When Dan and I made the big move to Boston, we were lucky to find an apartment in a two-family slightly below market price in Arlington. When the house sold to a new owner, they promised they wouldn’t raise the rent until after they finished renovating the upstairs apartment.
It’s not news around here that rents have kind of exploded in the last few years. So, we were thankful that they didn’t raise the rent right away, but we were annoyed with moving the car to the street each morning just so that they could access the driveway, especially on Sundays, when they showed up at 7:30 AM to make sure that the power tools could get fired up at exactly 8 AM for another day of renovations and demolitions. For those not familiar: Arlington has a “no overnight street parking” policy and many streets have 2 hour street parking limits. So cars get stacked and moved multiple times a day to fit as many as possible in the narrow tandem driveways at any given moment. This is probably not a big deal for people who use their cars each day, but we don’t use our four-wheeled vehicle very often; so moving it daily seemed like a waste of time and dinosaur juice.
Interest rates, real estate price trends and the rapidly rising rents made us decide it was time to buy something before we were stuck chasing cheaper rents further and further from places we wanted to be. I loved living along the Red Line, but it was really expensive, and getting more so. What’s the point of living near great food, theaters, weird events, etc. if you don’t have money left over after paying to keep a roof above you?
We spent a big chunk of the winter and spring looking at condos and houses from Somerville to Maynard, from Medford to Melrose, from Watertown to Billerica. It was not fun. We saw condos that were in active floodplains or with obscene HOA dues, we saw a house that still included the original outhouse (converted to a “rustic” pantry), we saw “I did it myself!” wobbly renovations, and tiny houses that appeared to have been built on what used to be the driveway of another house.
A friend of mine in a similar boat in another city told me that “buying a house is nothing like what HGTV told me it would be like.” In reality, middle class home buying in Boston is more like: “what can I really not accept when looking at the range of homes that I can afford?” Someone else decided that they were okay with an outhouse in their kitchen and crumbling foundation below their feet. Another person decided to buy the condo that was in a really great South Medford location, but was only about 8 feet above sea level with an obscene HOA payment. That super-expensive asbestos filled condo in Arlington that would have necessitated limiting all cheese consumption to Market Basket deli ends for the next 30 years? Someone else chose that.
Now we live in North Everett. It’s a lot like living in Malden, but I’m an extra ½ mile from the T. My neighborhood looks suspiciously like neighborhoods I used to jog through in West Somerville or South Medford. I no longer see the Bob’s Big Boy statue that lives in West Cambridge, but one of my new neighbors has a full sized horse statue on their lawn, which is slightly classier. We decided to prioritize staying fairly close to the city, having a safe place to store bicycles and a motorcycle, and not having to live in fear that a few weeks without a paycheck would bankrupt us in these uncertain times — and so far, its been a good choice.
I am still getting used to the change. I have to think in terms of the Orange Line. On a bicycle, I sometime think I’m in a time warp and I’m riding in Somerville in 2008, before sharrows got spray painted on every asphalt surface and the quality of street cleaning improved so drastically. My commute to Somerville/Cambridge is longer, and I get to meander through Medford neighborhoods to get there, which is pleasant, as long as I’m not running late.
I like it here. The driveway isn’t tandem, we have plenty of storage space for bikes and dan’s motorcycle, and I have a pre-cultivated veggie/herb garden. The last owner was so kind as to leave their rain barrels hooked up for my exclusive use. The big trade off — traffic isn’t great here for people in cars. It’s not as bad as it is for those living further up the North Shore and trying to drive into Boston or Cambridge, but its not as easy as living next to Route 2. The city roads here are not as easy for people on bikes as they would be in much of Cambridge or Somerville. It reminds me of living in Winter Hill / East Somerville 4+ years ago. Getting to Trader Joe’s on a bike (Alewife) is a huge trek, but the Chelsea Market Basket is about 300% better than the Somerville one and has 2 bike racks.
We’re not the first youngish, knowledge-worker-types to move to Everett, but when we were talking to real estate agents a few months ago, they made it sound like we were considering moving to Mars. I understand that they were highly motivated to sell us the most house we could possibly afford on paper (as that would better pad their wallets) and those condos/houses were in more expensive neighborhoods. However, I found the practice to be hugely off-putting and disingenuous.
There are some really great things getting started here. I’m loving the gluten free pizza (and wings!) at Nana’s on Main St. Red Bones promised to open a new restaurant a few feet from an intersection I ride through every day. The right-of-way is set for the Northern Strand Trail (and much of the trail is open with some bits newly paved) and the proposed road improvements to lower Broadway will likely happen in the next few years. Medford just started a bike committee; so maybe some of the bike connections across the Mystic will eventually improve? We still need to check out the handful of Nano Breweries that have moved to Everett recently. I live in the home of Teddie Peanut Butter and Richie’s Slush (mmmm). We have yet to find a neighborhood pub on par with our favorite Davis/Porter Square options — but, we are now closer to Charlestown, the North End, or Chinatown than we used to be, and have options there, too…
