General Living in Michigan Qs (Detroit, Royal Oak: income, low cost, lawsuits)

[Coldjensens]

IF it makes you feel better, I have not known a single person who had a car stolen since i left Orange County for Michigan. Further, I have not heard the roughly monthly reports of home invasions that were on the news in California.

Detroit car insurance is higher primarily because people in Detroit are far more likely to sue and for more alleged injury than elsewhere - at least according to insurance company studies. When people talk about higher insurance rates, they are usually talking about liability insurance, not theft (comprehensive). Liability insurance and car theft have no relationship whatsoever.

10 - 20 years ago, carjacking was common. Now, it is rarely in the news.

If you are worried about having your car stolen, drive a manual transmission (no matter where you live). Most thieves have no idea how to drive a manual.


Remember on roads, it is usually the County, not the City or township that owns and maintains the roads. Some cities own and maintain a few roads, a few own a lot of roads. What you are seeing si simply a work area. They had a limited amount of money, so they took the worst section of a road and fixed that section. Maybe in a few years they will fix another section.

Personally I like some roads to be terrible. The road in front of my house, would be a racetrack if it were in good condition. In its current condition, even driving the 30 MPH speed limit is impossible unless you like buying suspension parts. It keeps the speeders down also helps reduce traffic generally. this is important because so many kids and others use the roads for jogging, biking, walking, fishing. In this case - Hooray for potholes! I hope they never fix it (and the probably never will).

[Rothwells mum]

Originally Posted by taylor-2017

We are considering a job offer in Troy, MI. Job is great—only problem it’s in Michigan. I hear the horror stories about Detroit and crime and I hope it can’t be as bad as the rumors. I flew out with my husband for his job interview and we drove around various suburbs to get a feel for the area.

Things I’m curious about:
Roads— are there some cities/suburbs that are better/worse at snow removal and repaving? I would hope that most suburbs are on point with snow plowing/pre-treating roads. When driving around roads were horrible and then all of a sudden it would be newly paved for a stretch before becoming rough again.

weather—I can handle cold and snow but I need sunshine on a regular basis (I suffer from severe depression that is exacerbated by prolonged gray, dreary weather)

rentals — is it difficult to find a rental? ideally, we would like to rent a place with a garage and no more than $1700/mo while looking for a place to buy.

crime -- it seems as though much of the crime in the "safe" areas is property and vehicle theft. is this accurate?

Due to my struggles with depression we are wondering if this area is a good fit for us, even in the short term (we would be looking to stay approx 5 years, or until my husband is ready for the next step up on his career path). Any input would be greatly appreciated.

Troy, MI is not Detroit, it is metro Detroit -big difference- don't let the media scare you. Detroit proper is actually a fun place to visit- it has good restaurants and its where the young people (20-30) seem to be.
Real estate in the areas that you will want to live is probably not as cheap as you may have been led to believe.

Unless you are coming here looking for trouble (selling machine guns, dealing crack, insert whatever illegal activity here) you are unlikely to be a victim of any crime as you are anywhere else.

We relocated from the west coast as well and it is very nice here. Troy is a large suburb with many different cultures represented. The biggest difference I notice is that even though many different cultures are represented people tend to self segregate - I didn't experience that so much in the bay area.

People are polite until they get in their car -then look out- the drivers are so aggressive here.
The main roads are cleared quickly in the winter -its the side streets that take longer. We moved here the year after the so called horrific winter so there weren't many storms in the last few years that lasted more than a few days.

We rented a house the first 9 months we were here and I found that from Craigslist. We looked through realtors as well but we like dealing directly with the owner when renting. Also, it saved us a few hundred a month that way as there was no middle man to pay. Our house had a two car garage and was within your budget. We never looked at actual apartments as we have kids so that wasn't an option in our minds.
Try looking in Troy, Beverly Hills, Ferndale or Royal Oak for rentals.
I must say that some of the rentals that realtors showed us in Royal Oak were laughable to us but I'm not 20 so maybe my standards for suitable housing differ from others.

I bought a sun lamp because I listened to people that said it wasn't that sunny here - I found it to be unnecessary so I returned it as it isn't as grey as some people claimed.

[Coldjensens]

Originally Posted by Rothwells mum

T


I bought a sun lamp because I listened to people that said it wasn't that sunny here - I found it to be unnecessary so I returned it as it isn't as grey as some people claimed.

Good call. those lamps do not actually do anything. However, if you believe they do you some good, maybe they will. The mind is powerful.

[zthatzmanz28]

Originally Posted by taylor-2017

We are considering a job offer in Troy, MI. Job is great—only problem it’s in Michigan. I hear the horror stories about Detroit and crime and I hope it can’t be as bad as the rumors. I flew out with my husband for his job interview and we drove around various suburbs to get a feel for the area.

