Our Verdict...

[AikenHorses]

Originally Posted by rjent

AikenHorses, glad you like our state! A word of warning. NM is a very low population state. With less that 2 million persons in the fifth largest state, that low population, creates some challenges for small businesses.

I was able to create and maintain three business over a 35 year career here in NM, but it wasn't easy and I have lived in and operated out of Truth or Consequences. It is a challenge to do with such a limited population. Now, if your business requires a finite amount of customers that can be generated within an area like Alb. then you are good to go. Just be careful and really do the research on what your business is, and will NM support what you are wanting to do.

Born in Las Cruces and going to school there (public and NMSU) I cut my teeth on many small enterprises growing up. I grew up and was raised on a cattle ranch and apple orchard near Lake Valley NM. I painfully LOL know the ups and downs of agriculture here (we are an agriculture state) I eventually created a business environment in the high tech world starting in 1980 and retired two years ago. I have a fairly good grasp of NM and it's business environment.

Anyway, good luck with your endeavor, and welcome!

Thanks for this!

We are pretty flexible. Our business here in Canada is Automotive Finance, which means that our branch in NM can do anything either Automotive related, or Finance related for the purposes of the L visa. It has to tie into the original business, of course, but our current model doesn't have to be exactly replicated down there. Our current business is proftable enough to support itself, us, and our new business in ABQ, so we're going to set up shop where we want to live, rather than live where we need to set up shop. That being said, we would plan to expand quickly into Denver and Phoenix markets, and ABQ's accessibility to both of those larger cities is positive for us. For the purposes of our visa, we must create a business that requires management by people other than us within the first year, so it's okay for those businesses to be 5-6 hours away from where we live, wince they have to quickly become autonomous anyway.

We're playing with several ideas. We might do a non-customer facing export business (cars are in short supply in Canada) or instead do just a simple retail car lot. We'd offer finance, but the landscape down there is a bit different than up here, so it could take us a while to ramp up that side of the business. Or not. Who knows. We won't really know until we get there and figure it out. Auto lease and buy here pay here do well in ABQ, for sure.

The nice thing about used car sales this day in age (if we kept it simple and just did a car lot) is people don't really look for a dealership - they look for a car. If I have that car, the guy down the street doesn't. That means that if someone is looking for THAT car, we'll have the opportunity to sell it to them. To make money in used cars you have to know where/how to buy the good cars - not junk - for a price you can make money on, and then how to market them so they sell quickly. It is a pretty elemental business compared to what we do now, but it works, especially being backed financially by our Canadian company. Of course you'll always have the old generation that has their dealership they go to for everything, but the younger generation uses the internet to find cars, and are more accepting of a new dealership.

Heck, we may find that farm supply and finance will be our path down there. Who knows. We're open to anything, and it is all related as long as it is either Auto/Machine or Finance. :-)

[rjent]

Outstanding. I think you will do well. I have a couple of friends who are in the car business including one of them who has a Chevrolet dealership. You have a plan and you know what you are doing .... that is 99 percent of it!

Shoot me a PM when you set up shop

Originally Posted by AikenHorses

Thanks for this!

We are pretty flexible. Our business here in Canada is Automotive Finance, which means that our branch in NM can do anything either Automotive related, or Finance related for the purposes of the L visa. It has to tie into the original business, of course, but our current model doesn't have to be exactly replicated down there. Our current business is proftable enough to support itself, us, and our new business in ABQ, so we're going to set up shop where we want to live, rather than live where we need to set up shop. That being said, we would plan to expand quickly into Denver and Phoenix markets, and ABQ's accessibility to both of those larger cities is positive for us. For the purposes of our visa, we must create a business that requires management by people other than us within the first year, so it's okay for those businesses to be 5-6 hours away from where we live, wince they have to quickly become autonomous anyway.

We're playing with several ideas. We might do a non-customer facing export business (cars are in short supply in Canada) or instead do just a simple retail car lot. We'd offer finance, but the landscape down there is a bit different than up here, so it could take us a while to ramp up that side of the business. Or not. Who knows. We won't really know until we get there and figure it out. Auto lease and buy here pay here do well in ABQ, for sure.

