Agree - these (and other similar towns like Ayer and Harvard) are great towns west of Boston. The towns themselves are pretty quiet. If you would like someplace with more happening, look into Lowell and Lawrence towards the north. (Also Haverhill and Amesbury). Worcester is a little further beyond 495, but there is a LOT going on without heading to Boston. Also the bigger cities provide a wider range of housing options - modern apartment complexes are fine, but the real New England rental experience would be the top floor of a triple decker in a neighborhood with restaurants, cafes and shopping within walking distance.
As someone else noted, distances are nothing here compared to East Texas. But there are great places here where you don't even need a car - you might pay more for housing, but you can lose the car payments, insurance and gasoline.
If you are already planning to rent at first you might want to splurge on being closer to things that interest you... Nightlife, the ocean, museums... so that you aren't isolated in a small bedroom community that rolls up its streets at night.
The thing is, the commuter rail HAS those "big boxes on wheels". They are the SKI cars and they go out to Wachusett in the winter. I just saw one on the Haverhill line.
So they have the equipment, they just need to have the will and get organized
WAY back in the day I lived in East Boston - back when they didn't even try to minimize noise levels. The planes appeared to be 25 get above the roof tops and you would have to pause any conversations until they passed.
Airplanes lined up over Melrose to land at Logan
pwlocke t1_j926ckm wrote
Reply to comment by [deleted] in A new place to call home by payter_m8r
Agree - these (and other similar towns like Ayer and Harvard) are great towns west of Boston. The towns themselves are pretty quiet. If you would like someplace with more happening, look into Lowell and Lawrence towards the north. (Also Haverhill and Amesbury). Worcester is a little further beyond 495, but there is a LOT going on without heading to Boston. Also the bigger cities provide a wider range of housing options - modern apartment complexes are fine, but the real New England rental experience would be the top floor of a triple decker in a neighborhood with restaurants, cafes and shopping within walking distance.
As someone else noted, distances are nothing here compared to East Texas. But there are great places here where you don't even need a car - you might pay more for housing, but you can lose the car payments, insurance and gasoline.
If you are already planning to rent at first you might want to splurge on being closer to things that interest you... Nightlife, the ocean, museums... so that you aren't isolated in a small bedroom community that rolls up its streets at night.