Monte Ward Baseball League

[Eeyore]

I interviewed for a position in Boston with the IRS. Not exactly my ideal job; I would much rather have the one I interviewed for with the Office of the Comptroller of the Currency, and I think I would have been better at it, but whadda you do?

If they make me an offer, it'll be in August, and the position starts in September, which means I would have anywhere from 1-7 weeks to make arrangements. It gets a bit more complicated because I'll be on the job for a week and a half, and then they send me out of town (like, to Cincinnati or St Louis) for a month for training. So, I'll be leaving the cats in Minneapolis, and not closing on the house, until after that.

Do you guys have any advice on finding an apartment? I was expecting one to be a lot more expensive than they are here, and I still experienced sticker shock when I started searching. (I rent out the bottom half of my house, 1200 square feet, for $700 a month, though that is below market rates.) My one absolute requirement is that cats are allowed, given that I will be bringing three of them. (And won't that be an entertaining process?)

[JJ]

Do you have any questions? What type of location are you looking for? how many bedrooms? For comparison I had a 3 bedroom, half of a 2 family house in Medford, which is outside of the city and it was 1500.

[WrenFGun]

I'm happy to help as well. I've lived in Brighton (2 br, cats allowed, 1650) and currently live in Harvard Square (1 br, cats allowed, 1625).

I would think Somerville would be a decent place to look (t-accessible, bus accessible, likely cheaper).

[Edgecrusher]

I can help as well,
I currently live in Malden, (the town next to Medford), I pay $1000 for a single family (part of a 4 apartment complex), 2 bedroom, living, kitchen and bath, 2 offstreet parking spots, 5 minute walk to the subway, 5 minute drive to I-93 and I-95 (the 2 major interstates in the area).

The farther you get away from the city, the cheaper it will be. I agree with Matt that Somerville, is a good start to look, although I would consider Medford and Malden as well, both have T access, easy highway access and bus access.

Everett/Revere/Chelsea/East Boston will be a little cheaper than that, but IMO its not as nice an area, with a lack of Subway access in most areas.

You should ask Paul. In his year of living up here, he has lived in East Boston, Quincy (south of boston), Brighton and Allston.

[Murph]

Good luck on getting the position.

You guys would sick over what $1,600 a month could get you in the midwest.
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[Eeyore]

Anything with T access would be ideal. If it's farther out, I'd want to be on one of the commuter rail lines (I don't know if those are considered a part of the T or not), because I have no intention of trying to commute by car in Boston. My grandmother lives in Concord (and I lived in Belmont until I was , so I have some idea of the area.

All of the numbers being cited here sound much more reasonable than what I was coming up with in web searches. On those, I was finding 1 br starting at $1500 until you got way out of the city, except one place in Arlington that was $975, which frightened me.

Maybe the sites I found quickly are more high end places. I don't yet know what the IRS would be paying me if I took a job with them, so I don't know exactly what my price range is. Something more like what you guys are talking about sounds like what I'd like.

Thanks for the help. I'll narrow my search some, looking at the areas you've mentioned.

[jelder]

Places in the City itself are expensive, but if you go to the first ring of suburbs (and even potentially beyond that, depending on what youre looking to pay) they come down a bunch. The Somerville/Medford area to the north is a good place to start if you want to be on the "T" itself (commuter rail is more or less considered its own entity), though as you get out there you can find yourself having to take a bus or make a decent walk to the subway if you aren't careful (not the end of the world, just be aware).

If you are concerned about commute time, it might be useful to find out where the IRS office is as that can have a significant (or insignificant) impact on the length of the commute based on subway transfers and speed of some of the lines.

The best advice I got, and the other piece of advice I would give you is to look into going through a broker and giving them your needs. Not sure if you've gotten this far (and you may already be doing it) but the range and quality of places goes up significantly when you are actually dealing with someone who is going to make money if they find you a place rather than just internet searches.

Best of luck

[JJ]

Also as I have recently found, 1 bedrooms are as expensive at 2 practically.

[Eeyore]

[Edgecrusher]