The Front Range

[Trogon]

I live in Lakewood. Don’t do it for all the reasons above. We bought another house elsewhere and are getting the hell out of here in April.

 

[Eagle]

I made essentially the same move back in 2018. Huntsville, AL to Denver, CO, government job with a major paycut in starting salary ($50k); but man have things changed in 5 years. If I were offered the same opportunity today, I don’t think I’d be able to make the move simply due to housing costs.

I lived in Castle Rock and commuted, but I also knew I only had to do so for two years before I’d be full time telework. Even being just 30 miles south of my building in downtown Denver, if I tried to drive, it would take anywhere from 40 minutes to over 2 hours, so I just took the light rail every day from Lonetree to downtown.

We moved back east in 20 when the COVID madness was just getting started, mainly due to my wife missing family. I’d still be there if it was just me, but full time telework lets me live anywhere and the wife had to get closer to home.

 

[DenverCountryBoy]

"Expensive" is relative. What's your price range?

 

[sndmn11]

I grew up in Littleton (now everyone calls it Ken Caryl...) and am in Morrison now.

I wouldn't move here!

If you do, you may find something worth while towards Idaho Springs, but better pray for terrible ski seasons or you'll never get home. There are occasionally some nice rentals in Morrison proper, but they are way overpriced.

Bear Creek Park has a campground.

 

[Coveyleader]

No way I'd make that drive. There are more wrecks along that stretch (daily) backing stuff up for hours. If you're set on commuting an hour or so or more, why take the job? The traffic around Denver is horrible, you'll be a bitter person in a week.

CO is a great state, but it comes with a high cost.

 

[cnelk]

To the OP

I would really consider finding a job offer other than Lakewood CO.
I would suspect in this job market, that wouldnt be difficult

 

[BarCO]

For government work, try at the state level Colorado is supposed to be a great state to work for.

 

[Mtnmilsurp]

As a very anti-city guy who's been stationed in Boston, Washington DC, and Los Angeles, I found the easiest way to thrive in each place was to live as close to work as possible. The worst of living in a city isn't sleeping in it, its driving through it and I didn't mind driving through any of them to get out to the country on the weekends but would have hated driving through any of them every day during the week. I lived in tiny apartments as small as 400 square feet and even a sailboat for a couple years and rode my bicycle locally a lot, even commuting to work by bicycle. As far as housing cost goes, I knew guys in every city who commuted from the suburbs and hated life and didn't really save money by doing so. All they got was a yard they only saw in daylight on the weekends when I was heading up into the mountains anyway.

 

[307]

I have a patient that drives from Cheyenne to Denver to work every day. It CAN be done but there's no way I would do it. It sounds awful and puts a lot of stress on the person, family, work, and vehicles.

 

[mattferg84]

I'd look at somewhere like Conifer or Aspen Park and stay away from living along I25. It is insanely busy with everyone living on top of each other. Not cheap either up there and 285 can kinda get sketchy when it snows but sounds like youre work would be flexible from you working from home.

 

[EdP]

I think you need to ask yourself "What's wrong with Tn where I now live." To me, Tn is a great state to live in. A big part of that is the politics of the state. I would not want to live in Co or send my kids to school there.

 

[Fatcamp]

I highly reccomend visiting first. Highly.

I would never live there, but our kids do and like it.

 

[taskswap]

No way are you driving from Cheyenne to Lakewood every day. You'd be stuck in insane traffic all the time, you'd go nuts. It would probably be twice your time estimate especially given ongoing construction on I-25.

I think your biggest issue will be wanting that fenced yard. You're coming into an area that's gone through a massive housing boom for 20+ years due to oil/gas, technology, and other industry growth. Most of that new housing was multi-level apartments. You're going to need to settle.

