i did the long distance apt. search when moving here and while you won't be able to snatch up the deals, you/she should be ok. apartment finder sites like rent.com are handy, although you'll mostly find places managed by companies (which is good and bad).

i'd add Edgewater to your list if she doesn't mind living pretty far north. i like that area; i'd live there if i didn't need to be reasonably accessible to downtown and hyde park. Lincoln Square and Ravenswood seem nice too, if a little pricey.

i personally wouldn't wanna live in Rogers Park, a good chunk of Logan Square, or Bridgeport, but i know people who've had good experiences so who knows..

where will she be working anyway?

ps. this site came in handy when searching for places, though it's written from sort of a yuppie homebuyer's perspective.

i'm over in east village - maybe 1/2 a mile east of where scott's at... aside from a stolen bike, i've never had any problems and neither has tmbgitw. she and i are both of the opinion that this is one of the best neighborhoods in the city as far as food and convenience are concerned.

Rick Reuben wrote:[some 60 year old widow who will rent her whole second floor in Albany Park for $500 a month

i would recommend skipping albany park until the work on the brown line and the blue line is completed. it was hard enough to get into the more hopping areas of the city when both lines were running at full speed...

Right now our entire public transportation system is fucked. It doesn't matter too much where you live in that regard. As far as safety is concerned, it's a really big city...don't walk in dark alleys by yourself or otherwise make yourself an obvious target.

I live in Logan Square. Neighborhood's gotten light-years "better" in recent years, but runs the risk of turning into the next Wicker Park. Rick Reuben is right on, your best deals will be found wandering around until you find some elderly property owner who is completely out of the loop in terms of value.

In no particular order I recommend:
Logan Square
Lincoln Square
Boystown (Lakeview)
Bucktown
Roscoe Village
Ukranian Village
Avondale

since you can't "wander around" I recommend the reader over craigslist. I just moved from the south suburbs to the Ukrainian Village area and only had a few chances to actually view apartments. Some of the best places I looked at were from the reader--some great places that were listed on the reader first rented the day they hit craigslist. Bottom line: there are fewer people looking at the reader and it's search function is better.

Ultimately I think we got a good deal, and only spent a few days actually seeing apartments. On the other hand, the place we got was not yet listed and referred by a friend. But I saw some other nice places.

And since you aren't all that far, do take a couple of days to view places. Pictures tell you very little and can make shitty places look good. I don't *know* the neighborhoods, but it put my mind at rest to walk around my future .5 mile radius at day and night once I found a place I liked.

Thanks very much for the information. Any links that could be conveniently placed in this thread for tocharian would also be appreciated.

same wrote:

Minotaur029 wrote:- Ukranian Village by tipcat and scott. I love this neighborhood. It seems pretty safe to me, too! Is it ever not safe?

I live around the corner from Scott. There've been two drive-bys within a block in the past week or two. But you can't go living your life in fear. Just don't join a gang and it probably won't happen to you. I guess you could be in the wrong place at the wrong time though.

Also, my roomate saw some guy get stripped naked and beat down in the street with bats about two blocks away. That was earlier in the summer.

Some definitions of Ukrainian Village put the western border of the neighborhood at Rockwell (2600W), but the real border is Western (2400W). There are some really nice streets west of Western (Same's being one of them), but this is really Humboldt Park territory. It's not nearly as bad as it was 10 years ago, but you still have to watch your back. If you want to pay less in rent, you can get a great place in Humboldt if you can tolerate the shenanigans that Same describes. If you don't want to put up with that shit, rent east of Western and you will have no problems. Ukv is very safe these days.

Marsupialized wrote:

newberry wrote:Avondale:

Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Avondale%2C_Chicago

Chicagocrime.org:
http://www.chicagocrime.org/zipcodes/60618/

It does look crime-free in the center there, at least recently.

I am right there at Elston and Kedzie and not a peep, ever. Tons of parking, no bullshit.

Look at the crime map, one of the worst crimes are 'telephone threats'

Minotaur029 wrote:Any EA members live there?

uh, EA lives there

I've been living in Avondale for about four years. I've lived all over the north side and had friends that have lived in just about every other area that I haven't lived, and Avondale is the safest I have ever felt in the city.

It's not nearly as "happening" as most of the other places mentioned above, but it's safe, it's affordable, and most of it is near the Blue Line.

Now that I have told you how amazing this place is, please PM me if you want to buy a two bedroom condo in Avondale.

I'm sorry I keep bumping this...it's for a good cause, really.

Rick Reuben wrote:

tipcat wrote: There are some really nice streets west of Western (Same's being one of them), but this is really Humboldt Park territory.

Disagree. If you are north of Grand and south of Chicago ( Smith Park area ), you are in Ukrainian Village all the way west to California ave. Or you can say you are in the Smith Park neighborhood, but you are not in Humboldt Park, IMO.

The funny part is that the Ukarainian population in my neighborhood is significanly more dense (we're talking orders of magnitude) than in what is considered "Ukrainian Village". I guess that's why a lot of these neighborhoods shift names/borders constantly as the demographics and realty trends change.