META/OT - Where do you currently live? What are some pros/cons of living there?

Submitted by rainingmaize on

I live in Seattle, and have lived there since October. 

PROS: 

  • Very little snow
  • It might be the very best place in the US if you like the outdoors.
  • There are a lot of Michigan grads/transplants out here. 
  • A company out here gave me a job. 

CONS:

  • There are so many Michigan grads that alumni watch parties become a zoo quickly (Buckley's is way too crowded on gamedays)
  • People here can't Drive
  • Cost of living is way too expensive
  • The Seattle Freeze is real. Its a little bit harder to make friends here than other areas that I moved to. 

Wu

July 2nd, 2018 at 2:06 PM ^

Tucson, AZ for 5 years now

Pros:

  • Low cost of living
  • Winters are nice
  • Desert is beautiful
  • Monsoon season is fun

Cons:

  • Summer heat is brutal (over 100 basically every day from June thru September)
  • Surprisingly large number of Ohio State fans out here
  • I miss snow and rain sometimes
  • Driving here can be harrowing, especially with snowbirds

PopeLando

July 2nd, 2018 at 3:31 PM ^

I lived in Lansing for years. The #1 con isn't MSU fans if you stay away from the stadium on game days.

The worst part of Lansing is the casual wanton lack of regard that humans show each other there. There's very little to do, so the denizens turn on each other.

Lansing will turn you into the least happy version of yourself, because you are surrounded by people who would stab you in the back, cheat on you, or use you as a stepping stone, without a moment's thought.

I hated Lansing, and it had almost nothing to do with MSU.

Mr. Owl

July 2nd, 2018 at 4:04 PM ^

I visited Lansing once for a wedding.  I found it to be a sad little depressing town where gunshots weren't even noticed by the locals and occasionally I would see cars decked out in a putrid green where it was obvious they spent way too much on hooking it up to look like that.

4yearsofhoke

July 2nd, 2018 at 10:44 PM ^

Same here... Surprising amount of not only UM grads here, but also UM fans. It seems like every automotive worker + family is a UM fan and Sparty only really dominates EL and Okemos/Haslett.

Generally, I like how close Lansing is to GR, up North, and Detroit. A little small though when there's no like trader joes etc... Airport has some nice flights direct to MSP if you want to go out west or else DTW is 1 hr away. Basically everything in MI is 1hr away from Lansing.

4yearsofhoke

July 2nd, 2018 at 11:05 PM ^

Figured I'd beef this up with specific pros and cons of Lansing/the burbs

Pros

- Cheap COL. By cheap I mean extremely cheap and pretty good housing stock.

- Great public school systems (however doesn't matter w/ no kids)

- Nice to have an airport for a city so small

- Stable economy: MSU, State Gov, Insurance Co's, GM....nothing seems to be all down at once which insulates the area from Detroit-like boom and busts.

Cons

-Nightlife - either college bar, old people bar, or kind've a rougher crowd. Not much of an in-between.

- Sparty - 99% of MSU grads are awesome people. But being a younger guy you always get shit from the hardcore Spartans who are equivalent to our worst fans, and average O$U fans.

- Roads - they suck

- City income tax - I would strongly suggest not living in Lansing (current income tax) or EL (impending income tax). Also if you work in Lansing (which I don't) you are also subject to it.

- Politics - even local politics gets amplified here by people in the political "know." Similar to living in DC where some people take their lobbying jobs/legislative director jobs too seriously (to the point of trying to look totally awesome to people).

 

 

Perkis-Size Me

July 2nd, 2018 at 2:10 PM ^

Atlanta

Pros - big, diverse city that offers everything we want, but not so big that we feel overwhelmed. Cost of living is good, can get a direct flight to anywhere in the world, wife’s and my families are all within driving distance, lot of great companies HQ’d here.