But that doesn't mean you can't find anything. Here's a 2 bed 1 bath only 30mins from lakewood (depending on where you're going) for $1375:

1149 Akron St, Aurora, CO 80010 | Zillow

1149 Akron St, Aurora CO, is a Single Family home that contains 778 sq ft.It contains 2 bedrooms and 1 bathroom. The Zestimate for this Single Family is $314,900, which has decreased by $3,274 in the last 30 days.The Rent Zestimate for this Single Family is $1,908/mo, which has increased by...

www.zillow.com

That's probably going to be your lowest payment. For a few hundred bucks more you can get something much nicer. Browse around Zillow, there are hundreds of listings. You just have to understand you aren't going to find what you find in Tennessee. You're trading half-acre-plus lots for dense-packed urban sprawl at high prices. But you'll also be close to mountains where others pay thousands to vacation and hunt in. Sometimes you just have to decide what "winning" looks like

 

[jayhawk]

Don’t live in Cheyenne. I-25 is a zoo and Cheyenne just sucks as a town. Especially if you’re single.

Conifer, Golden, and Evergreen are nice spots if you can find housing. I think the recent statistic I read was that the front range is the 5th most expensive housing market in the US. Go figure. Commute may get dicey in the winter-time, but that’s the front range for ya.

 

[MTtrout]

OP, I’ve never lived in the Front Range so refer to the post above.

I’m not sure where you’re at in your career but entry level position sounds like you’re just starting. I’ve been in the wildlife/ecology field for almost 20 years. The thing about these sorts of jobs is that you cannot pass up opportunities to improve your resume. The fact that you are willing to apply far from home to gain experience makes me think you already know this. Without a resume, you will always be at a disadvantage.

 

[Bluefish]

Having recently moved from Colorado Springs to the Midwest, I am so glad to be out of Colorado. Politics have gone hard core leftist. I expect there will be an ar ban passed this year. Traffic sucks, drove from cos to denver for 4 years. When I started it was a 60 mile, 60 min drive with 4 stoplights. i am sure I could not do the drive in an hour now. There are 8 lights Now. We stopped skiing 10 years ago as the drive was so inconsistent, one time 2 hrs, next 5 hrs. Dirt biking used to be head up Friday night camp, come home Sunday. Now if not there Wednesday, no camp sites. Only good thing was we sold our house for 3x what we paid and we’re able to buy a nice retirement house in the midwest.

 

[arock]

The cost in living in Tennessee and Colorado isn't very comparable. My brother was in the Knoxville area for a number of years and you'd be hard pressed to find a better deal than that. The Denver area is a pretty big sticker shock in terms of housing cost but day to day stuff is not outrageous compared to places like Chicago or Seattle. I guess it's all perspective there.

Coming from the peoples republic of Illinois I didn't expect it to be as crazy here as it is but its still not quite as nuts as Chicago. I think the biggest problem is the ballot stuff that makes it more of a mob rule than governance by elected officials.

Anyway, I have a bird dog and being in the Denver area makes eastern CO, western KS, Nebraska and Wyoming accessible for day trips which is important to me. 300 days of summer is much better than the 8 months of awful in the Chicagoland area. I also like to elk and deer hunt so I can get to places like AZ, NM and Wyoming without having to drive for 25 hours which is kind of nice.

The issues CO is facing is not different from ID, MT or AZ and UT to an extent where the exodus of liberal tech based employees have migrated from CA, the north east and midwest. Wyoming seems to be somewhat insulated for now but I can't imagine there won't be a major development initiative there in the near future.

That being said you should be able to find something affordable and decent in the Arvada, Broomfield or Englewood areas. It'll just be an older house with less square footage.

 

[KHNC]

The Front Range of CO is really just Eastern California. And now it sounds like that is more so with the super expensive housing and blue voters im reading about lately.

 

[Coveyleader]

Has the front range changed? For sure, but make no mistake about it, CO still offers some of the best hunting in the lower 48 to it’s residents to people who get off the couch.


If you’re lazy, a complainer, don’t like turning the keys to go find places, well, it’s just like any other place.

 

[GringoBling]

We are landowners in SW CO, so not the Front Range. But, I would say almost everything is more expensive in CO...gas, food, utilities, service calls, housing, state income tax (but low prop taxes), seems like just about everything in the local hardware stores, insurance, and on and on.