Austin #1 place to live - DFW #21 (Houston, Dallas: neighborhoods, salary, living in)

[KathrynAragon]

Originally Posted by mSooner

Huntsville is actually supposed to be pretty nice--I've heard several people say it is the only place they would consider in Alabama. It has nice scenery and a remarkably high white collar presence.

Huntsville, AL IS nice. Very unlike most of the state when it comes to professional job opportunities, terrain, even weather. It's in the foothills of the Appalachians, and a lot of people don't realize that.

[Johnhw2]

Austin is a nice little town, its a little weird at times but if you want small there you go. DFW is on another two rungs up the ladder of big cities than little ole Austin.

[L210]

After living in both places, these are my observations. Austin has worse traffic because it has a severely inadequate highway system for a city its size. Dallas drivers are worse. Every day, I see one or more cars taking up two lanes, and someone scraped my brand new car in a parking lot. A scrape that bad has never happened to one of my cars. I haven't had issues with allergies since I moved to Dallas; Austin is the worst place I've ever lived when it comes to allergies. As a black person, there are more dating options in the DFW area. I'm not saying that the options are better; there are just more of them. People in Austin are friendlier than people in Dallas and will go out of their way to make nice gestures. I even found people in Austin to be friendlier than people in San Antonio. People in San Antonio tend to be superficially friendly.

[tcualum]

Maybe I've just had bad luck but I've haven't encountered friendly people in Austin. Fort Worth and San Antonio, yes, but not Austin. Poor customer service I have encountered in Austin though.

[Redlionjr]

Originally Posted by L210

After living in both places, these are my observations. Austin has worse traffic because it has a severely inadequate highway system for a city its size. Dallas drivers are worse. Every day, I see one or more cars taking up two lanes, and someone scraped my brand new car in a parking lot. A scrape that bad has never happened to one of my cars. I haven't had issues with allergies since I moved to Dallas; Austin is the worst place I've ever lived when it comes to allergies. As a black person, there are more dating options in the DFW area. I'm not saying that the options are better; there are just more of them. People in Austin are friendlier than people in Dallas and will go out of their way to make nice gestures. I even found people in Austin to be friendlier than people in San Antonio. People in San Antonio tend to be superficially friendly.

See my experiences are a little different when it comes to friendliness in Austin. I won’t write the entire city off as being unfriendly but I had my fair share of rude pretentious people in Austin than any other city in Texas. The city definitely has the rudest bicyclist bar none. San Antonio imo seemed to me to be the friendliest by far. I was taken back how friendly people were there.

[KerrTown]

Originally Posted by Mr. Clutch

Much prefer Houston and Dallas for the amenities, diversity of people and thoughts, way better nightlife, both are easier to get around and more actual opportunities outside of the tech industry.

I can't imagine having to put up with Bergstrom with its non-hub status! You'll always be connecting flights unless your destination is one of that airline's hub cites. DFW and IAH are better origin airports.

Originally Posted by RJ312

It's easier to achieve a decent quality of life in Oklahoma City or Tulsa than Albuquerque or Santa Fe.

Heard about Tulsa's $10,000 grant to qualified new residents in the news recently. Tulsa is turning out not to be that attractive!

https://www.cnbc.com/2018/11/13/tuls...from-home.html

[FreeVilley]

Originally Posted by Julio July

Yeah, usually the TRANSPLANTS win the transplant game---no matter which transplant filled city you are talking about or to what degree they have caused the cost of living to increase. But most of the people who were already living there? Not so much. Unless, of course, they were already working with Transplant type money and setups to begin with. That's why natives become rarer and rarer. Austin is a great example of that, and Dallas seems to have gotten that way (unless you are going to go to the hood or something, of course).

Any good business school will teach you that new customers are more valuable and profitable than existing customers.

[FreeVilley]

Originally Posted by tcualum

Maybe I've just had bad luck but I've haven't encountered friendly people in Austin. Fort Worth and San Antonio, yes, but not Austin. Poor customer service I have encountered in Austin though.

The friendly people in austin are the ones that want to sleep with you... or party.

[L210]

Originally Posted by Redlionjr

See my experiences are a little different when it comes to friendliness in Austin. I won’t write the entire city off as being unfriendly but I had my fair share of rude pretentious people in Austin than any other city in Texas. The city definitely has the rudest bicyclist bar none. San Antonio imo seemed to me to be the friendliest by far. I was taken back how friendly people were there.

I lived in San Antonio for 28 years. Maybe my experiences were different being a black woman. I had people call me the n-word a few times there (all Hispanic). I overheard one of my Hispanic coworkers talk horribly about dark-skinned black women, and none of the black men she was talking to said anything. These were all military veterans who said that they don't date black women, which is very common in SA. I had a coworker whose half-black daughter was called the n-word every day at a school that was almost entirely Hispanic. I had people call the police on me when I was delivering newspapers. The same state agencies that wouldn't interview or hire me in San Antonio offered me jobs in Austin.

SAPD was unprofessional. They would harass me when I was at my car in my security uniform, but they wouldn't do anything when I called the police on white men assaulting people at a homeless shelter. When I called about child abuse, officers would brag about hitting their kids in the face. BCSO deputies are always in the news for being arrested. I had a deputy laugh at me when I reported a woman scamming people on Craigslist for their dogs. About a year later, she was charged with animal abuse because there were dozens of dead dogs on the property she was renting. In my over 10 years in the criminal justice field, SAPD and BCSO had some of the dumbest peace officers I ever encountered. One deputy I worked with at BCSO said that he didn't think there was one black woman who was a patrol deputy at the time. The Travis County Sheriff's Office is much more diverse.

In the five years I lived in the Austin area, I experienced more random acts of kindness than the nearly 30 years I lived in San Antonio i.e. the car in front of me in the drive-thru paying for my meal and people leaving quarters when they noticed that the washing machine I had my clothes in was broken. Moving away from SA was the best decision I ever made. If I had stayed there, I wouldn't be making nearly the amount of money I'm making now. The work experience I gained in Austin helped me land my current job in Dallas. By next year, I'll be making nearly three times the salary I was making in SA, and I had a master's degree and supervisory experience when I left.

I haven't lived in Dallas long, but I was surprised to come across so many men in their late 20s and early 30s who had a job, no kids, and didn't live with their parents. San Antonio is one of the top cities for people over 25 still living with their parents. It was hard to find a man who didn't already have two or more baby mamas or who could afford his own apartment.

[RJ312]

Originally Posted by L210

I haven't lived in Dallas long, but I was surprised to come across so many men in their late 20s and early 30s who had a job, no kids, and didn't live with their parents. San Antonio is one of the top cities for people over 25 still living with their parents. It was hard to find a man who didn't already have two or more baby mamas or who could afford his own apartment.

I am one of these guys who you describe. I'm surprised you think we are quite plentiful. Dallas single men outnumber single women so there's an arms race to competitiveness here. Maybe it is a different mindset here than San Antonio, because single men also outnumber single women there as well.