[MightyMouseTech]

Wife and I are also DINKS. Made the decision 10 years ago to sell our house in the burbs and move into a condo in a great, walkable neighborhood. (Hintonburg in Ottawa) Within a 5 min walk there are about 20 restaurants, banks, grocery stores, dry cleaner, drug stores, hardware store, pet shops (and now about 6 pot shops) etc etc etc etc.

Best decision I have ever made.

Most important part to make it livable is having enough private outdoor space. Our condo is set up different than most, in that the long part of the shape of our unit is along the outer wall (so it is around double the width as deep) so we have incredible amounts of light coming in, and lots of windows for fresh air. We also have a terrace, and not a balcony, and it runs the entire length of our unit, so 40' long. This is very important. I also made sure our unit faces east, so it gets morning sun, but in the heat of the day, we are in the shade. The units on the west side absolutely cook in the afternoon sun. Buy in a good, concrete construction building. I have never heard any noise from any of our neighbors. Wood construction buildings you hear everything.

Being able to just lock the front door and fuck off anywhere for a week is amazing, although, not much of that happening right now.