What are the good neighborhoods? I’d like to be near unlv, but i have been to Reno and like the weather/wildlife there.
Well, I am not overly familiar with Reno, but have visited it a couple times. I think it is a better city to live in than Vegas, it seems less tourist trap and more like a community city. Not sure how to better describe it. It is big, and areas are very busy, but it seems to actually have residents instead of just tourists and casinos. If you don’t get any good answers here, I do know of someone on a different message board who lives and works in Reno and possibly be able to help you.
I’m thinking of moving to Nevada when I retire in a few years and I’ve started researching the Carson Valley area (in and around Carson City). If you are more in the suburbs, you probably get less tourists, it’s higher elevation than Vegas (making for 4 seasons and cooler summer) and it sounds like it has a better and more sustainable economy than Reno (which supposedly depends mostly on gambling).
As always, where the “good neighborhoods” are depends on what you consider to be the features of a good neighborhood. Do you want something walkable? Do you have kids who would be in public schools? Do you want something walkable, or are you happier in a suburban-type setting? What kind of neighborhood do you want to live in?
I lived in Reno for ten years and loved it. Unless you really hate winter, it’s got much nicer weather than Vegas, and it’s a great place to live if you like year-round outdoorsy stuff (kayaking/hiking/skiing are big deals). I think it’s more accurate to say that Reno’s economy is heavily dependent on tourism than on gaming, and the city’s been trying (with some success) to reinvent itself as a multi-activity tourism destination instead of just a gambling town. Even so, the tourist-heavy parts are pretty easy to avoid.
You’re asking about two cities that are 7 hours apart, so narrow it down. Why UNLV specifically? The south gets hot, the north gets snowy. Reno is closer to touristing in the Bay Area, LV is closer to LA.
All cities are dependent on gambling, I’m not sure why Carson would be less so. The economy is still recovering everywhere. Houses are good to buy, but it’s a buyer’s market so lots of competition. The casino-areas are nicer in Reno than the Strip.
Unlv is where i would like to work, and i don’t want more than say a 30 minute commute.
Priority to me would be:
- Low land prices
- Jobs that are at least the national median in pay scale/benefits
- Either low crime rate or fairly strong security measures available.
- Doesnt need to be near a big city, but close to arts or cultural centers.
- Low cost of living.
By far 1-2 are most important to me.
- Home prices are way down
- Not sure, but why UNLV specifically? Are you in academia? UNR exists too, as well as Carson schools.
- Then in the Las Vegas area, don’t live in North Las Vegas. Northern Nevada is less crimey, maybe not Sun Valley or the area between northern Reno and Sparks.
- Nevada has two types: near a city, or in the middle of fucking nowhere. You could also live near Elko or Tonopah or something, but they’re very small. There are plenty of suburbs otherwise.
- I haven’t followed the statistics, but I would think NV in general is somewhere in the middle. Housing prices are cheap compared to e.g. the Bay Area or LA, but not dirt cheap. Again if you’d want to buy, prices are way down (fuck me for getting a mortgage when I did) but competitive.
- All the colleges i attended and worked at had bad sports teams, i like unlv’s sports tradition. Once i get settled, i can see working at a better school in a better area.
Also, where can i see current housing prices? Im looking at Craigslist so far, but without knowing the area nomenclature, i have no idea if theyre good deals or simply bad neighborhoods.
I think Pahrump may be a nice smallish Not-Los-Vegas town, but tolerably close to Las Vegas, if you want to be tolerably close to Los Vegas.
(ETA: It’s got Sheri’s Ranch too, if that’s of any interest to you.)
Pahrump is a little over an hour’s drive from Vegas (out of the OP’s specified commuting range from UNLV). It’s got good access to some of the wilderness areas around southern Nevada (Ash Meadows*, Spring Mountains, an hour and a half to Death Valley), but it doesn’t really have too much to offer in the way of arts and culture.
*I did a lot of work in Ash Meadows, and Pahrump was my base during that time.
