relocating to California (Los Angeles, San Diego, San Francisco: foreclosures, rent, low crime)

[Sam2007]

I am single person from Massachusetts thinking of relocating to California but don't know where I want to live yet because I need perform more research and find a job.

I am looking for a neighborhood with a good party scène but with a low crime rate and it be affordable with a good school district. I am thinking about going to law school also. I would like suggestion on places I should start looking into. I would rather live in Northern California is not sure of good place to start looking into. I would appreciate any information you can give me.

Thanks

Sam

[MJBAKER83]

Originally Posted by Sam2007

I am single person from Massachusetts thinking of relocating to California but don't know where I want to live yet because I need perform more research and find a job.

I am looking for a neighborhood with a good party scène but with a low crime rate and it be affordable with a good school district. I am thinking about going to law school also. I would like suggestion on places I should start looking into. I would rather live in Northern California is not sure of good place to start looking into. I would appreciate any information you can give me.

Thanks

Sam

California is a wonderful place to live and play. I have grown up here. I have liveed on the central coast Southern Ca Northern Ca and the Central Valley. The central coast has a very mild climate San Luis Obispo has pretty much the same weather all year around but it does get in the 90s and occassionally gets in the low 100s in the summer. but it generally stays in the 60s-70s most of the year. So ithas a wonderful climate. Just south of the city about 15-20 minutes there are the five cities of Pismo Beach Grover Beach Oceano Shell Beach and Arroyo Grande. These cities stay quite a bit cooler all year long and they often stay foggy most of the day in the summer, but are nice small towns. Even San luis Obispo which is the biggest city in the area about 50,000 people, the area gets very boreing. There is nothing to do after about 7 pm except go out and drink with the enormous amounts of drunken college students. The area is very expensive to live in and there are not very many good paying jobs in the area except if you work for the university. Northern Ca has nice waether as well but it is much colder up there and alot of fog. But it is very expensive as well, but there are many more jobs up there that pay well you can pretty much find any kind of job you can think of up there but again it is very expensive espically in the bay area. By far southern Ca has the nicest weather in the whole state it is nice and warm dosent get too hot and has virtually no fog the down side of the area is that it is very congested and one of the most expensive places to live in the whole state. There are less congested places to live in Southern Ca like north county San diego with smaller towns but they are enormously expensive and dont offer the variety of jobs that the city of San Diego and LA have, but you can alwasy commute the drive is 30 minutes with no traffic which is very rare with traffic you are looking at about atleast and hour. But they are very nice sea side cities to live in and are great for raising famalies. For people who cant throw down a million dollars for a small home like most of us I would reccomend the Central Valley of Ca. The largest city there is Fresno which is centrally located half way between LA and San Francisco. About a 2 1/2 drive to SF and about 4 hours to LA. Fresno is a city of about 500,000 thousand people but it has a smaller town feel to it. There is pleanty to do there with very distinct parts of the city you have the multimillion dollar homes on the edge of the San Joaquin river to modest older homes on the south side of the city for less than 100,000 dollars. The city has alot of vey nice safe neighborhoods and it has some areas that you wouldnt want to even drive through. The great thing about the city is that it is centrally located in the middle of the state you can be at the coast in two hours in san francisco in two and a half hours and Los Angeles in four hours and in Yosemite National park in under and hour. There are many lakes in the area and you can live on the outskirts of town which are beautiful and there are pleanty of properties you could buy to raise horses for way less than you could buy anywhere else in Ca. There are four distinct seasons in the central valley Spring and fall are beautiful with wonderful weather , but summer can be very hot and winter gets down into the 30s but hey for all the money you are saing on your house you can have a giant pool put in your back yard and in the winter you can go sking 45 minutes away or like most people that live in the central valley they take a short drive to the coast for the weekend. For the price I think you get the most bang for your buck in the central valley and you can find really nice homes that are still affordible and has some very beautiful places to live the only drawbacks are the heat in the summer. Hope this helps out a little bit.
Quote:

[RyanLeeParis]

There's a small, nice town called JamesTown. It is located somewhere by Sacramento, Modesto, Lodi and Stockton. I myself live in Stockton, and JamesTown is a nice place to visit. The people there are friendly and it's nice to look at, but it's small. I can't imagine crime there.

Jamestown, California - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[DMenscha]

Jamestown is located in Tuolumne County a few miles west of Sonora, the County seat. It does have an nice historic main street, but I've always found it unremarkable otherwise.

For the OP, you might look at McGeorge school of law in Sacramento, I'm too old to figure out what a party scene is (I did live in a ski area for 12 years though ) bit I would guess that Sacramento has one.

For MBBaker- you may want to consider the use of paragraphs, your post was hard to read

[ferretkona]

My wife was born and raised in Jamestown, often called Jimtown by natives. We have a lot of family still living there,
There are rising gang problems right now. Theft has always been present but confined to firewood and tool theft. Firewood is a big deal as many in the county use only firewood for heating. Many have found good employment at the casino, they are raising standards in the whole county.

Some work has been recently done to highway 108, the county counts on this as a major road to Modesto and the valley. This has been a small county with few people and has been growing faster than it can handle. Trash is expensive, too many people will throw it on the roadside than pay to dispose it.

Columbia has a city college, for anything more advanced a trip to Stanislaus U in Turlock is a hour to the west.

Personally we love it up there, we are looking to buy a house and rent it out till I retire. Many foreclosures right now. Snow falls but melts within the day, real weather with rain and thunder.