For a small city, Vancouver is kind of sprawling with a diversity of neighborhoods and lifestyle options from urban to suburban to even kind of a country feel. In parts of unincorporated Vancouver you feel like you’re in the country real fast, as neighborhoods with a suburban feel have been built in place of former farms and orchards. In those areas, you’re technically outside the Vancouver city limits, but you can still have a Vancouver address, and be on county utilities.
Coming from a place like New York, San Francisco or even Portland, you might appreciate the super sweet downtown Vancouver scene with a charming upper Main street district, hip downtown, and modern waterfront. If you’re ready for a more suburban feel with a higher reliance on driving to go most places, there are lots of great options – and lots of great schools too!
Downtown, my favorite neighborhood is Carter Park because it reminds me so much of some of my favorite neighborhoods in Portland. It feels good and you can walk or bike to shops and cafes!
Some of the neighborhoods that we were interested in when we were house hunting included:
- Felida – This is many people’s favorite neighborhood, and one of the most highly desirable neighborhoods in Vancouver. Felida is located all the way on the west side of Vancouver, and is not too far from the Oregon border. There is a nice, upscale, shopping and dining area in Felida so you don’t have to drive to a more central part of Vancouver for absolutely everything. Depending on what part of Felida you’re in, you may be able to walk to a few of the restaurants or school. Otherwise, everything will be a short drive away. Lots of newer built homes and some gated communities as well.*
- Salmon Creek – This is another highly desirable area, at the intersection of I5 and I205 you have plenty of transportation options and are close to all sorts of shopping. If it didn’t take my 3-5 minutes just to drive out of my neighborhood, I’d be able to get to the supermarket in 5 minutes, but it’s more like 8-10 when you include the winding roads out of my hood. Like I said, it gets country pretty quick. Quick access to several golf courses and driving ranges for those who can grab a couple hours here and there. There are parts of Salmon Creek where you can live in a quiet suburban sub-division AND be able to walk down to the library and Fred Meyer. That is a huge selling point, for me, personally. Oh and did I mention there’s going to be a Trader Joe’s here! Life changing.
- Lakeshore – This also kind of reminds me of Portland. In the best way. Slightly older houses, lots of ranch style houses. Sweet sleepy neighborhoods, great schools, parks shops, close to I-5, and a nice family-friendly athletic club. This area has a real neighborhood feel and with the school right next to a huge park and right next to the athletic club, I can imagine living in the neighborhood and having the kids be able to walk to school, to the pool, to friend’s houses. Really quite dreamy. Not a ton of walking to commerce though.
Outside of the few neighborhoods noted above, there are so many other great places to live! Since there are so many good options, try to prioritize lifestyle preferences when narrowing down your search. For example, you may want to consider things like schools, commute times, size of lot you want, age of house you want, distance to neighbors, and ability to walk places.
* A note on HOAs. I never lived in an HOA before I moved to Vancouver. I didn’t even know what an HOA was, really (turns out it’s like living in a co-op). I’d advise anyone to read all of an HOA’s CCRs and rules before considering buying in a neighborhood because each HOA has it’s own rules and some are really restrictive which you may not prefer. Your realtor should be able to help you get a copy of any HOA’s rules before putting in an offer on a house.
