Reviews & Comments
Dallas, TX
Been in the Metroplex for 3 years now, and.... -
8/11/2013I'm writing this review based on my experience living in the Dallas area just over 3 years now. In the past, I've lived in New Jersey, Maryland, Virginia, D.C., Delaware, Philadelphia, Arizona, Houston.
Dallas is a good place to "be", especially for the benefits of economics. Pretty strong and diverse job market due to several companies/industries, both large and small, who choose to have a hub here due to Dallas' geographic location in the U.S. As a result, there's many people moving in, pretty much to save a buck compared to more expensive cities/towns with a less than favorable job market. No state income tax so you get a few bucks in your wallet.
Its a great place to raise a family because you can obtain a fairly large home for less $, pretty good schools around the metro area/Collin County, and you may even have some extra cash to get that Lexus, Mercedes, BMW, Maserati (Not all, but many folks like to drive these here) Though the home prices are lower+no state income tax, but you'll recycle that "extra" cash back into your property tax which is a bit higher than the average, about $17-$18 per $1k of your homes value, so be prepared to add about $300+ to your mortgage payment.
SOCIAL: There are lots of transplants from lots of states/countries and many nice people throughout the area, however I'd consider this Metroplex to be a bit segregated both economically and racially. Many places around the country are this way however, it didn't take long to notice this as my career requires me to travel extensively throughout the entire Metroplex. In all fairness, there's a handful of towns/cities in between which have a good melting pot of ethnicities/economic statuses, but not too many. Collin County is nice and "sanitized" if you will, offering fairly lower crime, good schools, nice homes, and a bunch of chain restaurants.
NOTE: After you've visited the zoo's, museums, state fair, and other attractions once, you've pretty much done it. After that, "SHOPPING AND EATING OUT" seems to be the thing to do here unless you hop a flight out of here. A vast majority of outings with friends involve eating something at some new restaurant somewhere; wash, rinse and repeat...
OUTDOORS/WEATHER: There's a lot of parks throughout the area for walking/cycling/trails but unless you enjoy HEAT, you'll only be outside from the end of October until May. May/June to September/October is COOKIN' outside, and don't let folks here tell you about "dry heat". Its like a 4 month pelting of sun spit. After living in the desert, Dallas is not a dry heat, but also no where as bad as the high dew point heat index of Houston. In Houston, you begin to sweat within 30 seconds that you walk out of the A/C, whereas in Dallas, you'll start sweating about 3-5 minutes after walking out of the A/C. Some people love the hot and high dew point moisture, but I find it irritating because I physically active, and enjoy outdoor activities year round EXCEPT during the long, long summers.
Many, but not all people here tend to focus on acquiring "things", that is, the huge house, the fancy car, etc... It kind of gets annoying when folks here talk to me often about what they have or plan to get. Don't get me wrong, we all like our toys and goodies, however the frequency here is higher than average or what you'd expect in other places. Sometimes I feel like the motto is "Look at what I've got!". I guess already been humbled by this stage/chapter of life when you've realized that there's other things that are much more important in life.
Again, this is only my experience of living in the Dallas area, and overall, its just a good place to be to weather economic challenges that may ripple through other cities. No real topography and/or natural beauty and a bit boring at times. Its full of everything you need, but doesn't offer much of the things you may really want.
Plano, TX
If you are considering relocating to the Metroplex -
2/18/2013So, Plano, TX could be considered the "nucleus" of Collin County not only for its location within the county, but also due to its economical stance, helping develop the surrounding areas grow such as, Allen, Murphy, Parker, Lucas, Fairview, Mckinney, Frisco, and a slight piece of Northeast Carrollton along the west plano area.
Plano is a nice place to live, offering a solid, decent place to settle into. Housing is affordable and schools are pretty good; especially for those who've moved or plan to move from areas where a 3,000 square foot home will cost you well over $350,000+.
I've been living here for approximately 3.5 years, and I have found that the economy of the Metroplex (Dallas-Forth Worth area), is very diverse with many companies, both large and small, with either headquarters or major regional operations. The Metroplex is mostly white-collar with a presence of some blue collar industries. Great accessibility to Dallas' sports team events including the happenings of Arlington, Fort Worth and many other cities and small town attractions.
West Plano is still being developed on top of the successful developments which are already established such as the Shops at Legacy, which brought about other commercial investors and businesses in the area. Another similar concept to the Shops at Legacy is the Austin Ranch planned apartment/condo community (actually part of a town called The Colony, TX), which doesn't offer an abundance of retail business, mainly offering hair/beauty services, a few places to eat and some business offices. A decent apartment in the West Plano area will run around an average of $950 to upwards of whatever you want to spend. West Plano's location along the Dallas Tollway makes it prime location for commuters into Dallas.
East Plano is not as commercially developed, and has a nice nature preserve however, if you travel further east from K Avenue, along the Parker area, not far from SouthFork Ranch, you will find larger lots for homes compared to other areas of Plano.
Overall, Plano is a nice place to be; very clean, police force full of college graduates, a few lakes, not completely flat with a few, very slight elevations no more than 15-50 feet. As with most of the metroplex, there's a lot of places to eat. Its almost the norm to see a Lamborghini or some other type of expensive road toy. There are people who are very wealthy here, then there are those that earn $80,000 but spend as if they earn $120,000, often overcompensating, purchasing more than they need. No State Tax, but property tax is well above the average. Vehicle registration renewals are around $65 a year per vehicle. For those concerned about Tornado's, the Tornado siren's alert us occasionally, usually in the late spring/early summer, but I haven't experienced a Tornado as of yet.
