Thinking of moving to the Northern Va area next year for better job opprotunities.  I would prefer to live in VA as opposed to MD.  Are there any decent areas within commuting distance of the DC metro area that are still reasonably priced?

Fairfax county, Arlington County VA would be good. Hit or miss in Alexandria depend on the location. Good place to live usually demand high price but still affordable with a good job. Stay out of DC or MD.

Edited to say: I assumed that you want to "rent" a place to live.

Bying is a different story, single home? or Town Home? The price vary and is expensive. The farther away, the more commuting time to work, usually is the more affordable.

Hate to give you a Bill Clinton answer, but define:

Reasonably priced
Decent Area
Commuting distance

Do you want to buy a single family home? Townhouse? Rent an apartment?

Depends on what you consider resonable. There are a couple of threads in the hometown section about this subject. Depending on where you work and how far you are willing to commute pretty much determines what you can afford. Most new developments in this area start around 400K for a single family home.

Try here  
[url]http://www.ar15.com/forums/forum.html?b=8&f=24[/url]

I lived in Reston for most of the year in 1986. Hated it. Got offered a great job to stay there. Turned it down. Good luck to ya.

Don't go any farther south than Fairfax - ie. Prince William County. You don't want to do the I95 commute to DC. Stay in Fairfax or Arlington.

You can use trains, busses, van pools, car pools, etc, to get into the DC area.
Think of the cost of living anywhere near DC as comparable to living in NYC and the surounding Queens, Brooklyn area with traffic on I-95 twice as bad.
Home prices all the way down to Fredericksburg have increased dramatically the past year. Both new homes and older homes are priced well into the upper 200's with 350-400K being avg price for a median 2500sq ft home in a nice neighborhood.

Now to answer your question on commuting distances. Yes you can live within 1 hour of DC if you take your time to find a place, but you had better plan on making upwards of 50k income if you are single. Rents fluctuate from as low as $400-500 for a 1 bedroom in a crappy drug ridden apt complex/townhuse neighborhood, to $800-1200 in a slightly better version of a crappy neighborhood. You need to search hard for nice townhouse rentals or apartments but you will find them if you are willing to pay the price, usually upwards of 1000$ month rent.

Virginia is a wonderful place, unfortunately the Northern part is growing very quickly into a fast pased busy environment. Heck if you like that type of life then join the hundreds of people that move down here monthly.

Don't move to MD--very anti-gun, even though we now have a decent governor, and he is holding down taxes (which the Democrats would love to raise again).

Northern VA is expensive because it's a nicer place to live and anyone who can afford it lives there instead of DC or MD.  Rather simple single story homes in Arlington can go for $450k or more.  I'd either spend more to live close in or live way out and try to take the VRE train to commute.  Driving is a daily nightmare.

GunLvr

NO!!!

Hey, I'm looking to do the same thing. I've had a realator sending me info for awhile now. I live in Silver Spring MD now(Lord how I dispise MD). I can't wait to get out of this democrat utopia. #1 in robbery for the nation 8 years in a row. #2 or 3 in murder. In Baltimore City alone there were over 250 murders last year. Anyway, if you want the name of the lady helping me look right now I can send it to you. I can tell you the commute to DC from Virginia is hell on earth. 95 is a parking lot. The only reason we stay is my wife has tp work there for a short while longer. Stay away from MD no matter how bad the temptation. It's an easier commute, but trust me, you don't want to live here. I dream daily of life in Virginia.

I just re-read your note. Where is the potential job? If it is in VA, you could easily live in Prince William (cheaper than Fairfax). However, if the Job is in DC, you are limited to FFX and Alexandria.

BwahhhhHahahahahaha...

Really nice here in NoVA,  but commuting is a bitch-and I'm a former NYC resident.  Never EVER go to Mary-land which is the south's version of new jersey

Arlington and Alexandria are better to live in if you work in DC, but the cost of housing there is prohibitive.  You might get lucky and find a townhouse in Annandale or North Springfield that is affordable; by that I mean around $200k.  I sold a townhouse in Annandale 3 years ago and got $185K for it...I'm sure that thing is WELL over 200K now.  

As you move further out, the traffic into town on 66 or 95 gets pretty bad.  Living in PW county and working downtown was the pits for me 20 years ago, I can't imagine it's gotten any better.  

Basically, they build on every piece of land around here, with no thought of traffic.  I66 is only TWO lanes in each direction inside the beltway when it should be 6 to handle the traffic.  God forbid we ever have to get out of here in a hurry.  

VA is much more gun friendly than MD and DC, although the 3 "liberal" counties...Arlington, Alexandria, and Fairfax do have waiting periods on handgun purchases.  

To make ends meet around here, I'd agree with Nick's salary assessment of $50k.  The bad part is there's no way to live alone in the NoVA area on that kind of salary if you want something nice.  Otherwise, you're gonna have to split a place with some other folks if you want a nice house.  

I inherited a house in North Arlington that I'm struggling to keep...BIG mortgage, little salary lol.  I've got a room mate now, but it's still not enough.  I stay here because every mortgage payment is gonna come right back to me when I sell it a few years from now.  Great place to invest if you have lots of $$$.  

Last week I had to go into downtown Baltimore for business.  I was near the courthouse(s).  There were some seedy individuals on patrol, and this was 12:00 Noon.  No thanks, I'll stick with the far suburbs of Richmond.

