Edmund Avenue

Saint Paul, MN 55104

Due to some unusual circumstances, we have 3 2nd floor rooms available for $600l, $615 and $700. We are near Edmund Ave. and Oxford St. in St Paul, 55104. We’re looking for new housemates who enjoy living with others.

We’re 3 blocks from the green line near Lexington and University on the border Frogtown and Hamline Midway neighborhoods in St. Paul. We’re 1.8 miles from Como Lake within walking distance of Concordia College, Hamline University and Hamline Mitchell Law School. We’re 6 miles from the East Bank of the UMN and 4 from the St. Paul campus. It’s a 30 minute train ride or bike ride to the UMN and a ten minute train ride to downtown St. Paul. We’re 3 blocks from University Ave which provides lots of shops and restaurants. We’re about 4 blocks from the Frogtown Farm where you can volunteer to help grow organic vegetables.

The house is a quiet, large, updated, fully furnished Victorian with 7 bedrooms, 3 large bathrooms, a living room, dining room, kitchen, den, front porch, hardwood floors, large windows, antique furniture, stone patio and lots of flower gardens that everyone can help with if they so choose.

Frogtown has always been a middle to lower middle income neighborhood, originally settled by European railroad workers and later Vietnamese, Latino, and Hmong families. You will see lots of young couples with children and seniors walking down the streets of Frogtown. Our immediate neighborhood gathers occasionally for barbecues and chitchat on Monday nights during the summer.

I’ve been sharing my house with people for the last 20 years and have made lifelong friends, some of whom have married each other.  We enjoy doing something fun together once a week, like playing games or cards, dining together, hiking at Minnesota’s many parks, hosting parties and camping.

We are looking for active, non drug using, nonsmoking, minimal consumers of alcohol, who work or study full time, who can at least, tolerate the animals, who are happy to do a weekly cleaning chore for about an hour, who would enjoy hanging out with their housemates.

I have a Master’s degree in English Lit with a focus on Medieval literature, but tend, these days, to listen to Victorian novels, spiritual writers and teachers and histories on Youtube while working about the house. I have to say that rehabbing my old Victorian house, sharing it with others and caring for our pets: two dogs and a cat, has been work of the last 25 years. I enjoy costume dramas, classical music concerts, museums, cooking, cleaning, and exploring MN’s parks. I have lots of great camping equipment and would love to go on a household camping trip in the early fall.

One of our housemates is about 40, has lived here for 3 years, is legally blind, works at Goodwill part time, babysits, volunteers at a cat shelter and spends a lot of time at her boyfriend’s house. She enjoys hanging out with the housemates. Another is 30, has been here for 2 years and has worked at various blue collar jobs. He particularly enjoys hanging out at Lake Minnetonka and looking at the million dollar mansions. He was born in Ethiopia and has a large family in the area whom he visits on the weekends. Another is from Vietnam, graduated from the UMN in math last spring and is job hunting. He particularly enjoys video games.

Regarding the rooms, I am really bad at taking pictures. The best room is the pink and blue one for $700. It’s huge, probably 25x16, has a wall of south facing windows and three west facing windows. It has a double bed, two dressers, a large desk, book case, chair, and 2 nightstands in the East Lake furniture style. It’s gorgeous, in my humble opinion. I’d take that room! Our house is definitely quiet. A Fulbright scholar from Hungry said the house was so quiet that he never knew anyone was home when he was in his room, but could always find someone to talk to.

I bought the house with the intention of sharing it with grad students, in particular, when I was extremely busy with grad school and didn’t want to have to work at socializing and had recently returned from visiting a friend studying at Cambridge Mass, who lived in a “house of studies.” In the glory days of the house, before scrolling the internet, social media, and a limitless supply of TV options, consumed everyone’s discretionary time, we dined weekly together with our friends at our 14 ft dining room table over delicious food and great conversation. Dinners lasted 4 hours, were the height of everyone’s week and helped forge lasting relationships between the housemates. When two of us decided to marry each other, 13 of us flew to Elpaso for the wedding. I’m hoping to find three new housemates who would enjoy living in an environment like this.