Episode Transcript
Speaker 1 00:00:03 Hey guys, it's Ron, and welcome to another episode of Moving to Maryland. I'm here with Nick and Megan. Hey guys. How, how, so today we're gonna talk about a classic historic neighborhood in the center of Baltimore, Mount Vernon. What a great neighborhood, huh? It's
Speaker 2 00:00:17 An excellent, awesome, awesome, awesome neighborhood.
Speaker 1 00:00:20 How do you des describe the location?
Speaker 2 00:00:23 I mean, it's, you know, like you said, central Baltimore city, just north of downtown. So it's, um, you know, right up all of the main streets, Calvert, Charles, um, and so it's buffered on the north side by Penn Station, so it's a really accessible neighborhood if you're coming in from out of the city or out of state.
Speaker 1 00:00:40 83 is like good access in and out, that
Speaker 3 00:00:43 It's perfect access. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. And also just to go through downtown, you can take Calvert or Charles and get in, in, throughout the city as
Speaker 1 00:00:50 Well. Now it doesn't have like, the easy access to 95 and 2 95 that, that you find
Speaker 3 00:00:55 That way. You have to, you gotta go through the city a little bit. Maybe take 83 to get up more north, but I mean, the prime axis is really to 83 and to other areas in downtown.
Speaker 1 00:01:05 Great location if you, um, wanna be in another train station, right? Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Yes. Um, great location if you work like North and Hunt Valley or mm-hmm. <affirmative>, somewhere that we getting on 83. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> through the center of the city. The, um, it's, it's got some, uh, some schools, right. Some, uh, universities got University of Baltimore. Yep.
Speaker 2 00:01:24 Yep. University of Baltimore. You have Micah. Micah, yeah. The, uh, college of Art. Um, and then you have like, you know, the, for younger kids, you have the Peabody Institute, which is an arts and music school. There's a bunch of nice little charter schools there. But in terms of, you know, where people are buying to move you, you are looking for more of like the graduate up law school, Micah, things like that.
Speaker 1 00:01:45 Yeah, absolutely. And, and then, um, it's got some great shops, uh, on the, on the southern part of, you're coming outta downtown. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> straight up what's at Charles. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Um, there's just all sorts of shops and bars and restaurants and it's just such a blend of, uh, retail and, but, uh, old style, like going back in time, kind of,
Speaker 3 00:02:03 Yeah, that's a good way to put it. Old style.
Speaker 2 00:02:05 Yeah. I mean, the best way I can kind of describe Mount Vernon for anybody is it's, it's an arts and culture neighborhood. I mean, addition in terms of different styles of cuisines to eat or things to do in terms of, you know, um, you have the Lyric Opera house up there,
Speaker 1 00:02:20 Walter's Art Museum,
Speaker 2 00:02:21 Walter's Art Museum, the, um, the library as well with the Peabody, like I had said. I mean, it's just, there's so much to do for people who really enjoy culture. Right.
Speaker 1 00:02:32 Yeah. So we'll get into the real estate component of it, but you're surrounded by these big brownstones. I mean, if you squinted your eyes, you were thinking you're in New York City. Yes. Certain parts, right? Yeah. What are your favorite restaurants?
Speaker 3 00:02:45 Where to start? So, I like the Owl Bar. I love the classic. Yeah. You have like, you know, the stuffed, the Belvedere heads on the walls, like the, almost like a speakeasy pub feel. Oh yeah. Um, but it's right underneath the Belvedere Hotel, which is absolutely beautiful. And another spot for condominiums for real estate too. Mm-hmm.
Speaker 2 00:03:05 <affirmative>, uh, I mean, I don't know where to begin. Um, the Hellman is one of my favorites. It's a long, they do Afghan food. It's a real big mainstay in the neighborhood. It's awesome. Um, you have Brewers Art, which is an old brown, and they converted and they have an awesome basement bar. It's really close to the lyrics, so you can go and grab a
Speaker 1 00:03:23 Tree catacombs back there. Yeah,
Speaker 2 00:03:25 Yeah, yeah. It's super duper cool. Um, you know, Soto, so opera, which is, you know, the classic Italian, well,
Speaker 1 00:03:30 The upstairs of, of brewer's art is really amazing too, with the tall ceilings. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> or dining rooms are really like, just beautiful from, um, you know, I don't know what century that's from, but it's,
Speaker 2 00:03:40 It's 19th.