Fairfax County is getting out of hand.  You will be hard pressed to find a decent single family home for less than $250k.  I sold my piece of $hit house (1800sq ft colonial w/ 1 car garage on .23 acre)in Centreville (western part of Fairfax Co.)for $285k last year and bought a 2700 sq ft colonial w/ 2 car garage on 1 acre for $245k in the Fredericksburg area.
If you have to work in D.C. you can take the MARC train from downtown Fredericksburg straight into D.C. or you can go to any of the commuter lots and do the van pool thing or even the slug line.  If you want to drive yourself you will have to deal with alot of traffic.  It can be ok if you time it right.  My morning commute to Falls Church was averaging to be 1 hour and 15 minutes if I left the house by 06:00.  If I left any later than that it would increase the time by 30 minutes.  In the afternoon, if I timed it so that I hit the HOV on 95 right at 18:00 (when HOV is lifted) then I could be home in about 1 hour and 15 minutes as well.
The other counties in N. Virginia (Arlington, Loudoun, Prince William, Stafford) are getting out of hand as well.  Stafford is the best out of them all, but it is the fastest growing county in the state....almost the whole country. They are starting to suffer from sprawl there because of the growth,.  Alot of people are looking at Spotsylvania and King George counties for decent houses.  (plus, there are alot of jobs between MCB Quantico and NSWC Dahlgren) Both counties are starting slow growth initiatives to avoid the mess that the N. Virginia counties are experiencing.  So now there is a "housing shortage" that is jacking up the housing costs.  My new house was just re-appraised after one year......$290k.  

Listen...

1 thing to remember, barring a nuclear holocost (G-D forbid) it'll never be any cheaper to buy in here then it is today.  So the sooner you get in the loop here the better.

I second W-W words. This place is a hotspot of growth right now, and is not going to slow down any time soon.
Fed. Government work is plentiful with all the new agencies cropping up and the private sector is booming around here. I do not know what kind of degrees or qualifications you have but if you are skilled construction, or have any sort of valid masters degree you can find good work here and make good wages. Good luck on your quest. I left NYC years ago moved to New England and then here. I would not go back to NYC no matter how much I was offered, (and I have been offered alot)!

Hey Whisper...Where in NYC are you from?  Ex-Brooklynite here, now in Herndon.

Astoria, born and raised.
Dad owned the 'Shell' on 65st and Fort Hamilton Pkwy. across the street from the Top Tomato.
HS and College in NYC.

I called it the triangle of Hell. Astoria to NYC to Bklyn to Astoria daily......Hated it.

But the food was good and the ladies fine [naughty]

FOOD, the low spot of life in Virginia...Ever eat at Taeng Fong on 65th and Bay Pkwy?  Man do I miss the food.  That's why I never go back to visit-I can't risk awakening my tastebuds...It'll take years to forget again.

I did find a pretty good pizzaria in Manassas of all places Tony's NY-Reminds me of Queens.

TRW, there are a ton of tech jobs available in the NoVa area - you don't have to live in D.C. to get a job if you have IT skills.  The pay is not as good as it was a few years ago, but it is not bad.

W-W, have you tried:

-Chutzpa's in Fair Oaks ?
-Rocco's in McLean ?
-Pucinelli's in Fairfax?

I am not an expert in NY cuisine, but I've heard good things about them from transplanted New Yorkers.

Just moved here to NoVA in July.  All the above posters are absolutely correct; this place DEFINES the time vs. money equation.  To live close to DC and have more time, you need to sacrifice lots and lots of money for a house; to keep your cash, you need to spend a couple hours a day in the commute.

I work at the Pentagon, and the rule of thumb there is anything less than a 1 to 1.5-hour commute is pretty good.  

Better commuting opportunities along the I95 corridor to get into DC, but if you can swing it find a place where you go against traffic during rush hour (you don't mention if your a federal employee or defense contractor, I'm assuming you are since that's 90% of the jobs around here).

I also wouldn't live any farther south than Prince William County; i live on the south end of the county (in Woodbridge), and that's about as far as I'd go; that gives me a 1hr commute each way.

And, yes, VA is MUCH more gun-friendly than MD.  Wasn't even an option for us (even though we could have lived on Bolling AFB in Maryland).

If Chutzpa's is the place in the strip mall near Tower Records I've been-Maybe it's getting better.
The other 2 are new to me-Thanks!

Originally from Florida, spent my time in the military at Ft. Myer, Ft. McNair and Davidson Army Airfied next to Ft. Belvoir (assigned to MDW) back in the 80's.  Moved back to Florida for 17 years and then took a job with the FAA. Got assigned to NYC from March 2002 until this past July. Now I live in Herndon VA after being transfered to Dulles.  I really like it here.  

Thanks for all the great info.  From having previously lived in Maryland for 8 years I definately don't want to go back there.  The job possibility was with DIA but I'm not sure where they are located in the DC area.  Even if the job comes through I could stay on a temporary basis with my sister in Baltimore until I found someplace permanant to live.  I'm not even sure if I will relocate yet.  I have a nice house here in upstate NY and my wife would like to stay here.  This means if I was to be offered the job, the best bet might be to rent a room somewhere in DC area and try to work a four ten schedule and commute back to NY on the weekends.

If you’re going to be working at the DIA Center at Bolling Air Force Base, I’d think you’re going to have to drive all the way in.

This means that if you live in Virginia, you’ll have to cross some Potomac River bridge, probably the Woodrow Wilson - which is a real bottleneck itself.

Ideally, you should figure out where exactly you’re going to be working so you can explore commuting options before looking for a home.  Making sure you have a reasonably bearable commute can make life much easier in this area.

Good luck!