The biggest relocation mistake I see in Reno, Nevada

Almost every relocation buyer makes the exact same mistake when they come to Reno for the first time. They fly in, rent a car, and spend two or three days sprinting from house to house. Then they fly home feeling either overwhelmed, disappointed, or weirdly unsure, even if some of the homes were actually great.

Here is the part that surprises people, even after I have helped hundreds of families move here over the last 25 years. The house is the last thing you should look for.

Not because the house does not matter, it absolutely does. It matters a lot. But if you pick the wrong area first, it does not matter how perfect the kitchen is, you are going to be frustrated every single day. Your commute will feel longer than you expected. The grocery run will be annoying. The vibe will not match what you pictured when you said, “We are moving to Reno.”

And yes, I get it, scrolling listings is fun. It is easy to do from your couch. It feels productive. But most people only research houses. They do not research neighborhoods. They do not research the city. They do not research schools, parks, commute patterns, and the little daily-life things that are going to make or break your experience.

If you want the inside scoop, my job is not just to help you buy a home in Reno, Nevada. My job is to help you land in a spot where you actually enjoy living here. That is why we start with lifestyle first, house second.

Why the house should be the easy part

Once you narrow down where you want to be, the house hunt tends to get a lot simpler. The price ranges are clearer. The style of housing stock makes more sense. The tradeoffs are easier to evaluate.

The problem is that “Reno” can mean 30 or 40 different things depending on who you are talking to. Someone says “northwest Reno, ” and they might mean old northwest, the more historic areas closer to downtown, or they might mean outside McCarran where things feel newer, or they might mean all the way out in Somerset, Verdi, or Mogul. Same direction, totally different feel.

South Reno is the same story. “South Meadows” can mean Double Diamond, Curti Ranch, or a more rural pocket depending on where you draw the line. Even for people who lived here 10 or 15 years ago and are moving back, it can be surprising how much the area has grown in every direction.

Here is the key takeaway: if you start by chasing a specific house, you often end up forcing your lifestyle to fit the location, instead of choosing the location that fits your life.

Start your relocation trip with a neighborhood tour, not showings

When someone is planning a relocation trip to Reno, I would rather spend the first day helping them understand the map than spend the first day unlocking doors. That is why we often do a quick planning conversation first, sometimes on Zoom, sometimes in person, and then we send people out to drive the areas that make sense for their lifestyle and budget.

We call it a simple tour, but it is really a decision accelerator. You drive, you look, you feel it out, and then you come back and we have a smarter conversation about which neighborhoods stay on the list and which ones get eliminated.

It is funny how quickly people can cross something off once they have actually driven it. Online research can only do so much. You have to see the spacing between shopping, schools, and work. You have to feel the elevation change. You have to notice the traffic patterns at 7:30 in the morning, not at 11:00 on a Saturday when the roads are wide open.

What to do on your first day in town

If you are coming in for a short trip, here is a practical way to structure it so you do not waste your time.

• Drive the neighborhoods before you tour homes. No appointments, no pressure, just get oriented.
• Take photos of anything that grabs your attention. A street, a park, a view, a little shopping corner, anything.
• Text or call when you get turned around. If you read a street sign and you have no idea where you are but you like the vibe, that is actually useful information.
• Do a second conversation after the drive. Then we talk about where to focus your home tour time.

Why weekdays beat weekends for relocation scouting

If you can come during the week, do it. Weekends can be great for fun, restaurants, and getting a first impression, but weekdays give you the real rhythm of living here.

On a weekday you will see school drop-off traffic. You will feel the flow on major routes. You will notice what a morning commute looks like from Spanish Springs into Reno, or from South Reno into the airport corridor. You will see where road construction tends to pinch. All the unglamorous stuff that matters.

Weekday scouting is not as exciting, but it is wildly more accurate.

Drive the commute, then drive it again

One of the best “little tricks” we tell relocation buyers is simple. Drive the commute you think you are going to have, at the time you think you are going to drive it.

We had a client last summer who knew he would be working further north of Spanish Springs. Instead of guessing, he drove it. He wanted to see whether that longer drive would bother him, or whether it would be totally manageable. He found it was fine for him, and that clarity made the rest of the decision easy.

