Just how upscale is Dallas? Gimme the truth... (Houston, Arlington: condo, townhouse)

[Eye of a poodle]

Originally Posted by jdallas

Most people I know who live in Uptown apartments are bartenders, work retail, generic business jobs like project managers (work from couch) or sales reps. They are nowhere near your starting salary of 60-70k.


Most architects/designers in our office start out in the low 40's so they end up in Oak Lawn or somewhere off Greenville/Ross if they don't have roommates to afford Uptown.

I was speaking to a fellow who lives smack dab in the Memorial area of Houston. He said that, while it is estimated that three contract jobs are formed for every good job created in the area, even more get fired for every good job lost.

One has to factor that into the equation. Concerning great employees, it is a buyer's market in Houston. If the remaining employees want to keep their jobs, they are having to work their butts off.

This is the peril for anyone making lots of money working in the energy business. In the end, that 60 to 70 thousand is going to average out to less.

[radiolibre99]

But is it the same in Dallas? And for non energy related careers which I'm assuming Dallas has more of since its economy is more diverse?

[jamezz]

Originally Posted by TheOverdog

That's just silly. First off, Highland Park is most assuredly a plutocrat oriented place, even more so than Manhattan.

Surely, this is a joke? Highland Park more plutocrat-oriented than Manhattan? Highland Park is a neighborhood and Manhattan/NY, NY is a city. You can't get more plutocrat in the world than New York, followed by London, Silicon Valley, Hong Kong.

HP is the most expensive Dallas neighborhood and the median sales price for a house there is $1,701,300. Compare that to a neighborhood in Manhattan like SoHo, which has a median sales price for a condo is $5,865,000.

That poster was absolutely right. Highland Park is certainly wealthy, but it doesn't make the list of the zip codes with highest gross average income.

New York, NY 10153: $10,284,676
New York, NY 10274: $5,035,236
New York, NY 10106: $5,001,180
New York, NY 10152: $4,303,444
New York, NY 10179: $4,172,93
New York NY 10005: $2,864,801
New York, NY 10004: $1,506,169
New York, NY 10103: $1,258,599
New York, NY 10112: $1,079,216
New York, NY 10154: $1,010,233
New York, NY 10020: $1,070,336
New York, NY 10167: $983,031
Atherton, CA 94027 $978,943
Purchase, NY 10577: $913,631
New York, NY 10110 $911,345
Palo Alto, CA 94304 $829,940
New York, NY 10111: $787,136
Miami Beach, FL 33109 $756,182
Seattle, WA 98154: $636,327
Alpine, NJ 07620: $628,913
New York, NY 10005 $615,272
Mount Vernon, NJ 07976 $603,548
Mill Neck, NY 11765 $603,411
Weston, MA 02494: $563,612
San Francisco, CA 94119 $553,573
Far Hills, NJ 07931 $550,636
Gladwayne, PA 19035: $536,467
Short Hills, NJ 07078: $534,712
San Francisco, CA 94111 $528,778
Chicago, IL 60604: $526,229
Kenilworth, IL 60042: $514,220
Portola Valley, CA 94028 $504,384
New Canaan, CT 06883: $496,711
Greenwich, CT 06831 $467,709
Greenwich, CT 06830 $465,753
Los Angeles, CA 90067: $447,962
New York, NY 10580 $441,584
Rye, NY 10580: $441,484
Riverside, CT 06878 $434,402
Darien, CT 06820 $417,666
New York, NY 10119 $415,593
Houston, TX 77019: $415,147
Green Farms, CT 06436 $410,950
Ross, CA 94957 $408,410
Sapaponack, NY 11962 $407,875
Boston, MA 02205 $403,503
New York, NY 10155: $403,473
New York, NY 10007: $391,809
Glencoe, IL 60022: $391,092
Palm Beach, FL 33480: $390,065
Dover, MA 02030: $389,438
Palo Alto, CA 94301 $389,094
New York, NY 10128: $391,168
Newport Beach, CA 92658 $384,947
Prides Crossing, MA 01965 $384,362
Boca Grande, FL 33921: $383,302
New York, NY 10021: $381,895
Weston, CT 06883 $375,375
Los Altos, CA 94022 $374,550
Newport Coast, CA 92657: $370,846
Chappaqua, NY 10514 $359,765
Rockland, DE 19732 $358,314
Old Westbury, NY 11568 $357,947
Armonk, NY 10504 $357,178
Old Greenwich, CT 06870 $355,983
New York, NY 10282: $351,913
Westport, CT 06880 $351,055
Gibson Island, MD 21056: $350,787
New York, NY 10028: $349,803
New York, NY 10168: $348,100
Beverly Hills, CA 90210 $346,351
Boston, MA 02108 $344,943
New York, NY 10022: $342,667
New York, NY 10013 $340,995
New York, NY 10169 $336,831
Pound Ridge, NY 10576 $335,819
San Francisco, CA 94104: $335,714
Manhasset, NY 11030 $334,012
Longboat Key, FL 34228: $330,402
New York, NY 10018 $327,963
New York, NY 10158 $326,151
Medina, WA 98039: $325,891
Houston, TX 77002: $325,653
Scarsdale, NY 10583: $325,439
Ranco Santa Fe, CA 92067 $323,369
Lake Forest, IL 60045 $316,923
Washington, DC 20004 $316,391
Pacific Palisades, CA $314,889
Bedford, NY 10506 $312,970
Naples, FL 34102 $312,954
Villanova, PA 19085 $311,937
Santa Monica, CA 90402 $304,261
Vero Beach, FL 32963: $301,270

https://www.irs.gov/uac/soi-tax-stat...-code-data-soi

[radiolibre99]

Wow Houston is the only Texas city that made the list.