Speaker 1 00:03:41 Yeah. 19th, 19th
Speaker 2 00:03:42 Century. Say I have to do, I have to do my back, I have to do my backwards math, like 19 hundreds, you know, 18.
Speaker 1 00:03:48 Yeah. Soda Sora. Really? One of my all time favorites. One of the first restaurants I went to in Baltimore City back in the nineties. Wow. Yeah. It's, we've, they do opera night There. Have opera, opera singer sing in, you know, in, in the restaurant. It's, it's, oh, that's one of my favorites.
Speaker 2 00:04:03 Yeah. Yeah. There's, there's, there's great food options
Speaker 1 00:04:06 There. The Prime is Yep.
Speaker 2 00:04:07 Classic.
Speaker 1 00:04:08 My all-time favorite. I mean, there's just the, uh, the staff been there for, you know, there's, there's staff there to put kids through college working there. I mean, it's just the classic go-to Perfect. I've never had a bad anything there. Just the decor, the, the piano playing, the, um, the ambience of that. I mean, that, that is just, if you haven't been there, you gotta check it out. Thanks. For sure. What are some of the others?
Speaker 2 00:04:34 Oh, man. Um, I'm, I'm Teo Pepe. That's another Yeah.
Speaker 1 00:04:38 Classic. Yeah,
Speaker 2 00:04:39 Absolutely. I, uh, you can't, you can't go a block without running into a really good restaurant in Mount Vernon, you know, it's cuz you know, I always go up there, you know, talking about like, some of the things to do up there. I mentioned, you know, the, the bso. I'm a big, you know, kind of classical fan. I like to do a, a symphony. Uh, but the, the Washington Monument lighting is, is such a big, you know, uh, a draw for people in the city. You know, they light the monument up. It looks just like the Washington Monument in, in, in dc Everybody comes to that neighborhood and, you know, in the, in the holiday season, they light the monument up. So it's, it's a great place, um, with a lot of really fun things to do. Mm.
Speaker 1 00:05:18 Right. At Washington Park. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, you know, so you got the monument, you got the park, it goes off in three different directions, and you got some really cool, um, you got some really cool, uh, hotels around there. Yeah. Like really, um, uh, what would you call 'em? Boutique hotels. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Um, you got the Engineer Club, which is a great event space. I've been to so many different events here. I've been to weddings there. Weddings.
Speaker 2 00:05:40 Yeah. It's a popular wedding venue. Yeah.
Speaker 1 00:05:41 It's got that, uh, like indoor outdoor space in the back there. Um, uh, phenomenal. Uh, it's a great, like if going to an event and then going out, there's so many choices for drinks and, um, you know, and, and there's, um, you know, there's, there's, uh, some bars that have shut down recently that, that, um, you know, we used to love the Hippo. It's Hippo now with cvs. Oh, great. Great time. You know, been going there.
Speaker 2 00:06:11 City Cafe was another good one.
Speaker 1 00:06:12 City Cafe was, was was a good one. Um, yeah, there, there, there's a bunch. So we've, you know, Mount Vernon's been a neighborhood, uh, before I lived in the city, it was one of the neighborhoods we came down to and it kind of mm-hmm. <affirmative>, um, you know, merges into Station North a bit. So, you know, on another episode we'll talk about Station North. Yeah. But you can't talk about Mount Vernon without some of the walkability to, you know, uh, just outside of Mount Vernon up in Station North, there's some good spots. Right. Um, you got the Charles Theater, you got some, uh, club Charles mm-hmm. <affirmative>, you know, it's not Mount Vernon, but you know, close, close enough close where
Speaker 2 00:06:46 Walk over bridge,
Speaker 1 00:06:48 Walk, walk over the bridge. Yeah. Um, so yeah, you got, you know, the, the green space. I mean, I, I think if you thought of green space in Mount Vernon mostly right there, the Washington Yeah. Park.
