A good fit for some, but not me
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9/3/2013
Houston has much to offer with it's Museum District, theatrical venues, great medical institutions, abundance of cheap food and easy winters. There are very nice neighborhoods, such as Montrose, Heights, Rice, Memorial Park--all in the 610 loop, but they are very expensive to buy into (even very modest homes with small yards), with property taxes well in excess of 3% of their values. I came to this town to escape the Midwestern winters and get better employment. The heat and humidity are formidable even for a hot weather person like myself and to be comfortable for the long summer means big electricity bills, but the winters are very easy to take. It feels tropical here for about 8 months out of the year and many plants are green all year long. Much medical research goes on as Houston is one of the leaders along those lines. The people tend to be friendlier than what I'm used to in the Midwest and the international flavor of the town is nice.
On the other hand... the traffic is super bad and Houston drivers are the worst I've ever seen, with accidents all the time. I've never seen a place with so many seedy neighborhoods pervasively scattered all over the huge metropolis. If you add up the attractive areas that include the Museum district, Heights, Montrose, Rice Village, Kirby, Memorial Park and Galleria you have about 20% of Houston. The rest of Houston is either mediocre or just plain trashy. In proportion to other large cities, it is a very ugly place built by planners and architects with horrible taste, guided by greed and ignorance in typical Texas fashion. Dogs run loose all over except the best neighborhoods, sometimes in packs and dogbites are very common here. If you can afford to live where you'd like there, it could be a good life. Even If I did get a better job there, it wouldn't pay well enough to finance a home in any neighborhood I'd want to live in that is less than 40 minutes from work. That ain't quality of life in my book.
dan | Houston, TX