Augusta vs Athens when jobs involved? (Martinez, Evans: buying a home, buying, college)

[VirtualErik]

Hey everyone, I was raised in Georgia since I was about a year old. Been living in Oregon since end of 2012, seems I can't get the southern out of me as I'll be going cross country back to Georgia at the end o this month. My home town is Washington and I have family there so I'll be staying there for now but my main focus is Augusta or Athens, so that being said I'm quite excited to be moving back and calling GA home.

so as far as jobs, my background is IT, i have an A.S. in Computer Information Technology and have been doing tech support out of a call center for the last 3 years. Looking to land a similar job with decent pay. I'll take a call center job though I'd prefer to actually physically work and repair computers although not sure of any computer repair shops in the area. So looking for some advice on where to start my search to begin the application process.

More about me, I'm a 36 year old single white male. no kids no pets so an easy transition. I'd eventually look to move into the area, I'm hearing Martinez and Evans are maybe a bit safer when it comes to buying a home. Not sure how true that is but I do see really good deals in housing prices when compared to up here in Oregon.

So based on all of that above, which would be the better fit for me? Athens or Augusta?

that's about all I got for now, so thanks for all the info and feedback!

[cwkimbro]

With little doubt, Augusta's economy is bigger than Athens'.

Athens outside of UGA also is a bit more blue-collar in comparison to Augusta.

This makes me think you would find more opportunities in Augusta, but a better measure would be to do an online job search for each city and see how many listings there are in each to compare. It is also worth searching any job listings with UGA when comparing Athens.

Athens is a fun town, but it will trend a bit young for you. Much of downtown performs as a college town and less of an office district.