The nice thing about used car sales this day in age (if we kept it simple and just did a car lot) is people don't really look for a dealership - they look for a car. If I have that car, the guy down the street doesn't. That means that if someone is looking for THAT car, we'll have the opportunity to sell it to them. To make money in used cars you have to know where/how to buy the good cars - not junk - for a price you can make money on, and then how to market them so they sell quickly. It is a pretty elemental business compared to what we do now, but it works, especially being backed financially by our Canadian company. Of course you'll always have the old generation that has their dealership they go to for everything, but the younger generation uses the internet to find cars, and are more accepting of a new dealership.

Heck, we may find that farm supply and finance will be our path down there. Who knows. We're open to anything, and it is all related as long as it is either Auto/Machine or Finance. :-)

[MikesMoving2015]

Aiken Horses...Hi there, I've been reading some of your interesting comments regarding ABQ and some other areas. I also have a strong positive feeling about ABQ, and am trying to figure out if its the right move for my wife and daughter (we're America).Your approach of opening a used car business along with auto financing in ABQ is pretty sound, I feel. My gut feeling is that ABQ is going to start growing nicely in the near future as housing prices along the coasts keep rising and the economy keeps turning around.

I actually bought the main domains (and registered the Facebook/Twitter-etc.) for the term "streetventory" (rhymes with "story" in American English) in anticipation of perhaps going the same route and needing a catchy name. I use it as a personal consulting brand for software consulting right now, but I think it would be great for an innovative used car chain. Let's chat sometime to see if I can help you get established. I need to head to ABQ in a few months to scout out some neighborhoos options, regardless. When are you two looking to move?....

[nmnita]

Originally Posted by AikenHorses

Hi all!

So, we just got back last night from our NM tour. We had only 6 days, and 2 of those days were spent mostly at airports (the ABQ airport is ADORABLE! I can't wait to use it regularly!), so it was a VERY condensed tour. But we got a great idea of some of our likes and dislikes.

We stayed in ABQ, visited Santa Fe as a day trip, and Las Cruces/El Paso over 2 days/1 night. We tried to do a nice mix of touristy things and also neighbourhood scouting.

Initially, we went down to NM with our hearts set on Las Cruces (on paper) with El Paso as our go-to city because of the house values, the weather, and what we thought would be better landscape for what we wanted. In reality, we found Las Cruces too quiet and didn't love El Paso like we had hoped to. Las Cruces had a BEAUTIFUL little mall that was clean and safe feeling. It was very, very quiet though. Actually, that is an understatement. It felt like some sort of global ascension had happened while we were in the car and my husband and I were the only humans left on earth. I am not exaggerating. Now, it was a Sunday so I have zero doubt that the city does liven up a bit... But wow. I've never been anywhere so quiet in my life. Inside the mall there were a few families and people were going about their business quietly.

Everything about Las Cruces felt clean, shiny, new, and safe. I could see it being a very appealing place for families. The subdivisions could not have been prettier, and overall with the exception of the QUIET I liked it, and could have seen us living there if El Paso turned out how we hoped. My husband didn't like Las Cruces because it felt too sterile for him. He did like the houses in the subdivisions we saw. We did go into Mesilla, and again it was quiet (no doubt had a lot to do with it being Sunday) but even quiet aside it was still very small. He said he didn't feel like we'd go into Mesilla too often for patio dining or people watching. Fair enough.

We drove into El Paso late at night. I REALLY liked the city as we went into it, and was looking forward to seeing it the next day. When the sun came up, we went out in search of a downtown core and patio area. We did not find it. Maybe I am missing it on the map, but as far as we could tell in our half-day before heading back up to Albuquerque, El Paso lacks a cute little central area with shops and patios. We found a Mexican-style market that was fairly bustling, and about as unpretentious as a city can get (they sure don't put on a front for tourists in El Paso, do they?!) but unfortunately very little in the shops actually appealed to me. Just not my style beyond a couple of dresses, and I couldn't see it being a real destination for us. It was gritty and very "rundown" feeling, but I don't mean that in an "unsafe" way because the whole city did feel very safe.