Cons - the rail transit isn’t that good and not as extensive as it should be. Also, even though Atlanta is fairly diverse, it’s still the south. My wife and I moved into our house last summer, met the neighbors, and one of the first questions they asked us is what church we go to. We are not religious so when we told them we don’t go to church, they looked at us like we were lepers, and “jokingly” called us heathens. They haven’t glanced our way or acknowledged our existence since then. The level of judgment passed on us for that infuriates me, and is one of the reasons I’m not a religious person. Lastly, not a fan of southern summer weather. Fall and Springtime here are phenomenal, but summer weather is awful. 

Chaco

July 2nd, 2018 at 2:29 PM ^

Also live in Atlanta - would add:

Pros: 

- on balance good weather

- in addition to getting a flight to anywhere you are a 1/2 days drive to a lot of different places like the ocean, the gulf, the mountains

- a lot of scenic beauty

- we've found the people here to be very warm/friendly

 

Cons:

- pollen is awful

- traffic is brutal

- SEC/ACC territory which....enough said

- it rarely snows/ices but when it does it is a disaster because a) it rarely does b) because it rarely does there is no equipment to deal with it  c) it is enormously hilly in Atlanta and even if you DID have the equipment dealing with ice in hills is much nastier than dealing with pre-salted ice on say Maple Road in metro Detroit.

Perkis-Size Me

July 2nd, 2018 at 4:05 PM ^

Lot of it depends on what part of the country you’re in. They call the Southeast the Bible Belt for a reason. I hear someone tell me “Bless your heart” or “Have a blessed day” at least once or twice a week.

I don’t at all mind what someone chooses to believe. But when you start judging my family or I for what we do and don’t believe, or when you start telling me that what I believe is wrong or immoral, that’s when you and I are going to have problems.

jbibiza

July 2nd, 2018 at 2:11 PM ^

I have lived on Ibiza for 20 years. Before that 10 years on an island in Thailand.

Pros: Almost everything

Cons: Limited access to Michigan Football. For many years it was only the Int'l Herald Tribune (when I could find one). The last 20 years with internet coverage... leading to live radio... leading to Live Streaming (!) have made this con much more tolerable. It's not the same as having easy TV access to games... but I ain't complaining.

MGoCJ

July 2nd, 2018 at 2:16 PM ^

LaSalle, ON

Pros:

  • Close commute to Detroit/Ann Arbor
  • Good/Safe schools & communities
  • Making American Dollar helps cost of living difference (Exchange currently $1.32)
  • A lot of M fans in my neighborhood that like alcohol
  • Very few MSU & OSU fans

Cons:

  • Higher cost of living (if you do not make American money)
  • Higher taxes
  • Gas, Milk and Alcohol insanely expensive (can be offset by shopping in the states when possible)

 

LSAClassOf2000

July 2nd, 2018 at 2:19 PM ^

Oh, why not....

Romulus, MI

Pros: 

 - 20 minutes from both Detroit and Ann Arbor

 - convenient access to DTW and most area freeways

 - despite having an airport in the middle of it, it's rather quiet

 

Cons: 

- there is an airport in the middle of it, which makes it less a city and more a loose confederation of neighborhoods

- if you want to shop, you're probably going to Belleville or Taylor

- it is the epicenter of poor drainage and clay-compacted nightmares

rice4114

July 2nd, 2018 at 2:21 PM ^

Camarillo California

Pros

-Weather is 72 and sunny pretty much all year long

-LA is close but not too close

-Easy access to some of the best vacation areas in California all within driving distance

 

Cons

-Family lives in Michigan

-It doesn't ran at all for 10 months of the year

BigJay071388

July 2nd, 2018 at 2:21 PM ^

I live in Charlotte, NC.

 

Pros:

1) I no longer live in Ohio

2) There are MUCH fewer Buckeyes here

3) To most people Michigan is a neutral fandom. They're not "fans" of Michigan but they don't hate us. (People to tend to HATE Ohio though)

4) I love the weather. I didn't realize how much I hated snow until I moved south

5) There's always something to do.

6) I found a Michigan Alumni bar that I can watch all the games at.

