle, which is not very. This makes it kind of dopey, IMO; there’s sort of this “Look how countercuture we are!” vibe that I find silly. But if you’re looking for hippies (young, rich, white hippies), that’s your place. It is friendly and can be fun. There is (or used to be) a great crepe shop on Fremont Ave.

The U District is where the U of W is, so feel free to check that out if you like to live in run down apartment buildings with college students; otherwise, maybe not. Like many university districts, the housing options seem to be student housing (bad shag carpet and loud parties) or professorial housing (loving restored bungalows that most of us can’t afford).

Another nice area IMO is Green Lake, which you’ll see just East of Ballard on the map. It has some nice places to live. Even if you don’t live there, be sure to check out Green Lake; there is a 3 mile walking/blading/biking trail around the lake, which makes it a nice place to go to get some exercise or just hang out on a sunny Saturday.

Two other very nice areas IMO, not listed on the map, are Madison Park and Montlake. They are on the shores of Lake Washington on the back side of Capital Hill. Madison Park is very expensive; Montlake less so.

Another one you may see referenced in ads is “Ravenna.” That’s basically the U District, edging into the area south of Green Lake.

Most of these neighborhoods can be Googled individually and you’ll find lots more information and maps.

Those are the places “in town.” If I were new to the Seattle area, I would definitely want to live in the city, at least at first. There is great bus service to and from downtown from all of these neighborhoods, which your husband should be glad to hear because parking downtown is ridiculously expensive. The buses are prompt, clean, and well maintained, so riding them is not a problem. IMO, commuting into the Seattle from outside is a major PITA; due to how the city is geographically situated, all traffic funnels – must funnel – onto I-5 North or South, or one of the two bridges across Lake Washington. There really isn’t any other way to get into or out of the city. Plus, I don’t think there’s a better way to get to know a city and to take advantage of its attactions than to live in it. In a year or two, if you want to buy a place, you might want to look at living in the suburbs, but there are so many great areas to live in, in Seattle proper, that I would strongly encourage you to do that first.

Whatever you do, enjoy Seattle; it’s great. :slight_smile:

10

Ballard welcomes its condo overlords. I moved there (into a condo, may the lares forgive me) about 5 years ago, and I was in one of two giant condo complexes. Now we have… uh, at least five or six that I can think of with at least two more going up within a 10 block radius. The older residents are understandably not too happy with the idea of approx. 7-story complexes going up all over in comparison to the normal-sized 2-story houses.

That said, it’s a great neighborhood to live in, good walkies. Lots of dogs. Great farmer’s market and lots of stores and things. For the record, I commute to the Eastside for work, and as a result, work off-hours and/or remote in to avoid the 520 traffic. I do not want to live on the Eastside even if it would reduce my commute by quite a bit because… well, it’s the Eastside. More suburban, and requires driving to go anywhere, which isn’t my thing.

Don’t worry about the fact that AC is a luxury up here – you’ll only need it for about 3 weeks out of the year. That was a shocker I must say since I lived in TX before SEA, and AC there is practically a human right. fans

And congratulations!

11

I haven’t scoured listings in awhile, but a few previous apartments we found through listings on seattleweekly.com. And there’s craigslist too, with the usual caveats.

$1800/mo. sounds low to me for a 3-bedroom, 2-bathroom place in the city (including Ballard). But I could be mistaken since I live on Capitol Hill (and love it!), where rents are high.

12

Thank you so much for all your advice! (especially Jodi–that detail is great!)

Going for a walk now to get rid of the jitters. :slight_smile:

We’re probably going to be driving out the first two weeks of September and stopping to visit family on the way.

13

Bucket of cold water: You’re unlikely to get into the city in a house that size for that price. Definitely not in any of the more desirable neighborhoods.

Instead, I would recommend you consider something a bit to the south or to the north. Both White Center and Shoreline, for example, are on the main freeways, maybe 15 minutes from downtown in light traffic, up to 30-45 minutes except in the worst of conditions, and both have convenient transit options if your husband doesn’t want to drive. And both are on the moderately affordable side.

14

I’ve been wanting to move to a large city myself and Seattle was at the top of my list. They have such a high cost of living though and I’m not confident I could get a good job there. I keep thinking about it though.

15

Yeah, we’ve resigned ourselves to living a good half hour away from downtown, but we might get lucky. We would love to live in a nice apartment in in the city, but bottom line, we’ve got more important commitments for our money right now. We looked at this place in Issaquah when he interviewed at Microsoft (not the place he’s going to be working):

http://www.avaloncommunities.com/avaloncore/nfloor.asp?comm=144

Now, that one is really far from where he’ll be working now, but they have a bunch of places scattered around Seattle that we can look at. We can compromise on the 3 bedroom, but we’re living in a 2 bedroom right now and really, for 3 adults, it would help soooo much to have an office where my husband and I can work and where my BIL can store instruments/work on music.

Also, he just got off the phone–we are go! He got the formal soft-copy of their offer in an email and they’re sending a contract for him to sign and mail back on Monday. Wheee!

16

The only thing I can say is post your resume on Monster and go for it. Sure, there are specific fields that recruiters go for in the area, but in any large city there are going to be a good amount of jobs. It’s easy for me to say since I didn’t have to go through the job search, but the stress does leak over into the job seeker’s family. I’m really glad he decided to look when he did.

One thing I would suggest is figure out what you’d need your minimum income to be when you start looking for jobs there, and compare it to what your going rate would be on salary.com, just to get a sanity check. If there’s a big difference in your earning power and the cost of living there, it will be harder, but I liked being able to estimate how much we could spend on debt, rent, gas, etc. before my husband even decided what salary to negotiate for.

17

super-congrats!!

18

You do realize there is an initiation required for people out your way who want to live in Paradise? It’s not the same as a Doper initiation with goats and a squid, but it comes close.

19

It involves a geoduck, actually. That’s all we’ll say.

20

What about the banana slug?

I can say no more.