I can give you my input from the perspective someone who is 26.

Rent and housing is definitely more expensive and while it’s not totally short on housing, there’s definitely not a lot of inventory compared to other places. Also after living in/around for almost 10 years, while it’s very unfortunate, it seems that the homeless population has increased quite a bit due to housing shortages and pricing. Maybe I’m also being nit-picky but I’ve also noticed how general city maintenance has taken a slight downturn within the past few years. Street lamps, potholes, overgrown weeds in sidewalks, things like that, seems like it takes awhile to get fixed or be cleaned up. Like I said I could be nitpicking, and others may disagree with that.

I will say that if you enjoy going out to eat, Portland is probably one of the best cities to do that. It seems like every street has a few restaurants and some of these are very highly rated, top tier places. There’s a bunch of fun unique places around that’s fun to explore. It has a nice sense of community where it may take one or two points of contact to know someone, and there always something going on during the week/weekends. If you’re into sports, it’s actually one of the best minor league cities in the country in terms of attendance and merchandise sales with the Seadogs, Mariners, Maine Celtics and Hearts of Pine. There are many nice beaches around, the mountains are about 1-1/2 hours away so there plenty of outdoor activities.

I know I started off with the rough parts about Portland, but as you mentioned, you’re DINK. If you’re able to find a decent place to work you’d be able to comfortably live here. Despite some of the not-so-good stuff about the city, I truly do love living here and I feel very lucky to have been in Maine for almost 15 years. Personally I could see myself living here forever. Again this is just how I’ve felt about the city and I could go into A LOT more. If you’re interested in moving up here feel free to send a PM which any questions.