Moxham Area of Johnstown, PA...Anybody know anything about this area?

[masmdu]

The reason I ask is that I stumbled onto a realestate site with listings in this area and nice looking older homes/duplexes are dirt cheap! Like 30-50k!

So, I'm thinking if things are this cheap there must be a reason...Drugs, crime, toxins...

Anybody know the area? What can you tell me about it and Johnstown?

We might move if there are no big problems.

Thanks!

[PRETZEL]

1. my 2 cents,

stay away. Johnstown is an old industrial town that is dieing (well, dead) area. there's not much left. Real estate is cheap for a reason. No body wants to live there.

edit for typo.

[madinmaryland]

2. Like many of the smaller cities in central PA,

much of the industry has left the area, and as a result the employment picture is not good. As an example, New Castle in the west central part of PA has lost most of its industries and had the population drop from 45K to 24K in the last 25 years. Actually, if you don't mind a 45 minute commute into Pittsburgh, New Castle is a good option, and very cheap. It's probably less than Johnstown.

[masmdu]

3. Duplex for less than 20K!

just an example




http://64.215.236.39/my3.cfm?id=23889&typeid=2&userid=77&fid=2

[crispini]

4. Nice!

Could you work there?

[masmdu]

5. If we move there I could teach or we might open a Subway or not move there

and just buy a cheap duplex as an investment.

[happyslug]

14. I have a old fashion (1900) era Hotel for sale.

Complete with bar and Liquor License and 10 rooms to rent out for $150,000. It has always been a good location but the present owner suffered a traffic accident a few years ago and do to head trauma can no longer run the place. Comes with complete bar setup and a banquet hall.

P.S. PLEASE DO NOT READ MY OTHER POSTS, Johnstown is a BOOMING TOWN just waiting for the right business man to open a new Business in its heart (The Hornerstown Section of Johnstown on Horners Street). Come in a get in on the NEXT BOOM... (Remember a sucker... I mean a SMART INVESTOR LIKE YOU, is born every minute.

Seriously, if you read my other post the area is nice but has seen better days. I expect it to thrive with the increase in Gasoline prices, but that will take 4-5 years to kick in but the present owner is unable to run the business and need to sell.

[hexola]

6. Beautiful Area...very senic...

Considering the way the suburbs are barfing into south central PA - you may be onto something...you are a few counties ahead of the wave...

I think Pitt has a branch campus around there...

The "nobody wants to live there" comment...to my way of thinking - that's an asset...consider it an area in transition.

Its not near enough to any of the major metro areas for a commute...so not of much interest to that crowd...

[masmdu]

7. Anybody else? Anybody who actually lives there? or, knows the place 1st

hand?

[miss_american_pie]

8. There is a Pitt branch there

my sis went there until this year when she transferred to IUP. That had more to do with the school than the area though.

It's very ... rural. And the rural sections of PA are very conservative. It is lovely though.

[happyslug]

15. University of Pittsburgh at Johnstown (UPJ) is in Richland Township

Richland is a Suburb of Johnstown located on the top of Allegheny Mountain (Johnstown is in the Valley below). As of a few years ago do to the development of Richland Township the value of its land was more than the value of the land of the City of Johnstown (The Local Mall and other car centered business such as Walmart are in Richland Township). Richland Township also has the reputation for the best schools in the area in addition to having UPJ campus in Richland.

[hexola]

9. I'll try to PM you an email addy of a friend who is a native...

She went to UPJ and now lives in New Mexico - but she always talks Johnstown up...

I only worked there once for a few days...I think they have a hockey team...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Johnstown,_Pennsylvania

[masmdu]

10. Any comments from the evening crowd? Thanks

[Bunny]

11. Check your PM. n/t

[Kingofalldems]

18. Moxham has good and bad

There are some beautiful old homes there but also some really rundown places. I've been following real estate in Jtown for years and amazingly it hasn't changed much unlike the rest of the country. We were going to move there but changed our minds. The weather in winter can be absolutely brutal. In the city limits the property taxes seem quite high. You could also try Windber which is just a couple miles from Moxham, nice town and the home of the original Tarzan.

[happyslug]

12. Johnstown has lost almost 40% of its population over the last 40 years

And that is the METROPOLITAN AREA not just the city (i.e. the City lost a LOT of people, while the suburbs lost some). Furthermore the surrounding rural area has also lost population (Mostly in the old Coal patches as people age and die 20 years after the coal mines closed).

Thus you have a lot of homes for sale. It is expected that 1/2 of the homes in Johnstown will be rental units within the next few years (In most cities rental units are about 1/3 of the housing units, with even less rental units in the Suburbs).

Last Fall one of the local slum lords (actually he was one of the better landlord, but he still owned a lot of properties) gave his rental property to the Federal Government as part of his plead involving illegal gambling. The Feds than had a local real estate broker sell them. You could get some good "Fixer- uppers" (i.e. livable right now but you have to put some money into them to get them up to modern standards i.e. new Furnace, new Windows, new insulation etc) for $15-20,000. You could get some habitable houses for as little as $5000 (i.e. NEEDS a LOT OF WORK INCLUDING NEW Roof, major reconstruction of the walls or Ceilings etc but still habitable till something goes wrong and it will).

