What State Do You Wish You Lived In?

[houston05tx]

texas thats were i stay! I never been out of texas haha im stayin in texas

Edited February 28, 2009 by chevyss05tx (see edit history)

[catdaddy300]

the 3rd cost is were it is at (i wanna go home)lol

Edited February 27, 2009 by catdaddy300 (see edit history)

[misterp]

Mr. P, I thinking of maybe retiring in Phoenix, what are the best areas to live in and what is bad about the Gilbert area. I been to Phoenix but didn't get to spend time to see alot.

anyway there is alot of REO bank home for sale at low cost. This something in future I just starting to look right now.

 

Thanks,

 

Clay

You gotta be careful when you say "Phoenix" because I don't know if you mean the city of Phoenix proper, or if you mean "anywhere in Maricopa County".

 

Phoenix is a good place to retire for a lot of financial reasons. It's a very hard place to really get ahead trying to be an average working man with a family. Phoenix boasts a really low cost of living, but what they don't tell you is that the wages are poor; in my career (I/T Architecture and Development) I now make twice what I could in Phoenix, it's why I moved my family to Austin 10-years ago and even though it cost more to live in Austin the difference was very little and the pay was double. I have a lot of good friends that are Microsoft certified and Cisco gods and they make 1/2 of their market value, even 1/3rd of their market value if they chose to work on the coasts. In the Phoenix area, most of the white-collar jobs are on contract, companies only hire on the upper management staff on W2 and the other 3/4ths of the companies outsource their HR to head hunters and job firms; the result is that they do not have to offer medical insurance to most of their staff, and the job firm/temp help companies (there are hundreds there) have now pushed wages so low because the job turnover situation is fierce and every 6 or 12 months you are fighting to get your job contract renewed. So you make less wages, have less job security, and no health benefits for your family. All white collar jobs in the Phoenix area are like this, not just computer field. It sucks bad, you cannot make a future in Phoenix, you are kept pretty much "Just Over Broke". Working in California the career culture was not like this, certainly not in Texas either; in Phoenix the HR people openly regard the employees as disposable.

 

But for that very same reason Phoenix is a good area to retire, because costs are contained and steady, so if you are on a fixed income your budgeted expenses and costs of living will not fluctuate as much as if say you lived in Silicon Valley, where these figures can shift radically depending on whatever is happening with the economy.

 

Glendale and northern Phoenix IMO are an ok place to live; houses are cheap, there's always been a glut of housing at the north part of town. Scottsdale/Paradise Valley are pretty exclusive and personally I never really saw the attraction to living there. Tempe is a DUMP, around the college and airport are high crime areas; pretty much the area north of the airport to McDowell & east of I17 is really run down IMO we always avoided that part of town. Speaking of I17 I used to drive that every morning from Bell Rd to US60 and OMG what a mess, total absolute 5mph gridlock the whole way until you got onto I10. Mesa is an OK place to raise a family but -very- crowded and busy, lots of good people though - my daughter was born in Mesa. US60 headed east through Tempe and Mesa is the most dangerous road I have commuted in my life, and I am comparing that to CA bay area and SoCal driving as well as Texas.

 

The better parts of the metro area are south of US60 - Ahwatukee, Gilbert, Chandler, and Queen Creek. LOTS of retired folks live in Gilbert and Chandler, my grandmother has a house there. All the rodeo and horse people I know live in Queen Creek, that place exploded as folks needing property were displaced out of the city but it's a far drive. Ahwatukee is the area near Ray Rd and US10 and that is where my wife and I last lived, and I actually liked living there a lot, really nice community.

 

If you want more specific stats & figures etc I can get them, my mother is detective in Mesa PD.

 

Mr. P.

Edited February 27, 2009 by Mr. P. (see edit history)

[Hankg42]

Steve, I hate the incomplete answers that you give. Never enough information.

 

One residential area I visited while in Phoenix / Scottsdale was Anthem. A friend of my wife has a home there. WOW! It seems like an expensive area. Their home was right on a golf course. If I could afford it, that would be a place that I could retire to.

[misterp]

I will say one thing - I would encourage everyone to sightsee the entire state of Arizona; I have never seen a place with so much varied landscape.

 

And yeah Hank they love their golfcourses LOL.

 

Mr. P.

[CoolBlueSS]

So Steve, I take it you like living in Plano. I lived there my whole life till we moved to Denton a couple of years ago. Growing up there it was a small town, but just got too big for me. It is a nice city, though. Lots of opportunities, and I think alot of the cities restrictions keep it clean and nice.

 

The recent economy hasn't really affected the DFW area like it has other areas.

[SSmoothSilSS]

Thanks Mr. P great info, I plan on spending a week down there to check out the state and see if I like it, don't plan on moving until I retire. I just looking a head, I'm only 49 so I have a few years to check things out.

 

Clay