Debt $ense

One regular assignment at work is a feature on a neighborhood. It’s a weekly series, and several of us rotate through. It can be a pain, but it does have one nice side benefit - I get to check out neighborhoods and find out what people living there have to say about them.

My latest one is right near my apartment, but it’s self-contained (for now), so I’d never been down there. So far I’m liking what I see. The smaller houses are in my price range, it’s near the park where I run and it’s a friendly place.

I’ve found a couple other neighborhoods I like through this assignment, though one is out of my price range. Another is not only in my range, but within walking distance to work and to another park I could run at. The downside there is the grades in the roads, which my little four-cylinder car isn’t as happy about. One I haven’t done - somebody beat me to it - but is on my list is within walking distance of work, close to the grocery store I shop at and not yet a hot commodity. But it might get historic district status in a few years, which could make ongoing maintenance and renovations problematic.

As the date to actively start searching gets closer, I’ll be taking even greater advantage of the opportunities to check out neighborhoods and talk to co-workers who write about neighborhoods that look promising. My goal is to find sections like the one with the steep grades that are undervalued by the community at large, yet have potential to improve. That would let me more easily afford something when I’m ready to buy, but not leave me stuck in a neighborhood where it will be tough to sell.