Speaker 2 00:06:59 It's, it's a Met, it's a metropolitan neighborhood. Right. You know, it's very walkable in terms of things to do. You're not really kind of, you don't have a lot of green space, unfortunately, but if that's, you know, something that you kind of hold near and dear, kind of not be the neighborhood for you, but it's still a great place to visit if you wanted to live in another place in the city. More north, there's a lot more green space. Um, but they used
Speaker 1 00:07:19 To Wtm D first Thursdays. Really? Oh, really? At the Washington Monument. Yeah. Before they brought it down to the Kenton wall front. Right. Interesting. It just got too big for that space. That space. Yeah. Yeah. Um, it, it actually was on, it was right, they had the stage right in front of the monument and then, uh, people would stand in the, the, uh, green space that went up towards, uh, north part of Charles Street. Okay. That little section right there. And it just got the, the, the event just got too big for that. Yeah. Um, let's talk about real estate. Okay. What's, uh, I mean, like I said earlier, you can squint your eyes and there's blocks there that are like beautiful monster brownstone sounding true. Mm-hmm. <affirmative> mansions. Yeah.
Speaker 3 00:07:57 Mayor is almost like a stately, just gorgeous, beautiful homes. If you are looking to live in that sort of feel and environment in the city, Mount Vernon Brownstones is where to go
Speaker 2 00:08:10 For sure. And, and there's also tons of condos. Like you touched on Megan with the, uh, Albar, the, the Belvedere, which was a grand hotel back. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, you know, back in the old days they converted into condominiums. Yep. Um, and there's a lot of other buildings there as well, um, that you can, that you can purchase if you want more of that kind of concierge condo style. Same
Speaker 1 00:08:30 Play Paul Place. Yep. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, there's, there's some, uh, buildings a little bit more north on Charles Street. Mm-hmm. <affirmative>, um, Stover Brothers did back, back in the day. Um, but, uh, yeah, you, you know, it's, it's, uh, a lot of houses actually will have a plaque that will talk about its history. Mm-hmm. Yes. You know, like, uh, it was a place, you know, back in the 18 hundreds, uh, early 19 hundreds where, um, people, you know, high profile people lived up there, people. Right. That's were, you know, owned banks or whatever. It's, it's a, uh, really, um, uh, cool history up there.
Speaker 2 00:09:10 Yeah. It's, it was the neighborhood for the, you know, the, the elite, you know, all the, the well to-dos, the, the socialites everybody lived up in, up in Mount Vernon. And you can tell by not only the size of some of the homes there, but by the architecture as well. I mean, everybody kind of put their own stamps on houses. You have some of these beautiful big marble fronts. You have more, you know, brick fronts. You have the true brownstones. It's, it's a architectural kind of, you know, fan's dream neighborhood, just to kind of see all that
Speaker 1 00:09:39 Stuff. Lot of multiunit mm-hmm. <affirmative>, lot of big houses that were turned huge into, you know, 5, 6, 7, 12 apartments.
Speaker 2 00:09:46 Mm-hmm. <affirmative>. Yep. Yeah. So it's great. It's a great for renters. And I think that's, that neighborhood kind of reflects it because of ub, because of mic. Uh, um, and, you know, even being closer to downtown, you have a lot of people who move in. You know, they want to be away from downtown specifically, but still work there, you know, work at the courts, work at the financial industries, things like that. People rent in Mount Vernon, fall in love with the neighborhood. I've had friends who've lived in Mount Vernon. They were all UB students, so I was, you know, they all moved on. I know. And got jobs outta the city, but, you know, they all swore by that neighborhood and loved it a
Speaker 1 00:10:19 Lot. Got one of the best gas stations in all of
Speaker 2 00:10:22 <laugh>, the St. Paul Mount Royal, uh, that saved me in a pinch many a times. It's, it's like a, it's like an oasis in a desert. You're like, I can't find gas downtown. And you hop off that one, the St. Paul exit on 83, and, and there it is like a, like a lake in a desert and you're just like,
Speaker 1 00:10:39 Oh, thank God. Am I gonna make it home? And then like, oh, and there it is. There. There it is. Halfway, halfway home. Yeah. So we're all real estate agents, um, Nick, Megan, myself, with the Greatest Moves team at Re Max Advantage, and we love Mount Vernon. We love all the neighborhoods around Mount Vernon. If you're looking to explore the area, reach out to us. Our contact info is in this post. We'd love to show you around. Take care. We'll see you next up.
