Oregon

First.. Portland is spreading like wildfire. And Traffic/getting around has gone to hell. In the late 90's/early 00's, it was pretty good. You could get pretty much anywhere in 30-45 minutes. By 2010, it was acting more like traffic in any large city, it could take an hour or more to get places in rush hour. In the last year it has gotten WAY worse. It can take an hour and a half to get across town.. during normal traffic. Rush hour is even worse, and its been starting earlier and earlier. We now have a lunch time rush hour, along with morning and afternoon. And afternoon rush hour seems to be starting closer and closer to 2pm. I84 traffic at 10PM often appears to be equivalent to what I remember it to be during rush hour in 1999.

I hear the rental market is now one of the tightest in the country. Ive been helping someone look for housing, and I can personally testify that even in outlying areas prices have jumped at least $200 a month from where they were 5 years ago when I was last looking for myself. And the options are far more limited than they were at that point. Plus anything that gets listed seems to disappear rather quickly

Pretty much most of the areas you have mentioned are now "popular". Gentrification... sorry, Urban Renewal, means that even formerly less expensive areas are often now more expensive. Belmont/Hawthorne is nutty popular with the hipsters, and therefore expensive. Hollywood and Lloyd are close to everything.. Expensive. Sellwood is getting a new bridge. Already a bit spendy, expect it to rise in price once that's done. Irvington area is gentrifying, lots of little boutique-ish restaurants and the like, not cheap. Anything downtown is going to cost, especially if you get on 21st, 23rd, the pearl. Plus, in my experience, your chances of gaining pet Bed Bugs goes up exponentially anywhere in downtown.

10 years ago, I would have said PDX was a great place for virtually anyone to move to. Now... I don't think I would recommend it to anyone without personal ties to the area.

The cheapest area is probably the Outer west side.. Hillsboro, for instance. Or maybe Vancouver, I haven't really checked prices there. If you want cheap and reasonably transportation friendly, I would say your best bet is outer east side. Gresham or near it. Along Sandy, Burnside, Powell, on the east side of 122nd. Near the Max line might be the easiest for transport, but comes with its own drawbacks. Milwaukee would be next on the list.

82nd has a growing Asian influence. There seems to be a growing African influence along 122nd. Both seem to be leading to more interesting culture and better food.