That is the whole point. What feels like “too far” is personal. A 25 minute drive for one person is no big deal, especially if the route is smooth and the neighborhood feels right. For someone else, 25 minutes might feel like an eternity if the traffic is stop and go and everything they love is on the opposite side of town.

In Reno, Nevada, we also have weather and seasonality. You might be fine in June and have a different opinion in January depending on your route, elevation, and how early you leave.

How to evaluate safety in a way that actually matters

Safety is a big topic, and it is also a personal one. You can look up crime statistics, reports, and maps, and those are part of the picture. But you also need to trust your own comfort level.

One of my personal rules is this. Drive to the neighborhood at night, around 6, 7, 8, or 9:00. Do not do it by yourself if you do not feel comfortable, especially if you are a single female buyer. Bring a friend. Be smart.

Then ask yourself one question. How do you feel getting out of your car?

If you are scared to step out of the car, that is not your neighborhood. I do not care what anyone else says. It does not matter if someone tells you it is “fine.” If you do not feel okay, it is a no.

If you hop out and you feel comfortable, that is a green flag. You are not trying to win an argument on the internet, you are trying to pick the place you will come home to every night.

A quick real life story from a house search

I have to laugh because I have done the exact same thing buyers do. I once saw a house and got excited, sent it over, and I had not even looked at the area. The response I got was basically, “Go drive there tonight.”

Both our assistant and our property manager said no at the same time. That little moment burned the lesson into my brain. A listing photo can make anything look great. The street at night tells you the truth.

Simple safety signals that cost almost nothing

After you choose a neighborhood you feel good about, there are also some practical habits that help people feel safer at home.

• Use basic deterrents. Even an alarm sticker on a window can change behavior.
• Make your home look occupied. Lighting, simple routines, and visible activity help.
• If you live alone, think about presentation. One trick I have mentioned before is leaving a big pair of work boots by the front door to suggest someone larger lives there too.

None of this replaces smart choices, but it is part of building peace of mind, especially for people who are new to Reno or Sparks, Nevada.

Live your daily routine before you choose a street

Once you have a short list of areas, do another test. Pretend you already live there.

People always ask about the essentials. Trader Joe’s. Costco. Whole Foods. Sprouts. Coffee shops. A local bar. Restaurants. Gyms. Parks. That is not random, those are the places that make your weeks feel easy or annoying.

So here is what I want you to do. Pick the neighborhood you are considering, then drive to the places you know you will use. Time it. Feel it. See if it is “close enough” for you, not for someone else.

Closeness is not miles, it is friction. If it is a simple right turn and you are there, you will go more often. If it is six stoplights, a weird left turn, and constant traffic, you will start dreading it, even if the mileage is low.

Daily life checklist for Reno relocation buyers

Here are the real world questions I want you to answer before you ever get too attached to a specific house.

• Where do you work, and what time do you actually need to be there?
• Where will you grocery shop, and how often?
• If you have kids, what does the school routine look like?
• What do you do for fun on a Tuesday night?
• Do you want older character, or newer construction?
• Do you want walkability, views, a bigger yard, or low maintenance?
• How important is being near Lake Tahoe for you?

Do not forget the Reno airport if you travel

If you travel a lot for work, or you plan on flying back to California or the Pacific Northwest regularly to visit family, the Reno airport needs to be part of your decision.

A lot of people move here after years of driving everywhere, so they do not think much about the airport until they already live here and they are suddenly trying to catch an early flight. If you have not been through the Reno Tahoe International Airport, go check it out while you are in town. It is a surprisingly easy airport, and knowing your drive time and parking situation helps you choose the right side of town for your lifestyle.

Once the area is right, the home tour becomes fun

After you have done all of this, then we get to do the fun part, touring homes. And yes, it really does feel different.

When you already know the area you want, the unknowns are mostly handled. You are not touring a house and wondering, “Is Costco close enough?” or “Where do we go for coffee?” or “Is this commute going to ruin my life?” You already know.

That is when you get to be picky about the house, in a good way. You can focus on layout, lot size, sun exposure, condition, HOA details, and what it will take to make it yours.

