Chicago, Dallas, or San Francisco? (Oakland: apartment, income, job)

[rw2006]

My friend is a 22 yr old single black male who's trying to decide between Chicago, Dallas, or San Francisco. He needs a place that's reasonably affordable (he makes $35K/yr) but wants a place full of culture, tolerance, and potential job growth. BTW can a person live modestly on $35K in Chicago or San Francisco?

[jdiddy]

You can make it on 35K in Chicago. I'm not sure if you can do that in San Fran.

So it's between Dallas and Chicago. If he wants a more urban lifestyle, then I'd recommend Chicago.

[outsider1]

If it's TX he wants, forget Dallas and head south to Houston! Study this thread on Houston forum for details:
African-American family searching for the "Good Life"

You can live, and possibly a little better than just modestly, in Chicago on 35K. SF? You'll be kind of "slummin'" it with this income unfortunately.

If he's can take the cold weather, Minneapolis could be a good possibility.

[ehall]

Um Minneapolis is just as cold in the winter as is Chicago if not more.
Its like four hundred miles north.

[j33]

I think the point was that Minneapolis has a lower cost of living than Chicago (which is true) and that it might be a better option for the person in question if that person didn't mind being chilly in the winter.

[CarolinaBredChicagoan]

I'll agree with the general consensus above. Frisco is too expensive. Dallas is kinda sprawly and doesn't have quite as much going on, culturally, as Chicago.

My first year in Chicago, I lived off of 32k (pretax) and was comfortable.

[Lookout Kid]

I moved here with $6 in my checking account and a $12/hour temp job. You can make it here on that salary easily, but you would be better off to not own a car and to make do with a very small apartment.

[wickedripeplum]

My friend lives on right about that in the Bay Area, but he ended up in a huge apartment in a neighborhood in Oakland where people are afraid to deliver pizza and a cab driver asked if his mother knew he was living in that kind of neighborhood. But that purely anecdotal obviously.

I've been living quite comfortably in Chicago on around that salary for 2 and 1/2 years.

I know nothing of this Dallas you speak of, so I won't comment on that.

[dragoro]

If your going to texas, san antonio is the place to be, not houston or dallas.

[neonwattagelimit]

It all comes down to his tolerance for the cold, methinks. If he can deal with it, Chicago is your best bet. It has the urban feel, a diversified economy and a reasonable cost of living.

If he can't tolerate the cold, it basically comes down to a decision between SF's cultural opportunities and Dallas' low cost of living.

I've never been to Minneapolis, and while I've heard good things, I've also heard that its winters make Chicago's look easy. If that is at all a consideration, I'd avoid Minneapolis.