[jdallas]

Originally Posted by radiolibre99

I mean that just sounds like being a 40k millionaire.

You just defined Uptown in Dallas

[radiolibre99]

Originally Posted by jdallas

You just defined Uptown in Dallas

LOL. I remember so many doing that in Houston. The richer guys in my office would commute from Katy but the office assistant making 30k would live in midtown with a roomie. That still happens in Dallas?

Now if I transfer my CA salary to Dallas, what could I get for 70k? It doesn't even have to be uptown cus im also liking Deep Ellum or the design district.

Hey, be happy you live in a city where you can 40k millionaire it cus in other big metros like NYC and LA, you can't.

[TheOverdog]

HP is the most expensive Dallas neighborhood and the median sales price for a house there is $1,701,300. Compare that to a neighborhood in Manhattan like SoHo, which has a median sales price for a condo is $5,865,000.

That poster was absolutely right. Highland Park is certainly wealthy, but it doesn't make the list of the zip codes with highest gross average income.

Highland Park is not a neighborhood. Soho is a rich neighborhood in Manhattan, Washington Heights is a poor one. Lakewood is a relatively rich neighborhood in Dallas, I guess something like NE Dallas would be a poor one.

'Average income' is lop-sided due to billionaires skewing the chart in their direction. Do we have to have these discussions every time? The median income in Manhattan is $66k, which means that half make more, half make less. The $66k earners may be young and not able to purchase there (or old and on rent control), but they can rent there (Manhattan's median rental price around $4000, or about $1500 higher than Uptown Dallas) and it's pretty easy to go there. $4000 in rent is pretty high, but it's not plutocrat. You can rent in the Washington Heights neighborhood in Manhattan for about the same as Uptown Dallas, also a neighborhood.

[jdallas]

Originally Posted by radiolibre99

LOL. I remember so many doing that in Houston. The richer guys in my office would commute from Katy but the office assistant making 30k would live in midtown with a roomie. That still happens in Dallas? .

Constantly happens. That's why admin assistants all drive leased BMW's and Mercedes around here.


Honestly, I'd skip the Design District unless you worked in the furniture/hospitality industry. It's mainly gentrified warehouse district and low quality construction put up in a hurry.


Deep Ellum is historically inconsistent. It seems to be on an upward swing right now by pricing out a lot of the unique shops in favor of the growing number of brunch-of-the-week places but that can change quickly.


I'd recommend One Dallas Center downtown. I.M. Pei designed tower with well done apartment conversion and convenient to just about everything. It's my current favorite.
If you aren't into shiny and new, I'm also a fan of the Southside at Lamar building. There's a lot going on in that area as far as smart development and the rooftop view is pretty great.


Something else to consider- The Soco lofts are downtown condos selling for around $200k with rental rates hovering around 2x mortgage expense. I lived there for a year when I first moved here. It's not the best area and certainly not upscale/highend but it's stable. A few years ago, they were selling for $125k and I opted for a ranch house in the burbs instead. I wanted a hammock in the backyard more than I wanted a shared wall with neighbors and rooftop pool.

[radiolibre99]

Nice! Great deals. I'm not super upscale myself but just like to have it nearby. I do prefer the converted logt look but if you say the quality is subpar and not worth the price I'll pass on DD. I'm going to look at those places you mentioned. I would just like to be back in a city where people can still fake it till they make it. LOL. In LA those guys would be priced out to the way outer burbs.

[jamezz]

Originally Posted by TheOverdog

Highland Park is not a neighborhood. Soho is a rich neighborhood in Manhattan, Washington Heights is a poor one. Lakewood is a relatively rich neighborhood in Dallas, I guess something like NE Dallas would be a poor one.

'Average income' is lop-sided due to billionaires skewing the chart in their direction. Do we have to have these discussions every time? The median income in Manhattan is $66k, which means that half make more, half make less. The $66k earners may be young and not able to purchase there (or old and on rent control), but they can rent there (Manhattan's median rental price around $4000, or about $1500 higher than Uptown Dallas) and it's pretty easy to go there. $4000 in rent is pretty high, but it's not plutocrat. You can rent in the Washington Heights neighborhood in Manhattan for about the same as Uptown Dallas, also a neighborhood.

Per-Capita and Average Gross Income are no worse than using Median in this case. Especially when you're comparing one city with hundreds of thousands of young, single people to one allegedly plutocratic zip code which is nothing older and dual-income families. You specifically brought up plutocrats, so what better way to find where plutocrats live than looking at average gross income? Yea, they skew, but aren't the skewers what we're looking for? The plutocrats? I'm sorry, but I hardly consider a bunch of 55+ year old dual-income/retirees with paltry $230k (AGI in HP) incomes "plutocrat".

Plutocrats are people like Bloomberg. The total gross income for everyone combined in Highland Park's zip code was 2 billion last year. Michael Bloomberg alone made more than 2 billion last year. How on earth can HP compare to Manhattan.