Best place to live with a baby?

Taiwan Moving to Taiwan
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1

this must have been discussed here before… but since I am kind of a hurry (first apartment tour arranged already this saturday), please excuse me for asking something that I maybe could find if I had the time…

I am moving to Taiwan with my wife and 4 month old baby. I will be working in Taoyuan, but after living in Shanghai it has become clear that the main priority when choosing where to live, is to accomodate the happiness of my wife and baby - and their needs (if they are happy - I am happy :slight_smile:. So where is the most comfortable place to live with a baby for a newcommer family?

Comfortable being (in our book):

  • ability for my wife to get out & around with a stroller without a car
  • easy access to good shops, parks, restaurants, international hospital, gym (or easy access to MRT)
  • local daycare options, or expat playgroups
  • nice environment (renovated buildings, parks, “clean” air)
  • high rise buildings, or area with an ‘open feel’ and a nice view

I would like some input from people who have “been there, tried that” so I can steer the agent in the right direction(s)
we are looking for a top notch 3br apartment, price is really not a big question, but would prefer <100k/month

thanks for helping a guy trying to create a good life for his wife, whom he dragged half-way around the world to follow him in his working adventures…

2

Tianmu meets all of your criteria for “comfortable” and you could certainly find a nice place there for under NT$100,000 per month. Your commute wouldn’t be particularly short; but lots of people do it.

3

Hello,

The first and most obvious answer to your question would be TianMu, the area where Taipei American School and Taipei Japanese School are located. Parks, playgrounds, good walkability, better air quality, can easily find imported items, can get along fine speaking English.

I totally get the Happy wife=happy life part. That’s the philosophy my husband lives by. When he house hunted last year, he picked this district for the community feel and family and foreign-friendly neighborhood, even though the commute for him is just under an hour.

Other good neighborhoods are Neihu and Da’an and Xinyi districts. I’ve never lived there with children, so don’t remember how family- and children-friendly they are. Hopefully other parents will chime in.

4

Maybe live as close to your work as possible. In case of emergencies. For the first couple of years anyways. If you can understand Chinese, or has a friend that can, check this site. You can find any apartment/ house in that area. You can even specify which floor you want, if animals are allowed etc.

rent.591.com.tw/

5

Areas closer to Taoyuan that you may consider are Longtan and Yangmei. But I agree Tienmu would be the better choice for newbies. If you are making a comfortable living, and it sounds like you are, it’s a nice place to live.

You could also look into the Xiao Bitan area of New Taipei City. A small but nice neighborhood with a slew of new buildings (both hi-rises and stylish low rises), walkable sidewalks, little traffic, the MRT is right there, beautiful mountain views, and the endless riverside parks with walking/bike paths and wide open spaces.

It’s also just a minute from the freeway entrance so would be much more convenient for getting to Taoyuan (maybe 40-50 minutes) than Tienmu.

6

[quote=“dorph”]Comfortable being (in our book):

  • ability for my wife to get out & around with a stroller without a car
  • easy access to good shops, parks, restaurants, international hospital, gym (or easy access to MRT)
  • local daycare options, or expat playgroups
  • nice environment (renovated buildings, parks, “clean” air)
  • high rise buildings, or area with an ‘open feel’ and a nice view [/quote]

Let me emphasis that whilst you might be working in Taoyuan, it would not be the place to live. You’ll find out soon enough once you start commuting there. Taoyuan regularly vies for the position of “armpit of Taiwan” on this forum.

  1. Absolutely hellish for pedestrians. Double that for anyone with a baby.
  2. Fails on pretty much all grounds. Shops, parks and restaurants basically blow in Taoyuan. The hospitals are good, but I don’t know if they qualify as international. There are some gyms, though the best one seems to be at Tai Mall in Nankan. Never heard great things about any others. Public transportation options in Taoyuan are horrendous and limited to buses (and traffic jams).
  3. I have no idea, but given the general lack of livability, I can’t imagine there are many expats with kids there. I worked with one woman with a teenage girl. I can’t recall ever meeting another expat child, though I did once see a blonde girl at the supermarket and almost fell down in shock.
  4. Absolute fail. Parks barely qualify as such in Taoyuan (no one mention Tigerhead Mountain, please, as it’s still crap and surrounded by crap and absolutely overrun on weekends). Clean air? You’re kidding.
  5. Absolute fail. Plenty of high rise buildings. Those with views and an open feel (i.e. on the edge of the city) don’t have nice views and will only remain open until the next high rise building gets built beside them.

I existed in Taoyuan for two and a half years and had to make frequent weekend trips to the east coast. I have since escaped permanently.

7

thanks for the info guys. Seems like Tianmu will be on our list on saturday.
can we narrow it down even more in Tianmu - nice streets, compounds, buildings?

The agent is very keep on the 101-area (?) - any comments on this area?

i’m completely lost on the 591 website - even with translate in google chrome… is there any DIY instructions for english-only anywhere :slight_smile:

8

New and commercial. Not an interesting place to live, IMO. YMMV.

