Living Situation

[Class n Sass]

OK ladies I need your opinions. I am about to get married in 45 days to be exact. My fiance and I just found out today where he will be working. Now here is our dilemma...we need an apartment. There is an apartment available close to where I currently live and it very reasonably priced. There is a good amount of closet space and free easy parking. Now it will probably be a one hour commute by car for my fiance. I already commute to work everyday and it takes me about 45 minutes. I have been doing it for 4 years now so I am used to it. My fiance is not so used to it.

Now he wants to look for apartments closer to where he will be working however the apartments are very expensive and not any larger than the apartment near my house. There also is not as much closet space. Now the apartment where I live is 950 per month and the apartments near my fiance''s job are about 1900 per month....HUGE difference. We will still have to pay utilities.

Now my fiance''s argument is that by living close to the hospital he won''t need a car so we won''t have an extra car note/insurance. We will also save money on tolls and spend less on gas. But I just have a hard time wrapping my head around paying 1900 per month plus utilities. I''d rather pay for the extra car etc and have cheaper rent. Also I have an extra job near my house that brings me about 1200 per month. I am not guaranteed to get something like that near my fiance''s job.

So what would you do??? Would you take the apartment near my house and deal with an extra car payment and a longer commute for my fiance? Or would you live closer to the hospital and pay alot more in rent?

 

[erica k]

how far would your commute be if you moved closer to the hospital? would it be more than 45 minutes?

the bigger question for me, though, is can you afford to move there? what will your fiance''s hours be like? an hour long commute might not be so much fun at the end of a really long day/night (i''m assuming he''s a doctor?). it probably wouldn''t be ''as'' bad of a commute with a regular 9 to 5 job.

 

[iheartscience]

Is there no in between? The jump from $900 to $1900 is pretty insane. If moving doesn''t give you a longer commute and your fiance is able to cover the difference in rent, then I would do it. However, I don''t think it''s reasonable to strain your finances so much to do something like that. Plus if you''ll lose your part time job, that''s another substantial amount of money also.

I certainly wouldn''t want to pay $1000 more a month in rent but be making $1200 less. I don''t think it seems feasible to move to that apartment unless your fiance is going to be making so much money it won''t matter that you''ll have $2200 less a month.

 

[Sabine]

One thing to consider is whether your FI thinks he will be uncontrolably unhappy with a 1 hour commute. One of the things my FI had to accept about me is that I HATE to commute, and I flat out REFUSE to work anywhere that is more than a 20 minute drive from where I live. I would be miserable if I had to commute. Although it might cost more, living close might save peace of mind (that is, unless thinking of the monthy rent ruins YOUR peace of mind).

Another point to consider is that you said you would be moving near the hospital. Does that mean your FI is a doctor? Does he work odd/long hours? My FI is a med student, and he lives in walking distance to the hospital, and I know that if I had to worry about him driving home at 2 AM after a 20 hour shift I would be really worried.

 

[zhuzhu]

Another thing is, who is a better driver? I know it sounds strange but whoever is less likely to get into traffic accident should prob do better commuting....

 

[sred2]

Date: 4/10/2008 5:56:24 PM
Author: Sabine
One thing to consider is whether your FI thinks he will be uncontrolably unhappy with a 1 hour commute. One of the things my FI had to accept about me is that I HATE to commute, and I flat out REFUSE to work anywhere that is more than a 20 minute drive from where I live. I would be miserable if I had to commute. Although it might cost more, living close might save peace of mind (that is, unless thinking of the monthy rent ruins YOUR peace of mind).

Another point to consider is that you said you would be moving near the hospital. Does that mean your FI is a doctor? Does he work odd/long hours? My FI is a med student, and he lives in walking distance to the hospital, and I know that if I had to worry about him driving home at 2 AM after a 20 hour shift I would be really worried.

I''m the exact same way Sabine. My BF is more than willing to comute if need be but I''m not used to it and know I would hate it.

 

[Class n Sass]

My FI is beginning his residency. We went looking for apartments today and there are ridiculous. We saw something today for $2K a month and I couldn''t believe what it looked like. We looked at numbers on paper and discovered that it makes more sense to deal with the commute. He''s not thrilled about the commute but he said he thinks he might actually enjoy it sometimes just because its time to think...that''s how I feel about my commute.