We got an EXCELLENT sandwich from a guy in a trailer, and went in search of a historic district. No luck. The park was under renovation, but even had it not been, the surrounding area just did not have the feel we were looking for. We did a tour of some historic missions, and all the surrounding shops were closed. Again, it felt like a ghost town (even though the core of the city was quite bustling) Oh! We did go into a McDonald's to use the bathroom and discovered Green Chile on a Double Cheeseburger. Yummy! My husband and I both felt we could visit El Paso for specific things (like custom boots and belts!!!) but didn't want to live there. If we would choose to live there, Spanish would become a necessity. While techincally not NECESSARY, a person probably won't get the most out of El Paso if they can't speak Spanish. Also, we felt we'd have a harder time setting up our business and breaking into the market in El Paso, which we didn't anticipate. So Las Cruces and El Paso were a no-go.

Santa Fe (and Madrid, on the drive up!) was beautiful, and we really enjoyed visiting. I couldn't live in such a touristy environment full time. Stuff was way overpriced (less so in Madrid, which was actually a lovely little town). In a way, it was the opposite extreme of El Paso. The city does give off a bit of a pretentious vibe. It had the feel we were looking for in terms of shops and patios, though, and we'll be back regularly. I can see how people would love the facade of Santa Fe, but I can't help but wonder if they're often disappointed after they move there and they decide they want to do something OTHER than shop for $5000+ bracelets and pottery. In any case, it was a beautiful city that I can see how it attracts so many (affluent) people... But I think a person considering Santa Fe really really has to look deeper than the facade. It wasn't quite for us as a living city.

One thing I discovered between Las Cruces/El Paso and Santa Fe was that I very much prefer the treed north mountains area over the southern parts without a tree in sight. This surprised me, as I was initially hoping for a very deserty feel. But nope. I far prefer northern NM. I need the changing of the leaves in fall, and the feeling of hiking in a real forest. My husband is neutral on this, so we'll go with my (strong) preference.

Albuquerque was the pleasing middle ground between Santa Fe and Las Cruces. It was close enough to Santa Fe for regular day trips (heck, we missed an exit on the I-25 and were almost half way up to Santa Fe before we could turn around! LOL) but had so much going for it on its own as well. The city had JUST ENOUGH people and traffic that it did not feel empty, stuff was open no matter what day we were out and about, yet it was not congested or frustrating to navigate.

ABQ Uptown had a sterile feel, but it was lively on Friday and Saturday night, and I could definitely see us going there regularly. Downtown was fun! Any number of bars, restaurants, patios, clubs, etc. to choose from. The malls were great and we could get anything we need in comfort and safety. Old Town was SO CHARMING and my husband absolutely loved it. We only had an hour there so we look forward to returning. It was definitely a place to grab a bite to eat and people watch in the park.

We checked out neighbourhoods in ABQ as well: Rio Rancho wasn't quite for us, and while we enjoyed neighbourhoods in the valley parts of the city it was a little too green. We had lots of luck finding homes we love on properties we love in the NAA area (and surrounding) and I loved a lot of homes in Sandia Heights and High Desert areas as well, but my husband felt they were too manicured. In any case, we definitely have narrowed down to the northeast. The prices though... Ugh. So we won't buy right away. But it'll be worth the wait. :-)

All in all, NM is a fabulous state and we know we chose right to visit it. When you know a city is right for you, you just KNOW. Albuquerque is right for us and also our business. Not so much our wallet. Oh well. LOL

Good luck to you; we felt very similar when we visited ABQ several years ago. We did relocate (retired) lived there for 7 years, only we lived south. We have a lot of fond memories of those years. We also loved the Sunport. The weather was the thing we enjoyed the most plus all the wonderful friends we made. Los Cruces was not our thing at all; remember though, this was years ago. The biggest negative for us was the high altitude. There are a few people who never adjust, I was one of them. There were a few other things that caused us to relocate, but family is the number one reason we left.