Moving to Seattle - never been there before. Tell me what I'm in for?

Good: food, Rainier, Whistler, Olympic NP, Cascades, Victoria, markets, coffee, short flight to Kauai

Bad: bums, the "freeze" hard to make new friends

Ugly: traffic, cost of housing, constant drizzle

Good: Lots of places to run. Only 5 hours to Hawaii

Bad: Tattooed women, Indian / Asian engineers, drug-ridden populace, homeless people everywhere

Ugly: People with awful attitude, passive aggressiveness

I'm not big on downtown Seattle itself (it's nice, I just don't like the congestion) but Seattle and the Puget Sound area in general is pretty great for running. Lots of good food options pretty much everywhere too. Housing is expensive but you already knew that if you're moving here.

Be prepared for a lot of rain! Summers are great but from around November to April it rains quite a bit. Invest in some good running rain gear!

There are a lot of outdoor things to do there and because of the rain it is very green and beautiful. I’m not as familiar with the running scene now only because I lived there before I really started running seriously but I believe there are some good trails and I’m guessing they have a few decent running groups.

Good food, especially if you do eat seafood. Housing is expensive depending on where you are coming from and what you are used to. People seem to be a bit more to themselves there, so I would get connected in some way as it will be easier to meet people. But overall a good city with plenty to do!

Good; outdoors , the ocean, close to Hawaii

Bad ; Bums and Hobos , East Indian cab drivers , Condo prices, sidewalk human feces

Ugly ; Plain women with lots of make up and died hair , Bald men that wear ball caps to cover baldness.

Jamin. You're in for Jamin.

Moving2Seattle wrote:

What's the running like?

How do you like the city?

Good food? Etc..

Running is amazing.

Jamin lives there so it's pretty cool.

Food is good but it's overpriced.

Traffic is awful & there are lots of Asian drivers driving 5 under the speed limit in the left lanes.

Lots of tech nerds.

I was born in Seattle and ran track & XC here. At the age of 18 I left for a D1 college with a partial scholarship. I didn't return to live in Seattle for 25 years. Been here for 15 years now.

As was mentioned before, it rains. It rains a lot. It doesn't rain hard like in the SE. It's just an on and off thing throughout the day. A constant drizzle. Rains start coming in October, except for this year, and doesn't let up until mid-April. April and May are still quite cool and one of the coolest places in the USA. June can sometimes be a bit rainy at times. Summer arrives on July 5th! It will last until the end of August. Then it gets noticeably cooler. Having said that, December - February are warmer then a lot of northern places, it's just wet. Lot's of gray cloudy days.

There are a lot of great places to run. Many parks and trails if you like that. There is a pretty big running community so join a club to get to know people. Races are almost every weekend.

As for living in Seattle I wouldn't do it. Housing is very expensive, lots of people, and the heroin epidemic is off the hook. Lots of homeless people, drug addicts, and what all that brings. There's an RV crisis too as many almost homeless people are living in them. Most are in pretty bad shape, barely able to run, and are about 20-30 years old. They sit in neighborhoods until told to leave which means just moving a couple of streets over.

I've never actually lived in the Seattle City limits. I've always lived in the 'burbs. Rents are an easy $2,000 for a 2 bedroom. If you're looking to buy you're looking at houses around $800,000. Yes, you can always find something cheaper but do you really want to live there? I don't think so. These prices are just a ballpark figures. If you can afford the eastside (Bellevue, Kirkland, Redmond) go there. Less crime, less homelessness, less drug addicts. Other places not as good but better than Seattle proper are Shoreline, Edmonds, and Bothell. Don't go south. Worse traffic (but hey, it's bad everywhere) more crime, more crowded.

Mass transit is getting better. Yes, it needs improvement but it is getting better.

Good luck on the move!

I heard Jamin lives there

Thx for the feedback. I appreciate the candidness.

I'm actually thinking of buying a condo/townhouse ($300-450K budget).

Question: If I am working in downtown - which suburb would make for the best commute?