 

Cons:

1) Too much traffic

2) It is possible to melt during the summer months

3) I'm 12 hours away from The Big House

4) When it does snow, people act like it's Y2K all over again

Wolverine In Iowa 68

July 2nd, 2018 at 2:22 PM ^

Small farming town 20 minutes outside of Iowa City

 

Pros:

  • Safe, very low crime rates, you can leave your front door unlocked without worry
  • Low cost of living
  • People are generally friendly
  • Slow, relaxing pace of life

Cons:

  • Small town, everything shuts down at 5, and nothing open on weekends, so weekend projects mean adding an hour on to drive to Iowa City and back to get something you need
  • People here can't drive
  • If you're not a Hawkeye, the locals look at you funny
  • Due to all the farmland and lack of natural windbreaks, it gets colder here than Alaska in winter sometimes
  • Small town - all married farm stock....as a single dad, it's impossible to meet someone for dating, so it's lonely.
  • Cornfields EVERYWHERE.....with the occasional patch of bean fields followed by more corn....and then more corn....and yep, you guessed it....corn.

Wolverine In Iowa 68

July 2nd, 2018 at 2:28 PM ^

I'm not a farmer, I just moved here because at the time I was the Training Manager for an Ag Manufacturing company in town.  I'm still in the town to let my daughter graduate with her friends (promised I wouldn't uproot her a second time).

I doubt the babes on FarmersOnly would be interested in a software/tech nerd who works at a hospital.

Giff4484

July 2nd, 2018 at 2:23 PM ^

Katy , Texas.

 

Pros - no state income tax, great economic area. Winter is pretty decent. Area is great for families. BBQ food, Mexican food is better than where you live.

Cons- summer is a rot box. My property tax bill is insane. 

Dorothy_ Mantooth

July 2nd, 2018 at 4:35 PM ^

...yes, and property (or any state taxes) will be capped at $10K in '18 under the recent 'trump tax cut' ...i'll lose a $40K write-off, which won't be offset by enough 'gains'... so it'll be a net loss for me and several others I know

other 'cons' - hurricanes and flooding (i.e. F'n Harvey) ...and yes summer is brutally hot/humid

Tex_Ind_Blue

July 2nd, 2018 at 5:21 PM ^

now now, you can't have everything, can you? Harvey was at par with Houston areas' twenty year cycle of heavy rain.

 

Katy is a nice place. :) all pros, no cons. well, besides the occasional OSU/MSU caps and tshirts one gets to see. I have seen very little Michigan gear in and around Katy. May be I need to change my circle as well. 

 

MGoFoam

July 2nd, 2018 at 2:24 PM ^

Champaign, IL

Pro:

-Cornfields farther than you can see

-You can see really far because it's so flat

-B1G town

Con:

-See above

-B1G town, but it's Illinois

-Illinois sports fan are "misguided" due to decades of failure. Don't get me started on the Illinois-UM "rivalry"

Romulan Commander

July 2nd, 2018 at 4:52 PM ^

I live in Urbana and get a lot of the above. I'll add a couple of things:

PROS

Easy to get around either by a great bus system, bike or car. You're always close to anything you need.

Affordable housing, low cost of living in general.

Access to fresh food right off the farm. Pretty good restaurants considering the size of the cities. 

All the diversity anfd cultural opportunities of a university.

Pace of life is fairly relaxed. People are friendly and well-mannered.

Hot as Hades now, but pretty moderate winters.

CONS

Many Illinois fans still attached to their old racist mascot. The rivalry thing is laughable. 

No bodies of water worth mentioning.

 

PoseyHipster

July 2nd, 2018 at 2:27 PM ^

Denver, CO (4 years)

Don't move here, it's awful.*

 

* Everyone who moves here is required to say this.  It's awesome, except for the housing costs, and word has gotten out.

WNY in Savannah

July 2nd, 2018 at 2:27 PM ^

Savannah, as the name suggests.

Pros: no snow, the weather most of the year is great, skies are generally clear and beautiful.

Cons: this entire area is swamp--92 degrees with 90% humidity is brutal every day in the summer. The bugs are horrible. Also, people here don't seem to know how to drive. And traffic is more annoying than it should be in a city this size because of the layout of the roads.