I have a neighbor who owns two houses in Johnstown section of Johnstown. One he lives in the other he rents out as apartments. These have been up for Sheriff's sales for years, no one would bid on them. The last couple of years the Sheriff did not even bother to list them for sale. You could buy both for less than $1000, but no one wants them for there are just to many low end housing units in Johnstown.

One of the problems with these low cost housing is that the closing costs are about the same for a $2000 house as for a $200,000 house if you plan to finance the house (i.e. about $2000). The only way to get around this is to pay cash for the house.

Let me show you how bad it is, I am running an old fashion 1900 era Hotel (I.e. Rooms with a common Bathroom and Shower of each of the two floors with Room). The Rooms are going for $250 a month (with me paying for heat and electricity) with access to a Washer and Dryer (No fee to use), a Computer with Printer, and a Phone (NOT a pay phone) and I still can NOT get tenants. Other Landlords are renting "1/2 a double" i.e. a house built as two homes with a common wall between them, can can not get tenants, my ex-landlord can not get tenants. With this many landlords looking for tenants, rents are low as are the prices of houses in Johnstown.

These prices tend to bring the better quality homes in the suburbs down with them, through the suburbs are more "Normal" prices than Johnstown Proper. For that reason Johnstown has NOT participated in the recent housing Boom.

That is the problem with Johnstown, if you have a decent paying job it is a great place to live. Housing is Cheap, Commuting to work is short even from the Suburbs (Johnstown has the shortest and quickest commute in Pennsylvania), but if you do NOT have a job the best way to get a job is to move out of the County. Sad but true and the reason for the last four Decades Johnstown has lost 10% of its population in EACH of those four Decades.

[happyslug]

13. Moxham Area

It is a good neighborhood of Johnstown. It has no bars for the original owner of Moxham when he laid out the "Borough of Moxham" put in the all of the land deeds a NO ALCOHOL provision on any of the properties of the old Borough of Moxham, (Thus all the bars are on the edge of the old Borough of Moxham, even today over 100 years after Moxham was annexed into the City of Johnstown).

Moxham is that older neighborhood with good housing (and none of the riff-raff that goes with problem Bars for no bars exist in Moxham). Even the Bars on the end of the old Borough of Moxham tend NOT to be problem bars (There are getting a lot of customers from Moxham so they do NOT need the riff-raff that goes with problem Bars). Nice homes (Tend to be built around 1900-1920) while maintained homes and a low crime area compared to other areas. Thus Moxham is one of the better Neighborhoods in Johnstown (if not the best neighborhood in Johnstown itself).

On the other hand are the "bad" areas of Johnstown. An example of a bad area is the Kerrville area which is located West of the Stoneycreek River and south of Downtown Johnstown (Kerrville ends when the Stoneycreek River squeezes against the hillsides leaving only a area wide enough for a two lane road, this stretch of road separates Kerrville from the "Eight Ward" where Conemaugh Hospital is located). Kerrville has had extensive removal of houses do to bad conditions over the last 15 years. Many of these houses deteriorated for no one wanted to live in Kerrville. Kerrville today, looks almost like a ghost town compared to what it was just 15 years ago when I moved to Johnstown.

Another area on the "Down Side", is Prospect which is on the hill side over looking Downtown Johnstown. Steep hillside housing along "old" US 219. A third "Bad" Area is the Hornerstown area between Downtown Johnstown and the High School along the East side of the Stoneycreek River (Moxham is the other side of the High School, the Stoneycreek river does a U around the High School, with the first part of the U separating the high School from Hornerstown, and the other side of the U separating the High School from Moxham). While Hornerstown has a bad reputation, the bad area is only the area along Horners Street. If you go more than a couple of blocks up the hill the area is as good as Moxham and the surrounding Suburbs.

There is some problems in the West End of town (as you go to the Conemaugh River Gap) but nothing really bad (and you hear of the problems in the Public Housing Projects of Coopersdale, Solomon Homes and Oakhurst homes) but none of it really that bad (For the last 15 years I have walked or biked to work through Hornerstown and Kerrville and have NEVER had a problem in either place).

As I said in my previous post, Johnstown biggest problem is a lack of Jobs. If you have an independent income it is a good place to live. If you do NOT have an job, the best way to get a job is to move out of the Area.

[distantearlywarning]

16. I visit friends in Johnstown every few months

I don't think I would live there myself. It always seems like kind of a depressing place to me. Everything looks very dead and kind of run down. I bet you can get some great housing deals there, though.

Edited to say: If you want cheap housing in Pennsylvania in an area that's not so boring/depressing/dying, try Pittsburgh!

[blue neen]

17. One big plus for the Johnstown area:

John Murtha is the congressman and a native of Johnstown. :loveya:

Maybe you could get some information from his office.

[happyslug]

19. If you go to the Bicycle Forum, I have posted a couple ot bike trips

Of the area