Near the top, in the box to the left of the yellow/gold button, paste in these characters: 天母 (and hit enter).

In the column on the left-hand side there’s a section for narrowing down results by price. Since you have a large budget, click on “40000元以上” (NT$40,000 and up).

A little below that there’s something for narrowing down results by size. In the boxes just below “50坪以上” enter “35” (or more) in the left box and “150” in the right one.

You could try the same thing, but with “中山北路七段” instead of “天母”. And try again with “忠誠路”. There will be some overlap. But that will give you an idea.

9

Most modern part of Taipei. Try to look for places close to the mountains. Also better location if you need to drive as again, a freeway connection is right there. Tienmu is going to be a big headache for commuting every day.

10

Should he be considering Linkou or Danshui?

11

No. Horrible traffic out of both. And Linkou is not a nice place to live. Crap air, crap traffic, and absolute lawlessness. Just ask Omni. He can’t wait to move out of the area.

12

Tienmu or Taipei’s Xinyi or Daan districts. Most foreign friendly places on the island and the highest concentration of foreign foods, shopping, plus cleaner, nicer, and more modern than anywhere else. You can avoid much of the annoying ‘Taikeness’ that populates the rest of this place, less betel nut stains, less scooters outside your door, neighbors who aren’t freaked out/in awe of whitey etc…

Taoyuan is the armpit of Taiwan (or perhaps the taint), I’d look elsewhere.

13

Linkou gets a massive thumbs down. Bad everything. Tianmu is a very good idea.

14

You can live in the 101/Xinyi area and it is very quick onto the no3 freeway. That area is very convenient for families, especially non Taiwanese with a big budget!
Driving from Tianmu everyday is not going to be good in my opinion.
Also Taoyuan is not that bad, there are many places in Taiwan that are far worse, but it is not recommended for people who have lots of choices.

15

Yep, but in terms of a nice place, with cleaner air, more schools and hospitals, more expats, less traffic, and general beauty and liveability, amenities and such, Tianmu is hard to beat. My guess is that teh agent wants to capitalize on the $$$, so he chose the most expensive area. If it was just a matter of access to Highway 3, then Xindian would also do. Bus clears the higway in less than half an hour, with no traffic, that is.

Few sample places for OP:

rent.591.com.tw/rent-detail-1250929.html

rent.591.com.tw/rent-detail-1262854.html

rent.591.com.tw/rent-detail-1263554.html

rent.591.com.tw/rent-detail-1263554.html

rent.591.com.tw/rent-detail-1238847.html

16

Tianmu is nice, but do you want a long commute to work everyday, this cuts down on family time. I am not sure of the commute time from there to Taoyuan.

17

I’m surprised no one’s mentioned Dazhi. The newly developed area around Miramar meets all the criteria the OP outlined, and it’s not as out of the way as Tianmu.

18

If you’re definitely gonna work in Taoyuan, try 新店. It’s much closer to Taoyuan than 天母 although 天母 is more suitable for ya based on your criteria.

19

No. Horrible traffic out of both. And Linkou is not a nice place to live. Crap air, crap traffic, and absolute lawlessness. Just ask Omni. He can’t wait to move out of the area. [/quote]

Definitely not Linkou!

[quote=“dorph”]Comfortable being (in our book):

  • ability for my wife to get out & around with a stroller without a car[/quote]
    Absolutely not in Linkou.

There are no good shops, parks or restaurants in Linkou. All we have is a major hospital, Chang-Gung Hospital, which is generally named as providing the best pediatric medicine in Taiwan, but is awfully busy and crowded. There are no gyms worth going to, but if you live in one of the better communities, it ought to have a gym of some kind.

There’s nothing at all like that that I’m aware of, and the wife would have found it if such a thing existed. We really wish we could put our 3-year-old daughter in a playgroup, but there’s nothing remotely suitable available.

The environment is not at all nice. We are hemmed in on all sides by industrial zones, there’s so much construction going on, and there are so many big trucks on the roads that the air here is never anywhere near clean or pleasant to breathe.

[quote=“dorph”]- high rise buildings, or area with an ‘open feel’ and a nice view
[/quote]
There are lots of high-rise buildings already up, and many more being built. But they are putting them so close together that it’s absolutely ridiculous. And there are no good views from anywhere here.

Linkou should be a great deal better, and might be almost liveable, five to ten years from now, when it has the MRT, decent places to shop and eat, and is fully developed. But as of now, it wouldn’t meet the OP’s requirements at all, except for being close to Taoyuan. Indeed, he’d be better off actually living in Taoyuan City, in my opinion (though I wouldn’t recommend that when his budget allows for so many other choices).

20

OK. I was somehow under the impression that Linkou was an ‘up and coming’ place, the thinking man’s Tucheng or something. Anywhere that close to Taoyuan and Wugu is bound to be horrible.