8 ms·

To add on to this, point a real estate app (Zillow, etc) to Racine Wisconsin. The east side is fairly nice. Also, look at north-eastern Illinois, starting in

To add on to this, point a real estate app (Zillow, etc) to Racine Wisconsin. The east side is fairly nice. Also, look at north-eastern Illinois, starting in a radius about 40 miles or so outside of Chicago. The grate thing about that area is there is a lot of open farm land, and pieces get converted to housing development periodically whenever the market can support it. So that means many areas have 1500 sqft on 1/4 acre homes in the $200K range (or $100k if you want to put some work into fixing it up). And everything is "close enough" to a major city, and there is enough of the city that expands out in the surrounding areas (a number of large employers aren't downtown, although some have been migrating back to the city to attract the employee demographic that prefers the city life).

honkycat 5y ago
So sick of seeing this. I grew up in rural Illinois, first 20 years of my life. Also spent 10 years in Chicago proper. 40 miles outside of Chicago is the middle of nowhere. It is not a substitute for living in a city. I do not see the draw in buying a cheap house in a rural community with nothing to do and nothing around it. My family owns a house in a rural community. It is dead weight. Nobody wants to buy it from us. It is not a good place to raise your kids. The schools are under-funded. The people you interact with are bigots and they will teach your kids to be bigots. If your kid is gifted they will sit them in a corner and do NOTHING to address how they are learning more quickly than their peers. They will suffer from under-funded schooling that is just desperately trying to keep the bottom half of the students from spilling out. Kids are heavily influenced by their peers. There are no "garage bands" or art groups or clubs or anything for your kids to participate in. There is school and sports. If you are lucky there will be a marching band. Also, you are assuming this person is a cis hetero white male. There IS sexism in these communities, there IS racism, there IS bigotry. You will not be welcome if you do not fit in. You WILL be confronted, you WILL be harassed.
- tayo42 5y ago
  Glad to see comments like this, this kind of conversation seems to always be dominated by col calculators.
  - honkycat 5y ago
    It just grinds my gears. It is such a non-solution to the problem. Basically "if you don't like it leave." and it just muddies the water around discussions about affordability of housing. Move away from your friends and family and community to somewhere in the middle of nowhere, make a massive investment, and cross your fingers you find friends in the community! There is no job market to speak of, so good luck when the remote work fad ends[0]! Also pretending these communities are not extremely religious and contain bigotry is dishonest. It is out there. [0]: which is not guaranteed but possible
- mechanical_bear 5y ago
  Calling all (or at least most) rural dwellers bigots… ah, the irony.
  - honkycat 5y ago
    We once had a black man come to one of our city council meetings to propose a new housing development near the school. He left after multiple people called him the n-word. My friends who were gay and came out in high school were harassed. It is out there. You just don't care.
    - deleted 5y ago
      [deleted]
    - seneca 5y ago
      > It is out there. It is in the place you grew up. Projecting negative stereotypes onto people because they share a broad group with other people you had negative experiences with is stereotyping. > You just don't care. Less of this, please.
  - bigbillheck 5y ago
    Of course not all of them are, and there's plenty of bigots in urban and suburban areas, but you start looking at voting patterns and it's hard not to conclude that the bigot density is a lot higher.
  - ozzythecat 5y ago
    I grew up in the Midwest as a person of color. I specifically refuse to go back and am consider a $1.5MM home purchase only because of the bigotry and prejudice that I faced and my parents faced. My friends at school couldn’t come over because their parents weren’t comfortable with it. It is a problem, and it’s not that most rural dwellers are bigots but enough people are, and they’re the loudest in the room. Asking a person of color, lgbt, Muslim, etcz to live in rural white america is often a non starter.
- seneca 5y ago
  The irony of how incredibly bigoted this comment is would be hilarious if so many people didn't seen to believe it.
- lp0_on_fire 5y ago
  Based on your hateful comments it seems that rural areas would be better served if you stayed in the city.
- hardwaregeek 5y ago
  Yeah...there's something spooky about places like Racine, Wisconsin or rural Illinois. And I don't think it's specific to me. Get Out resonated with a lot of people (ofc it's way different and difficult for Black people) because there is some fear and discomfort in going to a white, rural area. Even if the white, rural area is ostensibly liberal and friendly. There's something disturbing about being alone, the only one of your race and surrounded.
- Talanes 5y ago
  40 miles away from a major city is hardly the "middle of nowhere." That's still within spontaneous day-trip range. My hometown is 88 miles to the nearest real city, and that city is Fresno. Double that distance at least to get anywhere you actually want to go.
  - honkycat 5y ago
    Hour and a half total round trip? Almost certainly more including traffic and navigating the city? Plus having to drive yourself ( or public transit) instead of a cab? How often are you actually making that trip? At that point you aren't participating in the culture of the city. Also you aren't going to school in the city, aren't meeting people at cultural events in the city, etc. Etc.
    - ghaff 5y ago
      I'm not sure what "participating in the culture of the city" means exactly. I live an hour and a bit outside of a major city. I don't go in all the time but I regularly will go in for dinner and a show, to meet people, etc. Not that I would have wanted to do it long-term, but 60+ minute commutes are not exactly rare (and I once had one part-time), so that length of drive hardly rules out going into a city on a weeknight or weekend every 2 or 3 weeks.
    - Talanes 5y ago
      I live in west San Francisco, popping over to the East Bay is an hour and a half round trip for me, so that's not quite a deal-breaking amount of time. That's a magnitude of difference from having to do at least a four hour drive each way.
  - fivea 5y ago
    > 40 miles away from a major city is hardly the "middle of nowhere." That's still within spontaneous day-trip range. I call "40 miles away" a daily commute distance.
- AnimalMuppet 5y ago
  See, the thing is, not everyone wants to live in the city. Some find the quiet more refreshing than the noise. Some find open space better for raising kids than city streets. To a point that you posted in a follow-on, not everyone wants to participate in "the cultural life of the city" all that much. Personally, I'm not sure that I'd want to be closer than 40 miles to downtown Chicago... but I might want to be close to a Metra line.

