My thoughts on LA after 2 weeks of living here (Los Angeles: transplants, living in)

[nmnita]

Originally Posted by CmpEngineer

It is hard to believe that both Beverly Hills and Compton are within Los Angeles County. Those two cities are so different from each other (like night and day).

That is like the state of NM, the wealthiest (or has been from time to time) county in the country and the poorest are both there. In fact if it wasn't for the Los Alamos area, NM would far be the poorest state in the union. But, of course, now I am totally off subject.

Nita

[MuffinCups]

Welcome to town. It is refreshing to hear a newcomer talk about the positives of California. Keep exploring the various neighborhoods and free things to do.

[majoun]

Originally Posted by CmpEngineer

It is hard to believe that both Beverly Hills and Compton are within Los Angeles County. Those two cities are so different from each other (like night and day).

Not that surprising if you think about other California counties. E.g. Richmond and Moraga are both within Contra Costa County ; Santa Ana and Newport Beach are both within Orange County ; etc. etc.

[djsmps]

Hunters Point and Pacific Heights are both within the city limits of San Francsico. Every state/county/city has rich and poor areas.

Regarding the original post: it was misleading about what you were paying for housing. I used to live in LA as both a renter and home owner. I've also lived in in Northern California, Texas, Florida, Colorado and many other places. I would consider making under $40,000 to be marginally low income. I made a 6 figure salary in LA, and only felt middle class. LA is a very expensive area. The vast majority of people are in the service industry and don't make much money. As a result, they have to double or triple up in housing. Of course, that is what you are doing.

I liked LA. I also have liked almost every other place I've lived. But it is an expensive place to live a normal lifestyle, i.e., no roommates.

[Dunbar42]

Originally Posted by yoyoma02

Ok, well then it's obviously lifestyle - unless your car payment is like $1k a month. Because I don't make $50k and I'm still saving money every month. The cost of living here is over hyped up. Really, if you can't live on $50k here, you probably couldn't live on $50k in some small town in Iowa.

And, if you think it's so bad here, why don't you just move?

You have two roommates though and I said that figure is for people who don't want roommates. If you make something like $39k (or less) where I am you can qualify for a rent subsidy which ought to tell you something about the cost of living. I never said this is a bad place to live, just much more expensive than Chicago. Every time I tell someone out of state how much I pay for rent ($1300/mo) they are shocked.

[HarryKerry]

Originally Posted by Lovehound

Yes, that's normal. It's call "May gray" and "June gloom." The amount of overcast varies by where you are in L.A. and also when or if it burns off later in the day. It can get bad enough that the overcast might last most of the day in the valleys, or mild enough that only the beaches experience it and it burns off early in the day. If you don't like it you can just drive inland and you will eventually find sun although you might have to go to Lancaster to get it.

And then July and August comes around and it's hot as hell and you wish you had June gloom! One thing for sure in Los Angeles, no matter what kind of day we're having there will be somebody to complain about it!

I'm sorry, but I have to disagree. Our summers don't come close to Texas (especially Houston) summers or summers just about anywhere else in the U.S. except for the Pacific Northwest. "Hot as hell" occurs for a few days or weeks--often spread out over the months-- in general. Now, if one is in the SFV or SGV, than you they are living in a chosen hot zone. and yes, the Inland Empire is a true desert with "hot as hell" temperatures to match, and for those in the Antelope Valley, you wanted to move to a high dessert community with oven temps. But as for most of LA basin, our summers don't come close to what our fine fellow citizens must endure, and we have LOW HUMIDITY, that makes things much more comfortable than almost anywhere else. Even walking through toasty downtown Riverside (Inland Empire true desert) triple digit summer heat was actually close to bearable because of the low humidity. Yeah, Riverside qualifies as a "hot as hell" place.

Having lived here so long or all our lives, we forget what summers are supposed to be and anyone from most of the country would gladly exchange summers with us. I'll take an LA summer over a Houston, New Orleans, Chicago, New York City, Washington D.C., St. Louis, Nashville, Las Vegas, summer any day.

[Lovehound]

I've experienced 110+ days in the San Fernando Valley (but it's a dry heat, not like Houston which I've also experienced, yuck!).

You missed my point. We have the best weather in the US, except Florida which has equally good weather, but which also has hurricanes.

Here in the Valley we (or at least I) appreciate May gray and June gloom. Then the weather is great although the sun may not come out. Fewer opportunities to get skin cancer, what's not to like about that?

[AliveandWell]

I wonder how the OP will feel about LA in the long term. I personally thought that my first 15 years here after I arrived were the best. Although for a lot of those years I was too busy being involved with school, then community college and other things to truly think about what I thought of LA. Now that I'm older, I am realizing that the first 15 years for me were the best. Now, although I like the area that I live in, I'm not too impressed with LA County but I am still happy overall because my happiness does not depend on the place. It depends on me.

And yes, the cost of living is high here don't be fooled by this. What drives the cost of living up is the rent and car expenses and if you go to bars and clubs, you will pay through the nose for drinks and a cover charge Yikes!! And no it is not 75-80 degrees here all year. It can be in the 100s in the inland valleys in the summer. Best time in LA in terms of the weather is December through March IMO.

[nmnita]

Originally Posted by HarryKerry

I'm sorry, but I have to disagree. Our summers don't come close to Texas (especially Houston) summers or summers just about anywhere else in the U.S. except for the Pacific Northwest. "Hot as hell" occurs for a few days or weeks--often spread out over the months-- in general. Now, if one is in the SFV or SGV, than you they are living in a chosen hot zone. and yes, the Inland Empire is a true desert with "hot as hell" temperatures to match, and for those in the Antelope Valley, you wanted to move to a high dessert community with oven temps. But as for most of LA basin, our summers don't come close to what our fine fellow citizens must endure, and we have LOW HUMIDITY, that makes things much more comfortable than almost anywhere else. Even walking through toasty downtown Riverside (Inland Empire true desert) triple digit summer heat was actually close to bearable because of the low humidity. Yeah, Riverside qualifies as a "hot as hell" place.

Having lived here so long or all our lives, we forget what summers are supposed to be and anyone from most of the country would gladly exchange summers with us. I'll take an LA summer over a Houston, New Orleans, Chicago, New York City, Washington D.C., St. Louis, Nashville, Las Vegas, summer any day.

We are probably getting off the subject now, but I can think of lots of places with cooler or more comfortable summers than the Los Angeles area (I am not talking about living near the ocean) I can think of a hell of alot worse as well. Yes, most of Texas and the entire south are worse than Los Angeles, but not just the pacific NOWest, but DC, Chic, New England and many parts of Ca, NM, etc are more enjoyable. NM has a dry heat, high desert and pretty mild temps. DC rarely gets much above the how 90s even though there is a lot of humidity. Chic and the upper midwest stays cool even, again with the humidity. So, the majorityof the time, I would give the Los Angeles basin a B for weather, July and Aug into Sept there are many places much more comfortable than L.A. Of course, from what I have heard this year has been heaven and I wish I was there.

Nita

[Lovehound]

Nita, name a place in the US with better weather than So. Cal. and tell us why. I can't name any myself, except for Florida when they're not having hurricanes, and not better than CA just comparable.

Any other place that has cooler summers has colder winters and many of them have snow. Or go the other direction (e.g. Phoenix) and the winters are like our spring/fall but the summers are as hot as hell.

It's my strong opinion that Southern California has the best weather in the nation. Of course some people like four seasons and we don't got that.