Is anyone here familiar with the city of Elmira, NY? I was recently offered a job there. (I would visit before accepting to see how it suits me). In the mean time...would like to know more about the cost of living; type of community; general area; pros and cons etc. If you are from there or the surrounding areas please share your experiences.
I think I've been there, basically it's south of the finger lakes. Specifics on community and such I am not sure. But I just wanted to say in general, if you're coming to NY, be ready for high taxes and overly oppressive firearms laws. If you can live with those it's not too bad in general.
Ok this is not related but I remember in the early 80's my Dad mentioning Elmira when I was a kid and I started singing this song and he kept saying ELMIRA not Elvira.
Lived there most of my life and still own two house there. What do you need to know about it? Now I live about a hour or some from it in Binghamton area.
Would like to know about the cost of living, surrounding area, homesteading opportunities... etc...
For an area like Elmira what sort of annual salary does one need to make to live comfortably?? Someone who's looking to continue living frugally, manage finances well. Cost of renting a small place with a bit of land for garden and few goats / chickens?
Yes taxes are high but you can still buy a house cheaper then other states. Schools are are not to bad it really makes a different if your going to live in town or outside of town. Still have farms not far from town and good shopping close by at Horseheads.
Surprised to hear of a job as a lot of places have closed.
Look on Elmira Craigs list for place rent usually is around 600 to 1,000 a month. Salary are hard to say my son is say around 50,000. Is comfortable depends on your normal living expenses.
I was there two years ago to pick up some equipment I bought on craigslist. The man I bought the equipment from said it was a prison town and there were some negatives. I can not remember exactly the negatives but maybe the families of the prisoners would temporarily reside there to be close to their incarcerated relative.
Elmira has a lot of areas you can live outside of town and still be near the town. http://elmira-corningrealtors.com/ has a local MLS listing. There are 2 prison but the onlyescape from one in recent history has had a new fence put up (no fence in fron before a hug eoversight) Depedning on your salary you cna do quite well. Gas is high taxes are high but since housing prices are low its not so bad. There are some towns you want to avoid due to flooding issue from the rivers.Some towns ahve dumb rules so you need to investigate the zoning office before you buy! ONly issue is the gas drilling is supposed ti begin soon so prices of houses may go up. Rents have gone up a lot on th elast few years due to speculation of the gas drilling.
Depending on what you are looking for and willing to pay you can find a huge variance in costs.
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We bought a small farm with 10 acres,a larger barn, 3 car garage with extend work shop in back, and a3 bedroom home built 20 years ago for 150,000. Was used as a horse farm before us.
It's about 45 minutes from me- don't visit the city often, but shop in Horseheads ( north of Elmira) occasionally. The area has been economically depressed for some time- lost a lot of its industrial base. As a result, housing prices are quite low, even for the southern tier. Yes you do have NY state property taxes to contend with. Interstate 86 runs by it, which makes transportation easy. Nearby Corning, home of Corning Glass, is a somewhat more vibrant town.
Elmira is located in the Marcellus Shale- at this point NY is not allowing fracking, but may in the near future.There are already many Trenton-Black River wells in the county.
Because of its proximity to Pennsylvania, I would not be surprised if Elmira's economy is already being affected by the gas industry.
quite often now its cheaper here to own rather than rent a house with property. Howeverproperty tends to not have mineral right s sold and prices have gone up on everything. We won a 3 bedroom houseon the edge of town and pay over $2000 in taxes, however we do have public transit that is pretty good.
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We live in PA about 15 miles from Elmira, NY. I find Elmria to be a very sad town. Industry left many years ago and there are, as mention, 2 prisons. I believe the town is changing because of the element that the prisons bring into the commuity. The town of Elmira, itself, has nothing really to offer. I don't know what job you were offered but I would not live in the city of Elmira. I would look for a home in the Ithacha area which is home to Cornell University. Very different lifestyles but very welcoming community. Pa cost of living is less. Mansfield, Wellsboro area still have hometown feel but prices are higher due to the gas wells. If you buy property check into having your mineral rights either in NY state or Pa. The local hospitals are very good. Economy is poor. The Finger Lakes area and the wineries are beautiful and are not far from Elmira and might be something you would want to check into for homes too. Wakins Glen race way is a big tourist attraction in the summer. Our daughter teachers in the Elmira school district and I would decide for yourself about sending your children there. She has seen a decline in recent years. If you homestead you will probably find a nice homestead at a reasonable cost. I wish you the best but please check into prices and area carefully. Of course, I would hope you would visit the area and surrounding areas before you make a permanent move with your family..
I do definetely plan to visit prior to accepting the job. I would much prefer to live in PA rather then NY. Though I'm not planning to buy initially, the whole deal with fracking does concern me a bit.
As I don't have children and am single that does offer some flexibility. Will look into the areas in PA that Helena mentioned. Thank you.
I just did some business with a sharp. well spoken scientist from Corning. When the topic of Elmira came up, he pretty much quoted Helena's thoughts from post #15. Elmira suffers from long term decline from a shinking industrial base, a lot of recent undesirable immigration from those that want to collect their checks, and be close to "babie's daddy" in prison, and the dubious distinction of having the lowest home prices of any similar city in the US. Personally, I have spent a lifetime in the region and I'm getting real tired of the weather, lack of opportunity for my children, and the burning desire of our political overlords to give our future away to the fracking industry, regardless of the irreversable damage it does. Good luck, but dogs will fly before I would ever leave VA. for upstate NY. Most of my mother's side of the family migrated out of state, from upstate many years ago, others remain in the southern tier, and some are still far north on the St. Lawrence. Decades later, the available opportunities, and resultant outcomes, for each group are quite a bit different, to put it charitably.
I live 40 minutes away. All I can say they are ground zero for Fracking. It is an old town heavily damaged by two big floods in 2006 and 2011. Look for high ground if you move there.
Linda
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Huck,
let me know when you are coming to the area, might have a room to rent with house sharing. I am in pa. 35 min. from elmira. fracking has died off in recent months here in pa. they have gone west ot ohio. been quiet again.
I would not move into NYS is possible. Horrible taxes, horrible gun laws, the State gets 70 cents on every gallon of gas, NYC rules the rest of the State. I've been here my whole life and am considering leaving...if I can afford it.
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