I have lived in Nevada most of my life. The nice areas of Reno are Caughlin Ranch which is on the west side of the McCarran Loop (west and south of the intersection of Plumb and McCarran).
Spanish Springs is nice which is north of Sparks on the Pyramid Highway (Sun Valley, over the ridge to the west is not a good area). Down south anything in the DaMonte Ranch area is nice too.
Reno is not a good place to live if you work in Las Vegas. 
I live in the Las Vegas valley. I lived in Henderson for 16 years. I just moved to Paradise (which is an unincorporated township in Clark County.
From what you’ve said, you would most likely want to look at houses in the Anthem area of Henderson. Check Zillow and use zip code 89183. From the furthest part of Anthem to UNLV would be a 20-25 minute drive during heavy traffic, at worst.
An alternative would be Boulder City, which would add 20-25 minutes, tops, to your commute. I have many friends who live in BC and for them the extra few minutes in the car are far outweighed by the positives of living in a smaller, non-gambling city.
If you want a good sports team, I hope you like basketball, because UNLV’s football program is shite and the baseball program isn’t much either. The women’s volleyball team is usually pretty good tho.
For arts & culture, UNLV has a terrific lecture series every year and the Smith Center opened downtown a couple of years ago and is a world-class theater (I’ve worked there quite a bit, too) that brings in Broadway shows and quite a few concerts (I hope to get tomorrow night off to see Kronos Quartet perform a new Phillip Glass work, for instance).
Good advice, thanks all. 
How’s University of Nevada Reno?
Better than UNLV. Most sports, too. You may have heard of Colin Kaepernick, even if he’s not so hot this year. I know the Journalism school is well-regarded, and Judicial Studies, I think.
Check your PMs, Superhal.
We’re all full up. You’ll have to go to Texas.
If you are near retirement look at Carson City. Look at Carson City anyway. You might like it. Housing prices still fair. Easy access to Tahoe and the mountains most of the year.
We visit UNR occasionally and rather like it as a brief tourist stop but otherwise know nothing about it… It is probably a good hour from north Carson. Google says 48 minutes.
It says 38 minutes, unless you’re going from a specific location down south. It’s faster now that they built the freeway bridge.
Carson’s small. Downtown is cute. I don’t know enough about the rest of it. A little south of there are Minden and Gardnerville. I get the impression that they’re retirement-friendly, but they seem pretty nice, if a little out of the way. Incline Village is of course a place for rich people’s ski homes.
Damonte and Spanish Springs are boring suburbia.
Carson City is 30 minutes drive to Reno. 30 minutes to Tahoe. The housing is affordable and the schools are good, overall.
Anthem is such a pain in the ass to get in and out of though. And if you’re deep enough in there, it can take absolutely forever just to get to the main road. Also, if the OP doesn’t have a bunch of money to spend on one of the nicer plots with more space, the regular ol’ houses in Anthem are basically on top of one another.
Here’s the thing about Las Vegas: it’s the only city I’ve been to that has serious pockets. Like, most places have a good part of town and a bad part of town. . . Vegas has a good street, then a bad street. We bought a house right by UNLV (less than 5 minutes away) on a great little street. . . that is surrounded by less desirable streets. We’ve never had any trouble and the house was a steal (newly renovated, half an acre, privately gated, beautiful pool, no direct neighbors), but that’s just how Vegas goes.
If you’re willing to do some reno, you can get a killer deal on an older house in a great neighborhood fairly close to UNLV (besides where our house is, there’s similar pockets of greatness up east on Flamingo, as well as outside the Rancho Circle off Charleston (though that’s farther away).
Ultimately, you’d need to talk to an agent and find out what your dealbreakers are. For me, I can’t stand the new construction nonsense of having my neighbor less than an arm’s length outside of my kitchen window. So, because I want more space, I’d either have to go to the far corners of down (ie 45 min commutes) or do an older neighborhood. With the amazing prices in some of the older neighborhoods and my happiness to renovate, it’s a no brainer for me.