Things I’m curious about:
Roads— are there some cities/suburbs that are better/worse at snow removal and repaving? I would hope that most suburbs are on point with snow plowing/pre-treating roads. When driving around roads were horrible and then all of a sudden it would be newly paved for a stretch before becoming rough again.

weather—I can handle cold and snow but I need sunshine on a regular basis (I suffer from severe depression that is exacerbated by prolonged gray, dreary weather)

rentals — is it difficult to find a rental? ideally, we would like to rent a place with a garage and no more than $1700/mo while looking for a place to buy.

crime -- it seems as though much of the crime in the "safe" areas is property and vehicle theft. is this accurate?

Due to my struggles with depression we are wondering if this area is a good fit for us, even in the short term (we would be looking to stay approx 5 years, or until my husband is ready for the next step up on his career path). Any input would be greatly appreciated.

It is probably best you stay where you are rather than risk your health and welfare.

[taylor-2017]

Originally Posted by MS313

It sounds like your biggest problem is going to be the sunshine. No your not going to get nearly as many sunny days as San Diego or AZ (more like half the sunny days tbh) if that's a deal breaker then I'll say wait for another opportunity in a sunny place like New Mexico or something. If your not going to be in Detroit any longer than a few years then come get your money. 300 days of sunshine will always be waiting on you in Cali or wherever.

Yes, the sunlight is a big factor. We currently get an average of 250 sunny days a year. Detroit metro gets about 180 (I know weather patterns vary year-to-year) so I was curious what this actually was like for people who have lived in the area for years and there perspective.

[taylor-2017]

Originally Posted by Rothwells mum

Real estate in the areas that you will want to live is probably not as cheap as you may have been led to believe.

We relocated from the west coast as well and it is very nice here. Troy is a large suburb with many different cultures represented. The biggest difference I notice is that even though many different cultures are represented people tend to self segregate - I didn't experience that so much in the bay area.

We rented a house the first 9 months we were here and I found that from Craigslist. We looked through realtors as well but we like dealing directly with the owner when renting. Also, it saved us a few hundred a month that way as there was no middle man to pay. Our house had a two car garage and was within your budget. We never looked at actual apartments as we have kids so that wasn't an option in our minds.
Try looking in Troy, Beverly Hills, Ferndale or Royal Oak for rentals.
I must say that some of the rentals that realtors showed us in Royal Oak were laughable to us but I'm not 20 so maybe my standards for suitable housing differ from others.

I bought a sun lamp because I listened to people that said it wasn't that sunny here - I found it to be unnecessary so I returned it as it isn't as grey as some people claimed.

Anything under $300k for a 2 bdrm is a steal compared to where we live now. Sun lamps have not worked for me in the past, unfortunately. Hence the reason I'm asking people who live in the area about the sun situation.

[taylor-2017]

Originally Posted by zthatzmanz28

It is probably best you stay where you are rather than risk your health and welfare.

Trying to decide if the lower cost of living is worth a gray winter and horrible roads.

[Coldjensens]

Originally Posted by taylor-2017

Anything under $300k for a 2 bdrm is a steal compared to where we live now. Sun lamps have not worked for me in the past, unfortunately. Hence the reason I'm asking people who live in the area about the sun situation.

$450 - $500 K will get you a sizable house on waterfront with an acre of land. You would be hard pressed to find a 2 bedroom that cost that much. Maybe in Birmingham. Or one of those giant stupid houses that make no sense. (There is a 28,000 s.f. house that is for three people in our town, so they will use only 2 bedrooms although it may have more - once in a while you run into absurdly large houses with only two bedrooms, maybe they entertain a lot).

[Geo-Aggie]

The 180 days a year is up to 30% sunshine and this is an accurate statistic; however, as indicated before there are a surprisingly high number of partly to mostly cloudy days where you have some sunshine (30-70%), but a number of clouds too. Technically not a "sunny" day - but there is sun. It's your call on if that is acceptable or not.

Outside of the dreary Januarys, the sunlight situation here isn't nearly as bad as it was where I moved from, Salt Lake City. According to statistics, SLC has far more sunny days (222) than Detroit (180). We don't get the weeks upon weeks of overcast or inversion cap like you find in coastal cities and mountain valleys.

[taylor-2017]

Originally Posted by Coldjensens

$450 - $500 K will get you a sizable house on waterfront with an acre of land. You would be hard pressed to find a 2 bedroom that cost that much. Maybe in Birmingham. Or one of those giant stupid houses that make no sense. (There is a 28,000 s.f. house that is for three people in our town, so they will use only 2 bedrooms although it may have more - once in a while you run into absurdly large houses with only two bedrooms, maybe they entertain a lot).

We did see lots of large homes and yes, those waterfront homes are in our price range but I don't want a large home; it's just my husband and myself for now. No kids yet. Are the homes so big because during the winter months people stay in their houses more?