This also makes the process less stressful because you are not trying to solve every problem at once. You are making one good decision at a time.

How we can help you narrow it down

If you are planning a relocation trip, I strongly recommend you reach out to us well before you want to do home tours. A little planning upfront usually saves people a ton of time and frustration.

We can help you prioritize areas based on your lifestyle and your budget, then you can explore our local guides to specific communities here: check out the channel where we break down what it is really like to live in different parts of Reno, Sparks, and the surrounding region.

Conclusion: choose your life first, then choose your house

If you take one thing from this, let it be this. Your neighborhood is going to shape your day-to-day happiness more than your backsplash. When you pick the right area, the home buying part gets easier, and the move feels a lot more confident.

So on your next visit, spend less time racing through showings and more time driving the commute, testing the errands, checking out the airport, and seeing how the neighborhood feels at night. Then when you do tour homes, you will be looking with clarity, not hope.

If you want more straight talk on living in Reno, Nevada, plus practical relocation tips, explore other posts and keep learning. You can also start here: > It has. >> So if they want an older house, an old southwest, get it. It hasn't changed. There's nowhere else to go. But if they want something 10 years or newer, they can go almost anywhere at this point. >> Yeah, absolutely. And I think a lot of the time too, depending on what people's familiarity level is with Reno, I mean this respectfully, I will ignore it and I will treat it as if you know nothing about Reno [laughter] just to make sure that we cover all the bases. >> I hope that makes sense for people that realizing looking for the house in our our opinions is kind of the last thing we should do. There's so many other items and so many other questions and so many other things that we want them to figure out first. If they come here, we can either take them on the 50-cent tour and drive them around, or if they prefer to do it on their own, we come in, talk to them for 30 or 40 minutes, and then say, "Here's where we think you should drive." Not going into houses, not going into new construction developments, just drive around, and then we can have another conversation. Okay, now where in these areas do you want to see homes? Cuz it's funny how they'll eliminate a lot of stuff on their own. >> They totally will. And a lot of the time when we send people out, we always tell them, "Send us pictures of things. Call us if you're out and you read a street sign and you have no idea where you are, but you're interested in it." whatever it may be, we can figure that out and help you with it. And it's honestly rare that I actually get pictures, but I do always get text messages of, "Didn't like this neighborhood, figured out we didn't like this area, we do like this one." They figure out very quickly where the line is and how important it actually was. A lot of them become excited about it actually. They like the neighborhood tours. >> If you're talking about Reno and you say northwest Reno, well, you could be old northwest Reno, kind of the more modern outside McCarron Northwest Reno. You can be Somerset, Verdi, Mogul, that's all northwest Reno. >> Yeah. It all depends on who you're talking to. >> Yeah. I mean, you can be in the South Meadows and it's Double Diamond Ranch and Kurtie Ranch and then you've got some properties that are a little more rural or you go Donner Springs. So, when you say Reno, Reno could be 30 or 40 different things and we're trying to figure out based upon price points and lifestyles and all those things. It's the thing that we've been trying to hammer home after the last few weeks. So, if you're thinking about moving to Northern Nevada, do me a favor. Click the link in the description below. We'll get you a copy of our free buyer guide that'll get you a lot of great information that you're going to need on your journey to Northern Nevada. Once they sort of know is, let's say there's someone who's coming here for a job. if they know where they want to be or they're not sure where they want to be or they're not sure it's safe or not. Sure. What are some of the little tricks that we talk about that say you should do this while you're here? And ideally, if they're not here on a weekend or here during on a weekday, I think coming on the weekdays is almost better than a weekend. Yes. >> Cuz you get a a little more feel for the for the neighborhood to actually live here. >> So, some of the things we talked about is like drive the commute. >> Yeah. Driving your commute is super important. And we had clients who had done that. I want to say it was last summer. Yeah. And he knew that he was going to be working out a little bit further north of Spanish Springs. And he just was curious if he was going to be in this area what it would be like. And he let me know that it was a completely manageable thing for him. And he was one of the first people that had actually done it. >> You had told me to do this when I was thinking about this one. This is one of