I was looking at living downtown to save time on commute , but think I am more of a suburbs guy

Why the hell would anyone pay that kind of coin to live someplace where it rains all the time and the streets are full of homeless people driving broken down RVs and trying to score heroin?

As for the weather, the summers are great. One thing no one mentioned is the forest fire smoke we've had the last couple of summers, and that's a new thing and definitely something we are really hoping is not the new normal.

The rain - yes, for about 7 months of the year it tends to be drizzly and gray in lieu of the frigid winters most of the rest of the country is getting. But here' the thing - it's mostly just a drizzle that comes and goes. The good thing about that is if you remain a little flexible, it's quite easy to find some non-rainy stretches most every day and certainly a few times a week in whihc to go for your run. And it rarely gets a serious driving type of rain.

Honestly, most of us in the PNW just learn that it isn't anything to get riled about. A downpour - yes, but the little intermittent showers are just not that big a deal.

The big draw here is the outdoors. There's just about everything to do, from skiing, mountain biking, hiking, boating, trail running, etc. Lots of running clubs and weekly runs to choose from. All that stuff is super accessible and close by and with many options to choose from in just about all directions.

But the big clincher for me is the beauty of Seattle itself. Green and lush - all year long. Homeowners commonly landscape the hell out of their yards and it's a visual feast just to walk or run through the neighborhoods. I thrive on my daily runs through the killer neighborhoods around here. And if that weren't enough, you get the most amazing views of the Cascade Mountains, Olympic Mountains, and the Puget Sound from countless spots in the city, not to mention Mt. Baker and Rainier.

Traffic is something to be reckoned with and i find myself planning errands and the like based on not getting caught in the traffic.

People can be kind of bitchy if they think you've violated some kind of civil norm and i've gotten stuff like snide comments when on a bike trail at a road crossing when i pulled up in front of a couple of other cyclists who were waiting there before me.

Also, I'd encourage you to join a running group. The people are generally really nice.

Have a good time here and hope to see you out and about!

Not widely known, but still true: In a typical year Seattle gets less rain than NYC.

I would question the logic of moving to one of the most expensive cities in the country just to live in the suburbs. Unless you are moving here because you have a job lined up, you could live in the suburbs in any city, because they are all about the same.

That being said, anywhere in the Seattle area gives you access to all that is already mentioned, both good and bad. I don't feel like it rains so much as it is gray from Nov-May. I hate cold weather and moved here from the Midwest. I find the winter here much more tolerable.

Something not mentioned enough is the music scene. You can catch amazing local talent in any of the neighborhood venues, and often much bigger names will play in them too. KEXP is to me the heart of the city and hands down the best radio station I have ever heard.

Although the people here can be hard to reach, I find that most people I talk to in Seattle are remarkably well-educated. I can have conversations that push me to new ideas I couldn't have been exposed to just anywhere. I have met people from multiple continents and walks of life. Seattle has changed a ton just in the last 10 years, not all for the good, but I would say few cities are as vibrant as Seattle.

Moving2Seattle wrote:

What's the running like?

How do you like the city?

Good food? Etc..

OP, are you the430miler? Are you moving to Seattle because you have always wondered what it would be like to live in the West after a lifetime of living in the South?

Downtown traffic is a nightmare and I don't know why anyone would put up with it if they don't absolutely have to. If you live on a direct bus line or close enough that Uber is cheap then that helps. The cost of owning a car is insane between parking in the city, parking at apartment, registration fees. There are lots of good running paths here (Burke Gilman, Green Lake, Lake Union, Discovery Park). I would look at Magnolia, Wallingford, or maybe Westlake from a running persepctive.

By the way: https://www.tripsavvy.com/seattle-not-the-rainiest-us-city-1609247

kibitzer wrote:

Not widely known, but still true: In a typical year Seattle gets less rain than NYC.

Seattle is the cloudiest city in the USA though

I'm not sure total inches of rain is the best measure here. If it drizzles every day for six months, that may not be much total rain in inches, but it sucks. I live in one of the cities that has more rain than Seattle -- but we get rain in 1 or 2 inch downpours that aren't super frequent.

A better measure would be how many days per year have rain.