Again, The Metroplex is more or less, simply "a good place to be", and has many things to do, but I haven't found anything specific about the area that has that "must see or do" characteristic. Dallas people want to show their wealth whereas Fort Worth people are a bit less "showy". Thanks to great airports (DFW and Love Field), you can always visit other places if you need to get away as we are nowhere near a beach.
This is just my experience and observations thus far; other's may have had a different experience living here. I've lived on both coasts of the U.S., and quality of life is pretty good here.
Houston, TX
re: Thinking Houston? Think again - 1/26/2012 -
2/8/2012Danny, I'm not sure if you've explored other areas of Texas yet but I, like you, found that Houston; strong economy, low cost of living was great for many, but also didn't work for me. Being from the west coast also, I'd check out Austin and Dallas-Fort Worth....not perfect however, much, much happier. just sayin'.
Houston, TX
Houston.....wow. -
5/6/2011Either you'll like houston or you'll dislike houston. We lived in Tucson, AZ. In 2009, Arizona's economy was severely weakened, and very few opportunities. So we sold the house and set out for Houston in 2009 due to all the hub-bub about Houston being the "IT" place for jobs, economy, etc. First thing, I went from dry hot heat in AZ to wet hot heat in Houston. Arizona was hot, however this was a point in my life where I understood the significance of dew points (Tucson dew point 15-25, Houston 65-74).
Houston does have many restaurants, parks, theatres, cultural events around the city. However, if you have to get on any highway to get there, be ready for some traffic jams, ESPECIALLY during the summer months which seemed to kick in around may, ending around the end of september; make sure your A/C is in top running condition. Driving around houston was a crazy experience, to say the least.
We lived in Spring, closer to The Woodlands, which was a very nice place to live. The trade off was my commute to downtown for work. I'd leave around 6:15am to get to work by 7:30ish. Coming home was roughly 1.5 hours in traffic. I'd pray to God everyday to get me through traffic safely.
JOB MARKET? Let me first say this to those thinking of moving to Houston: Don't move until you have landed a gig. Its was a lesson learned. We saved, and had enough to live off for roughly 6 months, but i didn't realize that I'd use nearly all the $ before we found jobs. Houston's job market is interesting in the fact that MANY people were flocking to Houston due to national reports of job opps. Well, we found out that for every job you apply to, there's about 400+ people applying also. To sum it up, we moved in January 2010, i didn't land a job until August 2010. My boss said that I was chosen out of 384 applicants. We did everything you can think of to land a gig, and it came down to this: Houston has a lot of "who you know" going on, and/or you may luck up and work in a field where there's high demand. Some people get jobs rather quickly, but it had to be the grace of God to get something quick and easy. NOTE: Though there's a good amount of corporations in Houston, Oil & Gas Industry is HUGE: Take a ride down highway 225.
Houston gave us a tough ride and many, many things happened in Houston that motivated us to leave the city during the fall of 2010. We now live in the northern Metroplex, and we've had an overall positive experience thus far (8 months). It has its humid times, but not at all like houston.
In comparison of the two metro's, most of Dallas-Ft. Worth seems a bit cleaner and easier on the eyes to look at though it does have its share of ghetto style neighborhoods. Houston seemed and felt "dirty" in a sense. Communities were hit and miss ghetto style. Around houston, you'd see this landscape often: Tall office building, miguel's tire repair shop, broke down motel, luby's restuarant, car dealership, liquor store, mattress king, apartment complex, half vacated strip mall with graffiti, pep boys, chinese buffet, another strip mall etc..
In a nutshell, if you like it, great. If you don't like it, I understand. IMHO, all the money in the world wouldn't bring me back to Houston. just sayin'.
Tucson, AZ
re: Hmm, Tucson... - 11/24/2007 -
8/2/2009Ok, I must add some information about Tucson. After 3.5 years here in Tucson, I now have some observations that I must share. I still enjoy Tucson's weather and golf, and it still feels safer than Philly however, with all due respect to native Tucsonians, this town is headed in an interesting direction. I now see that the downtown may never be redeveloped. This is a great place for retirees because there's no pace whatsoever. In my own opinion, it isn't a reasonably cheap place to live anymore as many have thought it to be. We are faced with a possible 4.35% property tax hike based on the value of your home from 2007 because Tucson's officials are playing a game against themselves, that they probably won't win (the dog chasing its tail). This stinks. The Rio Nuevo revitalization project sounds great on paper and as a Community Economic Developer, it was a not-so-wise choice. They should have built the baseball stadium downtown to further enhance the downtown's appearance and economic stability/growth. But I now know that Tucson's officials are somewhat against growth. Its a beautiful place but its sad that its not utilizing the town's potential for better growth overall. Why did they build all these new homes, and very little economic development around these new subdivisions? Anti-growth strategies. People are still nice, but the mentality is to be "comfy". The job market is as diverse as a pack of M & M's. Either you build missles, work for U of A, state or county gov't, and oh yeah, tourism and a few industries in between. And don't expect to get a raise unless your company is really nice to you. So, in efforts to maintain our good credit, me and my wife will have to just suck all of this up until we can sell our home in a few years, i hope. So, to sum it up, if your retired, its great as long as your not on a fixed income. If your ambitious and hungry for more out of life, rent a place and pay attention to "the way" things work here before you put all your eggs in this basket. -Just my observations.