my safety things that I tell people to do. >> I saw this house and I did exactly what every buyer did. I sent you the house. Didn't even look at the area and I said, "Dad, look at this house. It's so cool." And you said, "Yeah, go drive there tonight." Both our assistant and property manager simultaneously said no. [laughter] >> So yes. So I tell people especially when we get single female clients. Yes. >> Somewhere where I might live at 6'2 and 220 lb would be different than where some young gal that's 5' 3 and 120 lb might live. And so my little secret is this. And a lot of times I tell them don't do it by yourself. >> No. >> But >> please don't. >> You know you can look up online statistics and safety things and what police departments will say and all that kind of stuff. Here's how I look at safety is this. If you drive to a neighborhood and it's dark and it's 6 7 8 9:00 at night, how do you feel getting out of your car? >> If you're scared to get out of your car, I don't care what anyone else says. That's it for you. That's not your neighborhood. If you're comfortable and you hop out and say, "Hey, this looks good to me." That is my personal safety thing. This point at the time we're shooting this now. Probably shouldn't say this, but you're living by yourself. What were a couple of my little tricks I tell people to do? I luckily can use my own pair of boots, but um I I leave a pair of boots out on the front porch that are old and they look like some blue collar man lives in my house. Just >> get the size 15 boots at the discount store. >> I think the the intimidation factor of somebody walking by your front porch and they see a big old pair of boots. It's just just a hey, >> whether you have an alarm or not, put a sticker on your window that you have an alarm. Like there's lots of things you can do that cost nothing that will help people do all that stuff. So that's kind of some of the tricks that we talk about with that stuff. Now, another thing we want people to do, especially if they can come during the week, which is great, is go drive around like you already live here. So, people always ask us, it's kind of funny, right? Trader Joe's and Costco and Whole Foods and Sprouts and I need my coffee shop and my local bar and I want the restaurants. Great. Let's figure out what neighborhood do you want to be in and then go drive to all these places. Figure out what the timing is, the driving is, how close they are. How important are these things really for you? >> I had to do the same thing when I recently moved and you're figuring out your new neighborhood. And the funny thing is, speaking of all of the things that we tell people to do, I did not drive my commute. And at first I thought it was going to be awful and terrible and the worst thing ever. It's not bad. >> No, not bad at all. >> Not bad. >> The last one of these kind of things that sometimes very important to people is our airport. If you're someone who travels a lot for work or has plans on living here and wants to be able to travel a lot for just travel sake or visiting family or whatever the case may be, if you've never been through our amazing little airport, we have videos we can link that will show you everything about our amazing little airport. It's been awesome. They've done a lot of great things. But if they're not familiar with it, you can conc who drove here from say California or Oregon or something and they moved here and they only ever drove. Then the first time they've ever been through our airport is they actually live here already. >> Yeah. Now and now they've never been there. A little nervous. So once we've sort of walked them through all this stuff and did all this planning and figure all this out, what do now? What do we do? >> We get to do the fun part and we get to go tour some houses. >> Yeah. Because now they kind of know where they want to be, what their price point is, and and we can sort of put everything in there together. >> It makes the home tour process that much easier and enjoyable. >> Would you say it's less stressful? Yes. >> Because now they sort of picked out the area. >> The unknowns already figured out by that point. Then you can be picky about the house. Then we're focused on the house. We're not focused on is the grocery store close enough. Is the is the Costco nearby? I mean, >> yeah, you've kind of answered the majority of the outlying questions that they people are trying to figure out. So, as always, thanks for being on. If you're planning a relocation trip to Northern Nevada, reach out to us long before we want to do home tours. We usually like to do this kind of what we talked about today in a Zoom meeting and we can help you prioritize the right neighborhoods, the right areas that actually can fit the lifestyle so that you can make the best use of your time when you've either driven here or made a weekend out of it or gotten on that airplane. We want to make sure that when you get ready to go back home, if you hadn't bought a house, you know exactly where and what you want to do. So, if you're someone who's thinking about moving to Northern Nevada and you're trying to figure out where the heck I want to live, check out this video we did right here about all the neighborhoods you need to know about in Northern