What's it like living there? Best place to rent a home?

The answer is highly dependent on where you'll be moving to and for what reason.

I work in the space/defense industry, so I'm situated between Titusville and Melbourne.

Traffic isn't bad. Politics are mostly conservative, for now. Housing and rents have gone up everywhere. Jobs are plentiful.

Lots of indoor ranges open to the public. If you want something outdoor with some decent distance, you'll most likely have to join a club, or have your own land. I make do with the limited hours/days the Titusville Pistol and Rifle Club is open to the public for the moment.

what's safe between Titusville and Melbourne?

Depends on what you mean by "safe". Every city between Titusville and Palm Bay has its share of crime and shitty neighborhoods, but none of them are New York city or Memphis level.

Go here to research the neighborhoods.

You should avoid most of Cocoa, though the western outskirts seem to be developing nicer neighborhoods, and Cocoa Village is a nice place to shop, eat, and drink. Kid friendly, nice park, boat ramp, ect.

I haven't spent enough time in Titusville to give an honest evaluation. My limited impressions are that it's very middle class up that way.

Melbourne seems mostly ok, lots of entertainment, industry and a smattering of academia. Choice pick if you're younger.

Rockledge is good. Port St. John is good. Viera is probably the best area, but you're going to pay $$$$$$ for it, and not the place to go if you hate HOA's.

Anything near the water is going to obviously cost you, but anything east of US-1 seems nice to me (I'm sure there are exceptions).

If you look hard enough and are willing to pay or develop, you can still get a place on Merritt Island that's country. Lots of nice neighborhoods there regardless. The island seems to attract homeless for some reason.

Cocoa Beach is nice, but a tourist trap. BUSY in the summer. Cape Canaveral is ok from what I can tell, lots of restaurants and such, and near the port/space center.

When I moved, I used the crime feature on Neighborhood Scout to help me find the good and bad areas, it really helped.

I'm a Satellite Beach local.  Lived here off and on since 82 or so.  It's consistently voted safest city in Fl.  BUT, housing has gone through the roof lately. We bought our current house in 2015 and it's price has doubled as have most of the beachside properties lately.  Love it here, Port Malabar range is 30 min or so from here and is very nice/large outdoor facility.  West Melbourn and Palm Bay are still very affordable and safe.  Lots of Good ol boys still left in southern Brevard.

I'm in Port Saint John, just south of Titusville, easy access to Orlando via the Beachline. Fairly blue collar middle class.
For the most part the sketchy areas look like sketchy areas.

South Merritt island checking in. Good advice in this thread. Viera has all the new apartments and shiny stores.

Is Pt. St John less expensive than the other parts?

Definitely less than Viera and Melbourne. On a par with Titusville and Cocoa as far as home prices, but less on taxes due to being in the county.

Don’t want to start another thread, but my question goes with OPs question.

The crime rate in Melbourne seems to be pretty damn high.....is that mainly concentrated to certain areas or is property theft a big concern in the area as a whole.  

Anyone know why crime rate is so high in the Melbourne area?

The few times I’ve been there I don’t remember seeing any “slummy” areas, are they there and I just missed them?

Lots of good questions in there.  As a long time resident, I can only give you my historical perspective.  50 years ago, Brevard was a back water area that had an infant space industry, a military presence (meaning most families moved in and out within 2 years) and a "surfer" culture.  Drugs ruled then at that time probably due to the transient nature of the military families and typical government 2 year industry contracts.  People moved in and out with out any commitment to the towns.  In the later years, we went through several boom and bust cycles, each bringing in people and then causing them to loose their jobs!  During these boom times, areas like Port St. John built up--it was very close to the Cape, housing was well priced etc etc.  Again the bottom fell out and Port St John became a haven for foreclosures and druggies.  Similar things happened throughout Brevard, and happened in each cycle ( remember Mission Apollo, Saturn, Moon, Shuttle etc--each was a cycle).  So what about today?

There is now a much more stable industrial base, not based on tourism, although Port Canaveral is ranked second in cruise sailings (again a bust industry due to covid--lots of people out of work), but mainly in aerospace.  Wages are fairly high for skilled workers, and builders are building crappy houses for big money like crazy.  The most important thing is that now there is a thriving community of people who have invested their lives into this area!  It is a conservative area and as such the Democrats are trying hard to infiltrate and corrupt, but most folks are strong.  I do a Sunday church parking lot census and it is re-assuring that families are commited.   As more educated science and engineering types have moved in, the schools have upped their game.

There are rundown areas of Melbourne; some are ok, just old people who can't afford the time/money or enegry to fix their places up.  Some of those old places have tax bills of less than $100/year,  others are owned by dead beats, meth-heads or drug dealers. Drugs are still a big problem in the county.  There are crime maps on-line that you can look at and get an idea.  There are areas to stay away from such as south Melbourne (main land)  and much of Cocoa .  Palm Bay is not too great either, lots of hispanic who have not quite assimilated, but will get there (they are the one who are building our crappy houses ).  The other area ( Cocoa) is the remnants of the agricultural past of the area and true segregation.

More than you wanted to know
PP48

^very helpful info.


Are there any newer areas that aren’t HOA in the melbourne are, if not is there anywhere that has homes with decent land?

I'm actively looking right now too. I'm failing miserably.
I'm now looking for a decent rental (house) once I'm down there, it'll be much easier to find something.
I hope.

Yes and probably less congested than most yet has quick access to 95 and US1 for easy trips to north or south when needed.
But this also means the housing values aren't increasing as much as other places too.
Depending on what street you drive down, it has hints of Mims or lower end of titusville.