Charming California bungalow
Located in Fremont, United States
Room available in a charming bungalow filled with books, antiques, and roses in Fremont’s historic Niles District. Off street parking. Fast internet. New HVAC plus ceiling fans in every room. Shared use of Apple TV in living room with Amazon Prime channels. Shared use of desk in study. Full laundry and kitchen privileges (including dedicated space in the fridge and kitchen cupboard), or enjoy a view of the East Bay hills while barbecuing on the back patio. Lovely mature landscaping. Depending on the season, pick your own Meyer lemons , clementines, or apples fresh off the tree. Complimentary coffee and tea. You’re welcome to store your suitcase in the garage.
PREFERRED TENANT:
Quiet, courteous and clean professional (e.g. traveling nurse), intern, or student. Internationals are welcome.
THE ROOM:
Enjoy a fluffy down duvet on an Avocado mattress (top-rated by Consumer Reports), heirloom quality sheets, and a mahogany four-poster bed from the mid-1800’s. Your bedside table will be an Italian bombe chest circa 1930, with a designer lamp. The room also includes a small fluffy bedside rug, a chair, a full-length mirror, a closet (with hangers, shelves, and a storage cubby), a dirty clothes bag; a bookshelf, and a circuit breaker strip (so you can safely charge your phone, etc).
PROVIDED UPON REQUEST:
A small radio and/or full-size hairdryer can be provided upon request.
BATHROOMS:
The room is adjacent to a shared full bathroom, and is near a half bathroom (the latter will be yours exclusively). Towels will be provided, unless you prefer to bring your own. There are grab bars in both bathrooms (because I have an unfortunate history of breaking my legs). The full bathroom has a toilet seat bidet.
THE NEIGHBORHOOD
Easy walking distance to the bus stop (it’s on the same block), convenience store with basic groceries (plus deli, smoothies, tamales, fishing bait, newspapers, etc), Saturday farmer’s market, coffee shops, ice cream shops, doughnut shop, restaurants, an honest-to-goodness biker bar (that often hosts live music), museums, many, many antique stores, a tattoo shop, a Pilates studio, a yoga/meditation center, beauty shops, multi-use trails, parks, tennis courts, creek, ponds, lakes, library, historic railroad, silent film theater, events and entertainment (see niles.org for details). I’m sure I’ve overlooked something, and am perpetually amazed by just how much happens in this small town.
THE COMMUTE
Overall, a better commute than most in the Bay Area.
PUBLIC TRANSPORTATION:
— AC Transit bus 216 passes in front of the house, stops on the same block, and goes to both BART locations.
— Union City BART station is 6-minutes away by car.
— Fremont BART station is 8-minutes away by car.
— Amtrak / ACE station is 8-minutes away by car.
APPROXIMATE COMMUTE TIMES BY CAR
— Washington Hospital is 6-minutes away
— Kaiser Permanente Fremont Medical Center is 9-minutes away
— Palo Alto Medical Foundation is 9-minutes away
— Lucid is 16-minutes away
— Solar City (Fremont location) is 22-minutes away
— Tesla factory is 23-minutes away
— Rivian in both San Jose and Palo Alto are less than half an hour away (unless you’re traveling during rush hour, in which case welcome to Bay Area traffic).
— Meta (Facebook) is 18-minutes away, traffic permitting (but let me tell you the Dumbarton Bridge is horrible during peak commute hours)
DISTANCE TO SCHOOLS
— Ohlone College — 13-minute drive, 33-minutes by bicycle, 53-minutes by bus,
— California State, East Bay — 16-minutes by car. Public transportation is doable but time-consuming. Your best bet would be a combination of your personal bicycle, plus BART, and it would take about 40-minutes.
— Chabot College — 17-minutes by car; 42-minutes if you combine BART and your bicycle; 54-minutes by bus.
— San Jose State — 27-minutes by car (traffic permitting); but with your bicycle and BART, you can get to school in just under an hour.
— Berkeley — 37-minutes by car (traffic permitting); alternately, take the 216 bus to the Union City BART station, and take the Orange line to Berkeley (a little over an hour)
—Stanford — half an hour by car (traffic permitting); 1 hr, 5-minutes by bus
OTHER DRIVING DISTANCES
— Safeway is 4-minutes away
— Whole Foods is 8-minutes away
—Trader Joe’s is 12-minutes away
— Walgreens (with a drive through pharmacy) is 8-minutes away
— Target is 21-minutes away
— Walmart is 17-minutes away
FUN PLACES TO VISIT NEARBY
— iFly indoor skydiving is a 6-minute drive away
— Fremont Park Golf Club is a 6-minute drive away
—Quarry Lakes Regional Recreation Area (swimming, fishing, sailboards/stand-up paddle boards, canoes, kayaks, and boats with electric-powered motors) is 4-minutes away.
— Central Park has too many amenities to list, but I will simply mention the water park, the boat rentals, the skate park, and the dog park, is 6-minutes away,
TRAIN-ENTHUSIASTS
This is a great location for train lovers — there are RR tracks behind the house (https://tinyurl.com/Fremont-Train); and you’ll also be within walking distance of the historic Niles Canyon Railway (https://www.ncry.org/) — you can walk to the platform and hop on the Wildflower Train, the Wine Train, or the Christmas Train depending on the time of year. Inside the house, dual-paned windows keep train noise to a minimum.
AIRPORTS
All three major regional airports (San Francisco, Oakland, and San Jose) are a reasonable distance from the house, and I’ve used all of them depending on where I was traveling, and what deals I could find. SFO is the nicest, but it’s also most likely to get fogged in. SJC is the next nicest, but is the most inconvenient if you want to take BART. OAK is less likely to get fogged in than SFO, has better transportation than SJC, often seems to have good deals, but is shabbier, and the Oakland Coliseum stop does have that “Raiders” vibe…. All three airports have public transportation options, although I usually just take an Uber. Both San Francisco and Oakland Airports have easy BART connectors (https://www.bart.gov/guide/airport/sfo):
— Fly into San Francisco Airport, get on SFO's AirTrain to the Garage G/BART Station stop, then take BART to Union City. From the Union City Bart station, catch bus 216 to Niles (or just Uber)
— The Oakland Airport BART station is just a short walk from both airline terminals. Take BART to Union City. From the Union City Bart station, catch bus 216 to Niles (or just Uber)
— San Jose International Airport does NOT have an easy BART connector. Take VTA Route 60 (a.k.a. the Airport Flyer) to the Milpitas BART Station, then take Bart to the Fremont station, then either catch bus 216 or grab an Uber for the final leg.
OVERALL
Niles is a great historic neighborhood, and by far the most fun place to live in Fremont. Best of all, the dog and I are rarely home — you’ll mostly have the house to yourself.
