My 3 years in wichita KS (Park City, Park: crime, houses, neighborhood)

[sugaries]

I have lived in Wichita for a little over a year (job transfer) and I'm counting the months until I can go back home to Texas. The winters here are brutal compared to home.....the ice is very scary to drive on and my first winter here had a lot of ice and snow, but I was told that was not the norm. Summers are hot, but I don't detect any humidity. I guess it seems mild to me because the part of Texas I'm from has 100% humidity all of the time and is very sticky and muggy year round. I have not seen one mosquito in Kansas, but tons of spiders...they are everywhere.

My main gripe about Wichita is the crime. There's a lot of it here and this is not a town in which you can draw lines between the good and bad parts. It's speckled all over the city. Everyone I know here has had his/her car and/or home broken into at least once. I was raised in Southern California and lived in Texas (Dallas for 15 of my 38 years in Texas) and never experienced either. I haven't experienced either in Wichita, yet, either, but several people in my apartment complex have.

I'm not happy here at all and plan to get out as soon as my required time with my employer has expired. Sorry Dorothy, but "there's no place like home" is NOT Kansas.

[TedH71]

Sugaries,

I'm from Texas myself but have lived in NY. Snow here is NOTHING compared to NY. Snow there tends to accumulate to 2-8 feet and stay frozen til the whole winter is done compared to here. I've lived here 3 years. Snow tends to fall then melt 2-5 days. Very rare if snow stays past 5 days. Blizzard conditions don't happen much here either. As a matter of fact, our winter weather is mild compared to West or East KS. Honestly I like it when it gets cold here nowdays compared to the 100-110 degree weather in TX! Stay here longer, you'll discover that not every winter is the same. This year the leaves are beautiful! Last year they weren't.

As for crime, yes, there are areas that are well-known for high crime (Planeview comes to mind) but honestly, my house has never been broken into. We are smart enough to have dogs that will make a lot of noise and criminals avoid that and our neighborhood is pretty much safe.

[drjones96]

Originally Posted by sugaries

I have lived in Wichita for a little over a year (job transfer) and I'm counting the months until I can go back home to Texas. The winters here are brutal compared to home.....the ice is very scary to drive on and my first winter here had a lot of ice and snow, but I was told that was not the norm. Summers are hot, but I don't detect any humidity. I guess it seems mild to me because the part of Texas I'm from has 100% humidity all of the time and is very sticky and muggy year round. I have not seen one mosquito in Kansas, but tons of spiders...they are everywhere.

My main gripe about Wichita is the crime. There's a lot of it here and this is not a town in which you can draw lines between the good and bad parts. It's speckled all over the city. Everyone I know here has had his/her car and/or home broken into at least once. I was raised in Southern California and lived in Texas (Dallas for 15 of my 38 years in Texas) and never experienced either. I haven't experienced either in Wichita, yet, either, but several people in my apartment complex have.

I'm not happy here at all and plan to get out as soon as my required time with my employer has expired. Sorry Dorothy, but "there's no place like home" is NOT Kansas.

I'm very surprised to hear you think Wichita is a crime ridden city but Dallas is A-OK.

[leighland]

Originally Posted by drjones96

Do you not have property taxes in CA?

Not really -Prop 13 froze many taxes for pre-exisiting homeowners so many people are house rich (+750K valued home with less than 1500 state taxes a year on it) and cash poor

[KevK]

Originally Posted by drjones96

I'm very surprised to hear you think Wichita is a crime ridden city but Dallas is A-OK.

That kind of took me too. Wichita is not crime ridden. I own a 4 plex there - my sister occupies 1 unit and the other 3 are rented to tenants and neither her nor the tenants have ever had their apartments or cars broke into (area not too far from the old Parklane Shopping Centre). It is all about where you live just like anywhere else. If you live in NE Wichita or Planeview, you are probably going to get jacked. But in 80% of the city, you will have no trouble at all.

[OMGUP]

If I move to Wichita I was thinking of getting into rentals. How are they in Wichita? I had 4 of them when I lived in Michigan. I do most all my own repairs, so I can keep that part to a minimum. I ran 4 at one time and they were not a plex. I had 3 mobiles and one house. I had a bit of trouble from time to time, you know people get behind in rent, never had anyone really trash a place though. I did have a relative leave behind a trailer load of trash though. I did well, first off I never had loans on my places so I did not pay interest to the bank. Second I put money back into as needed, I.E. windows, Floor covering ect. I rented them for 5 -7 years and sold most at a profit, one at a loss, I paid 15k for one mobil and got 14 out of it. But if you take into account I got 425 a month for 6 years, I did fine.

[Brasidas]

Originally Posted by Modron

Name ANYPLACE you'd rather live than California. I suspect comparing Wichita to Detroit, MI would get completely different results. There are people who've moved to more metropolitan places, like Dallas, from California and wished they'd never done it, just because it's not California.

I'd rather live in Iraq than live in California.

[KevK]

Originally Posted by OMGUP

If I move to Wichita I was thinking of getting into rentals. How are they in Wichita? I had 4 of them when I lived in Michigan. I do most all my own repairs, so I can keep that part to a minimum. I ran 4 at one time and they were not a plex. I had 3 mobiles and one house. I had a bit of trouble from time to time, you know people get behind in rent, never had anyone really trash a place though. I did have a relative leave behind a trailer load of trash though. I did well, first off I never had loans on my places so I did not pay interest to the bank. Second I put money back into as needed, I.E. windows, Floor covering ect. I rented them for 5 -7 years and sold most at a profit, one at a loss, I paid 15k for one mobil and got 14 out of it. But if you take into account I got 425 a month for 6 years, I did fine.

If you charge reasonable rents and have decent tenants that have been checked out you will not have troubles. It is kind of funny that I am a person that generally dislikes landlords because of my own past experiences with them. But I try to be a different kind of landlord. Although I am an "absentee" landlord, my sister- whom I give a free apartment to- runs the other 3. If a tenant has a problem, she has a list of people- electric, plumbing, locksmith- that she calls and, sine she works 2nd shift, she also does things like accept package deliveries and other things in the day. While a free unit certainly cuts my investment return since I get rents on 3 of the 4 units, it is well worth it to protect my investment. One of the tenants has been there for 4 years now and thus far I have had few problems. But if you are not careful, you can have bad tenants and big problems really fast.

[upandrunning]

Bras, if you hurry up before Obama ends the war, bush will take you up on that. I am sure California would rather have people like you live in Iraq than their state.

[Modron]

Originally Posted by Brasidas

I'd rather live in Iraq than live in California.

What's your experience living in California, or Iraq? Just curious.