Elmira, NY

I'm about 45 mins north of Elmira. Echo many of the comments above. There are some nice views and nice properties if you get away from town. If homesteading is what you are after, you can create your own little piece of heaven. Cost of living isn't bad in my book, but you have to pay attention to the taxes as they vary greatly in the region.
Rent is abnormally high right now as the frack guys had lined up many of the units for their teams working in PA and they are planning to come to NY next if the governor lets them.

Www.endlessmtrealestate.com is a local REA you can check things out. Elmira sits practically on the PA border so its not far. There are a few areas that are easy to get to Elmira with decent roads otbers not so great. Millerton and Gilette are the main little towns to look for. Once again it will really depend on just where your job is located

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I live about 1.5 hrs from Elmira, I have only ever really passed though, My buddy who I used to work with lives in Vestal and works for the City of Elmira PD, He tells me the place is a real dump, There are the prisons there and a lot of the people get released then hang around for a bit. The crime rate is very high, I am sure there are prob places on the out ----s that are decent. Now this is just what I hear, But I tend to believe him.

Elmira is just up the road from me. Post #15 pretty much summed it up. If I were taking a job there, I'd live on the PA side.

I know people are all freaked out about fracking, but have not talked to ANYONE with first hand bad experience. I have talked to many people who have moved up a tax bracket or two in the last 5 years because of it.

The only thing I see bad about fracking is the ----ed trucks that drive in 80mph convoys on back roads.

Enough about fracking...Mansfield and the surrounding area is very nice and not far from Elmira.

I can't comment on Elmira's prices, but I will say, after having lived in Rochester, NY for nearly 10 years, make sure you can handle the winters coming out of Virginia. I hated them--snow on the ground almost constantly from the end of December through the end of March. I'm very relieved to be back in Virginia, despite my husband's comments about this being "tropical."

Visit soon if you're going to--that will give you an idea of what the ugliest part of the winter is like. There's nothing worse than built-up old snow at the end of the winter. Bleah.

Steve, seriously? Surfactants (soap) from frack fluid bubbling out of a spring on Rt 44, adjacent to a frack well, even though the industry claims that it's impossible to violate the layer between the ground water and gas pockets. Well documented stats. that you are 17x more likely to have methane in your water well if you live within 1/2 mile of a fracked well head. (That info. is recent National Academy of Science research, BTW, not some slanted anti-fracking propaganda, just the horrifying truth) Talking to locals from Wellsboro who tell me that there are potable water trucks filling an underground tank at an adjacent farm, every three days. This farm has been fracked, basically in the yard of the house. When questioned, the farmer first denies that it's happening, then tells everbody to mind their own business. Nothing to do with the subtle threats by the drilling company? Camp owners in Bloss that sold out, since they now own a "get away" property in a heavy indusrty zone, and the noise, dust, speeding trucks, trashed roads and other problems are intolerable. I live 125 miles from you, but I spend a lot of time in your neighborhood, have seen the damage, and talked to at least a dozen rural property owners from Armenia mountain to fifty miles west in Potter, who have been impacted. This by the way wasn't out searching for trouble, it was casual conversations at diners and campgrounds. I met everybody from large farmers to folks on a 1/2 acre outside of town, who made it quite clear that they are not happy, and that moving to Tioga county wouldn't be something they would recommend. Sorry, but the "come join us, everything is just dandy" story doesn't cut it.

Wharton everyone is entitled to their opinion. I merely stated as someone who lives and works here my firsthand knowledge of the situation. You are free to have other information and opinions.

I'm not turning this into a fracking debate. There are plenty of opinions, points, counter-points on both sides.

I travel to Ithaca from time to time and have spent some time in both Elmira and Vestal. My feelings pretty much echo those of post 15. If I were to accept a job in Elmira, then I'd want to live in the Ithaca area. The cost of property is higher there but fracking will never be allowed there. There are too many hippy treehuggers from Cornell to ever allow that. I wouldn't want to live in the areas of Pennsylvania that are close enough to commute to Elmira due to the fracking issue.

Ithaca has excellent schools and lots of community events and activities.

To help you to understand the real estate values in the area, try using Realtor.com and type in some of the cities that were mentioned. Use the advanced search function and extend the search for a 20 mile radius around each area.

As others have mentioned... It gets cold in this area. It will require some getting used to. However, NY is a beautiful state with something for everyone. There are beautiful gorges, waterfalls, mountains, valleys and lots of wooded areas.

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