honkycat 5y ago

So sick of seeing this. I grew up in rural Illinois, first 20 years of my life. Also spent 10 years in Chicago proper. 40 miles outside of Chicago is the middle of nowhere. It is not a substitute for living in a city. I do not see the draw in buying a cheap house in a rural community with nothing to do and nothing around it. My family owns a house in a rural community. It is dead weight. Nobody wants to buy it from us. It is not a good place to raise your kids. The schools are under-funded. The people you interact with are bigots and they will teach your kids to be bigots. If your kid is gifted they will sit them in a corner and do NOTHING to address how they are learning more quickly than their peers. They will suffer from under-funded schooling that is just desperately trying to keep the bottom half of the students from spilling out. Kids are heavily influenced by their peers. There are no "garage bands" or art groups or clubs or anything for your kids to participate in. There is school and sports. If you are lucky there will be a marching band. Also, you are assuming this person is a cis hetero white male. There IS sexism in these communities, there IS racism, there IS bigotry. You will not be welcome if you do not fit in. You WILL be confronted, you WILL be harassed.

tayo42 5y ago
Glad to see comments like this, this kind of conversation seems to always be dominated by col calculators.
- honkycat 5y ago
  It just grinds my gears. It is such a non-solution to the problem. Basically "if you don't like it leave." and it just muddies the water around discussions about affordability of housing. Move away from your friends and family and community to somewhere in the middle of nowhere, make a massive investment, and cross your fingers you find friends in the community! There is no job market to speak of, so good luck when the remote work fad ends[0]! Also pretending these communities are not extremely religious and contain bigotry is dishonest. It is out there. [0]: which is not guaranteed but possible
mechanical_bear 5y ago
Calling all (or at least most) rural dwellers bigots… ah, the irony.
- honkycat 5y ago
  We once had a black man come to one of our city council meetings to propose a new housing development near the school. He left after multiple people called him the n-word. My friends who were gay and came out in high school were harassed. It is out there. You just don't care.
  - deleted 5y ago
    [deleted]
  - seneca 5y ago
    > It is out there. It is in the place you grew up. Projecting negative stereotypes onto people because they share a broad group with other people you had negative experiences with is stereotyping. > You just don't care. Less of this, please.
- bigbillheck 5y ago
  Of course not all of them are, and there's plenty of bigots in urban and suburban areas, but you start looking at voting patterns and it's hard not to conclude that the bigot density is a lot higher.
- ozzythecat 5y ago
  I grew up in the Midwest as a person of color. I specifically refuse to go back and am consider a $1.5MM home purchase only because of the bigotry and prejudice that I faced and my parents faced. My friends at school couldn’t come over because their parents weren’t comfortable with it. It is a problem, and it’s not that most rural dwellers are bigots but enough people are, and they’re the loudest in the room. Asking a person of color, lgbt, Muslim, etcz to live in rural white america is often a non starter.
seneca 5y ago
The irony of how incredibly bigoted this comment is would be hilarious if so many people didn't seen to believe it.
lp0_on_fire 5y ago
Based on your hateful comments it seems that rural areas would be better served if you stayed in the city.
hardwaregeek 5y ago
Yeah...there's something spooky about places like Racine, Wisconsin or rural Illinois. And I don't think it's specific to me. Get Out resonated with a lot of people (ofc it's way different and difficult for Black people) because there is some fear and discomfort in going to a white, rural area. Even if the white, rural area is ostensibly liberal and friendly. There's something disturbing about being alone, the only one of your race and surrounded.
Talanes 5y ago
40 miles away from a major city is hardly the "middle of nowhere." That's still within spontaneous day-trip range. My hometown is 88 miles to the nearest real city, and that city is Fresno. Double that distance at least to get anywhere you actually want to go.
- honkycat 5y ago
  Hour and a half total round trip? Almost certainly more including traffic and navigating the city? Plus having to drive yourself ( or public transit) instead of a cab? How often are you actually making that trip? At that point you aren't participating in the culture of the city. Also you aren't going to school in the city, aren't meeting people at cultural events in the city, etc. Etc.
  - ghaff 5y ago
    I'm not sure what "participating in the culture of the city" means exactly. I live an hour and a bit outside of a major city. I don't go in all the time but I regularly will go in for dinner and a show, to meet people, etc. Not that I would have wanted to do it long-term, but 60+ minute commutes are not exactly rare (and I once had one part-time), so that length of drive hardly rules out going into a city on a weeknight or weekend every 2 or 3 weeks.
  - Talanes 5y ago
    I live in west San Francisco, popping over to the East Bay is an hour and a half round trip for me, so that's not quite a deal-breaking amount of time. That's a magnitude of difference from having to do at least a four hour drive each way.
- fivea 5y ago
  > 40 miles away from a major city is hardly the "middle of nowhere." That's still within spontaneous day-trip range. I call "40 miles away" a daily commute distance.
AnimalMuppet 5y ago
See, the thing is, not everyone wants to live in the city. Some find the quiet more refreshing than the noise. Some find open space better for raising kids than city streets. To a point that you posted in a follow-on, not everyone wants to participate in "the cultural life of the city" all that much. Personally, I'm not sure that I'd want to be closer than 40 miles to downtown Chicago... but I might want to be close to a Metra line.