TP_Mantis

After reading the Where have you ridden thread, i thought i would ask for some advice on relocating.

Current City Tucson - hate to leave the cycling hear but cant wait to leave the other drama.

Cycling important, a good group is important, I hate climbing so climbs that will make me better and hate it more are important, Weather is very important.

Other considerations
Avoiding high cost of living areas such as CA
A city around 1million would be good, not any bigger
Will be moving with Wife and 8 yr old son - so safe and family friendly important
I am a business intelligence guy so finding jobs wouldnt be too hard (hopefully)
Would want to keep the mortgage around or under 1000 - not sure if thats possible many places outside of tucson

thanks for the consideration

Doohickie

Fort Worth. Population about 750,000. Lots of different neighborhoods/communities. Decent schools. (You can do okay in the Fort Worth school district, depending on neighborhood, plus there are several suburban districts that are great.) Low cost of housing for a major metro area (decent houses between $100-200k; above that you're getting seriously good stuff). Increasing bike friendliness. Access to both urban and rural riding. Cycling groups ranging from serious training/racing groups to strictly social and beginners' groups.

I ride with a club that has a wide ability range... rides for different levels. I also ride with a less formal group called the Night Riders (see Facebook group of same name). Here's some video from our ride last Sunday:


(I pop in at 1:14)

bored117 

Cost of living in California is very divided depending on where you are. Housing cost can vary by x2,x3 easily for similar kind of living. Real problem is your job. IT jobs while being all over the places are usually concentrated on the more expensive area. I for one commute from place where cost of living is reasonable, cycling is good, decent for my kids, but decent job for me happens to be 45 miles away. I am pretty sure there are jobs for me where I live (SQL DBA) but at my current carrier, it's hard to find one that's senior enough with open position around at all.

Bob Ross

Okay, I'll bite: What's the "other drama"? 'Cuz right now Tucson is on my very short list of Where I Want To Retire To.

TP_Mantis

The city is great. So its not political or city related. Just Exes, Families and personal stuff that makes us want a nice clean fresh start

Phil85207

The only thing I can think of it the illegals coming in to the state and the crime issues. I live in Mesa AZ and we are affected also by this problem, however, I don't think as bad as there.

ColinL

DFW is a good choice but you have to live close to your job unless you want to spend a lot of time commuting either on the highways (bleh) or DART park & ride (slightly less bleh).

Weather has much more variation than SoCal. Can get near cold in winter, and really damn hot in summer. Austin is a good choice as well; more humid and rainy than DFW, and much less insane than Houston's traffic.

New Mexico and Arizona have similar towns but all of them are much smaller save Phoenix, and I wouldn't suggest that as it's a major downgrade from Tucson in my not-so-humble opinion.

dstrong 

I don't think Austin is accepting new people right now...check back in a year.

valygrl

Boulder (or Longmont) if you can flex on the mortgage, Ft Collins or Loveland otherwise.

You'll have to get used to winter, but you can ride all year if you dress right.

matthewk459

Second DFW...

Looigi

Consider Reno or Carson City, NV. I lived in Reno for over 10 years and loved it. The area is ~5000' in elevation and gets four seasons, though the winter is fairly mild, more so than in the front range of CO where I lived for 12 years, though that's also a great place from Fort Collins down to CO Spgs, and even further to Pueblo. If you have to travel frequently, the Reno airport is very convenient with lots of flights. I lived on the western outskirts of town and it was a 15 minute drive to the airport.

cuda2k

the DFW area is good for IT workers, we're one of the largest tech centers outside of Cali if memory serves. I'm in the Allen area, small town close to a bigger town which is close to the BIG city (Dallas). Very low crime, still close enough to rural roads to ride on, commute time to north Dallas is ~30mins @ 7am-4pm work hours. Lots of other areas of DFW that provides good opportunities, and close enough to Austin to go harass the locals down there from time to time. (I'm lookin at you dstrong )

Padley

Check out Tulsa. Cost of living is one of the cheapest in the country. Not sure about IT jobs, pretty sure IBM has a center here and I think Google is building (has built) a server center outside of town too? The roads in town are not safe to ride on but we have a great bike path system and I can get in a 40-60+ mile ride all on paths. There are quite a few groups that ride the rural areas too, just outside of town. Pretty easy to get 2-3k ft in climbs.

I'm in the mortgage business and it would be no problem to get a mortgage at $1k or less. The areas to look at are midtown tulsa, south tulsa, bixby, jenks and owasso.

Doohickie

That's the "D" side of DFW. The "FW" side is not near as congested.

Doohickie

You might also look at OKC. From what I can tell it's similar to Fort Worth without Dallas.

TP_Mantis

Very nice, Thanks to all of you... a lot more places to research.

ColinL

I'm all for suggesting Tulsa, OKC, KC and even Wichita (not bad here! ) but they're not Southwest as the OP requested. They're Plains states.

TP_Mantis

Pain states are sooo flat. I think i would go crazy if i could see for miles and miles with out a mountain in sight - plus my bearing would get all screwed up. That said, ill add them to the list for the wife to look at. thanks

Doohickie

Fort Worth is largely flat, but there are some significant ridges parallel to the Trinity River which runs through town. Further west and south (not too far out), it gets hillier.

pweller

I live in Tucson, been here for about 8 years. The first thing you need to remember is that Tucson is probably one of the better values in a place to live. It's hard to beat the combination of quality of life, weather, cost of living, etc. I suspect you are going to have a difficult time coming up with a 'better' alternative, though I understand all you really want is an 'alternative'.

Anyway, I was out visiting San Diego a year or so ago, and there are some places out that way which are reasonably affordable, like Vista and a few other surrounding areas. You've got to pick and choose very carefully, though, as the prices can get high fairly quickly. But, they do have some nice views, mountains, nice weather. Property taxes are probably higher, houses are more expensive, but not horribly so. Your mortgage payment depends on your down payment, of course.

ColinL

Tulsa isn't flat especially on the west and north sides of town. OKC mostly flat, a little hills near Edmond. Wichita dead flat. KC not bad on the Kansas side and you don't want to live on the MO side anyway.

Good jobs to be had in all of them. Dallas and Austin will have the job markets, I would bet.

Al1943

Tulsa has plenty of hills, a few grades up to 20%, flat areas too. The folks I ride with ride mostly county roads, use the trails to transfer to one area to another. Our rides are mostly in the 40 to 70 mile range.

rruff

Albuquerque... meets all your requirements.

david58

I had looked at Los Alamos for work, possibly living in Santa Fe. Albuquerque seems nice, as well.

I spend the two longest years of my life in Fort Worth. Hellacious hot summer, unpredictable spring, fall, and winter weather. Did I remember to say it was hot in the summer? Unlike Phoenix, their heat comes with humidity, too.

DayTrick

"Anyway, I was out visiting San Diego a year or so ago, and there are some places out that way which are reasonably affordable, like Vista and a few other surrounding areas. You've got to pick and choose very carefully, though, as the prices can get high fairly quickly. But, they do have some nice views, mountains, nice weather. Property taxes are probably higher, houses are more expensive, but not horribly so. Your mortgage payment depends on your down payment, of course."

Well if you want to pay $2000/mo for rent (on a 3bdrm townhouse) or $2500 for a 4bdrm house, then go for San Diego. And that's not even in the best part of the city. Figure $4000-$5000/mo+ if you want to be by the ocean or bay. And the job market sucks. People will take less pay to live here. The weather's great though and the cycling is awesome.