Anyone from Seattle, Wa?

[Cassie85]

My boyfriend and I will be moving from South Texas to the Seattle Wa area this year, probably in the next 3 to 6 months. We finally have the money to move and be closer to family.
I've been on apartmentguide.com looking for some semi affordable apartments in or around Seattle. Anyone know of some good apartments that are semi affordable ($900 monthly would probably be our max), and preferably near public trasportaton?
Is the public trasportation there pretty good? Any idea how much it costs to rent a small house?
Any information on the Seattle area is more than welcome. This is kind of a huge, scary step for us, but we are none the less very excited about it.
Thanks!

[Ribbs]

I just moved from Seattle. I lived over on the west side near the beach, Fremont, West Seattle and University district seem to be the most affordable areas. Good luck!

[LadyMoondancer]

My boyfriend and I will be moving from South Texas to the Seattle Wa area this year, probably in the next 3 to 6 months. We finally have the money to move and be closer to family.
I've been on apartmentguide.com looking for some semi affordable apartments in or around Seattle. Anyone know of some good apartments that are semi affordable ($900 monthly would probably be our max), and preferably near public trasportaton?
Is the public trasportation there pretty good? Any idea how much it costs to rent a small house?
Any information on the Seattle area is more than welcome. This is kind of a huge, scary step for us, but we are none the less very excited about it.
Thanks!

Have you tried Padmapper? ( https://www.padmapper.com/ )  It's a great resource for looking for apartments!  It finds apartments listed on Craigslist, Apartments.com, and other sites, and plots them out on a map.  Then you can filter out apartments over a certain price, etc.  It also will give you an idea of which parts of the city are more affordable.

I will say that you are going to have a hard time finding an apartment in Seattle for $900.  You might be able to find a studio for that, but probably not a one bedroom and definitely not a house. Unless it's a shared house, which is a possibility, like renting a room.  If you don't mind living with other people that might be a good option, especially since they will likely have communal couches and tables, which means you won't have to buy those things.  Best place to find shared housing is this section of Craigslist: http://seattle.craigslist.org/search/see/roo

On the bright side, the minimum wage in Seattle is $15 an hour (a recent change because otherwise people were basically being priced out of housing), so depending on your occupation you might make more than you do now.

Public transportation is good if you're traveling north and south.  West Seattle has pretty lousy bus transportation to the rest of the city.  Magnolia Hill also has bad bus service.

There are also a lot of commuter cities with frequent buses to Seattle (Redmond, Renton, Burien, etc), so be sure to check them out as well.  You can use Google Maps to figure out how long of a bus ride it would be.

[Cassie85]

Thanks for the awesome advise! Yeah, I think to save a little o rent we'll probably try to find an apartment outside of Seattle. Is it true that they have pretty good train service?

[Ribbs]

From my experience the lightrail train is much better and more consistent than the buses.

[ashes]

Good luck with your search!  We just moved up to WA over the summer, but we moved to Woodinville, which is about 20 miles northeast of Seattle.

[Galactica]

Awesome!

I live in Seattle! I think the public transportation is pretty good-  we live nearish to the light rail and it is very very reliable.  It stretches out now to Tukwilla which I think is cheaper to rent in than Seattle.  If I were you, I would try to stay within walking distance (5 blocks or so) of the light rail just because it is so convenient.

When considering addresses- you might want to check transportation options through:
http://tripplanner.kingcounty.gov/  (will give you an idea as to which bus/train is nearby and commute times)

I know rents are going up, but I don't have a good idea as to how much these days. 

[kaoskat]

Good luck with your move!

[ShugarGlider]

Welcome to Washington! I live south of Seattle and I love going there to visit. My BFF pays $1500 for a 1-bedroom in Ballard neighborhood and my other BFF pays $930 for a 1-bedroom in Wedgwood neighborhood. Living away from Seattle is cheaper, but then there's longer commute times to consider. I'm sure there's a perfect balance in there somewhere!