Possible Relocation to Phoenix? (insurance, company, expensive)

[BIG CATS]

Originally Posted by ElleTea

wow! Mine went up MAYBE $5 (if that? I can't remember honestly)? Clean record, full coverage. I'd do some shopping around if I were you!

Ive been with Geico, Country Companies, All State, and am currently with State Farm, who I found to be the best. In fact, we've been with them for 15 yrs now almost.

[Valley Native]

Originally Posted by OneBeachBum

A little background, my wife and I are early/mid 30's with 3 kids, one school aged, two infants. We currently live in Houston, TX but have been looking to make a huge life change. I grew up in Florida and have made stops in Tennessee and Louisiana, she's never lived outside of the Houston area. We're tired of life in "the big city" although we do love an "urban/downtown" lifestyle, we're tired of the rampant crime that comes with living in a huge city like Houston.

So why are you thinking about Phoenix if you're tired of big city life? Phoenix might be smaller than Houston overall, but it's not that much smaller, and you're still going to find many of the big city problems here like you do in Houston or any other large city. The exception of course would be to find a nice quiet suburb or outlying area where you won't have as much traffic or crime. One big drawback to that, however, is your urban/downtown lifestyle would be more out of reach.

[Finger Laker]

Phoenix is much different than "big cities"

It's essentially sprawling suburbia with some urban and country elements mixed in

[OneBeachBum]

Originally Posted by BIG CATS

Is there anyone that's currently living in the Phoenix area that can share their transition from Texas to Arizona? LOTS of ex-Texans here. Besides CA plates, I probably see more TX plates than anything else. I guess everyone's sick of that crappy TX weather?

LoL, I think it's more of wanting to escape from the huge cities and crime. I've seen a lot of people kinda raise eyebrows at me when I posted that I wanted to escape the big city and crime that comes with it because Phoenix is a rather large city itself, at least population wise, but Phoenix and Arizona as a whole seem to be so spread out with a lot of room to move about, whereas where I live in Houston it's pretty much cookie cutter subdivisions and non-ending apartment complexes.

I guess when it comes down to it, I've spent so much time in the Southeast with green forests, humidity, mosquitoes, and so on, that it'd be nice to have a change of scenery and escape our comfort zone.

I don't want to sound like a small person, but I really have no desire to live in California or New Mexico because of their politics. I've never had an appeal towards Nevada, and Utah seems to be full of weirdos, so Arizona was pretty much it for us.

We've seen a lot of photos and think it's beautiful. We're planning a trip out that way hopefully in March or April.

When I moved to Houston, my first summer was pretty much 20+ straight days of temps above 105, and I seemed to handle it alright..

Thanks for the reply!

[OneBeachBum]

I appreciate everyone's replies, I thought for a fact that my thread would get buried without anymore replies, so thank you!

I actually went through the Phoenix real estate guide and used an address from a house that's for sale to get an insurance quote. I'm with Geico and with the zip code 85040, my 6 month premium only increased by $110, so I'm not too worried about that now.

[ElleTea]

Originally Posted by OneBeachBum

LoL, I think it's more of wanting to escape from the huge cities and crime. I've seen a lot of people kinda raise eyebrows at me when I posted that I wanted to escape the big city and crime that comes with it because Phoenix is a rather large city itself, at least population wise, but Phoenix and Arizona as a whole seem to be so spread out with a lot of room to move about, whereas where I live in Houston it's pretty much cookie cutter subdivisions and non-ending apartment complexes.

I guess when it comes down to it, I've spent so much time in the Southeast with green forests, humidity, mosquitoes, and so on, that it'd be nice to have a change of scenery and escape our comfort zone.

I don't want to sound like a small person, but I really have no desire to live in California or New Mexico because of their politics. I've never had an appeal towards Nevada, and Utah seems to be full of weirdos, so Arizona was pretty much it for us.

We've seen a lot of photos and think it's beautiful. We're planning a trip out that way hopefully in March or April.

When I moved to Houston, my first summer was pretty much 20+ straight days of temps above 105, and I seemed to handle it alright..

Thanks for the reply!

You aren't going to escape cookie cutter subdivisions and apartment complexes here unless you stay out of the suburbs. I like to refer to Gilbert and Chandler as Chanbert because it all blurs together for me Add to the mix never ending strip malls and that's the valley in a nutshell.

[observer53]

To the OP- It's possible to find neighborhoods, generally somewhat older, in both Phoenix and the suburbs that do not have that cookie cutter feel. A lot depends on where you end up working, your budget, and what other things you want to be close to.

[Valley Native]

Originally Posted by OneBeachBum

LoL, I think it's more of wanting to escape from the huge cities and crime. I've seen a lot of people kinda raise eyebrows at me when I posted that I wanted to escape the big city and crime that comes with it because Phoenix is a rather large city itself, at least population wise, but Phoenix and Arizona as a whole seem to be so spread out with a lot of room to move about, whereas where I live in Houston it's pretty much cookie cutter subdivisions and non-ending apartment complexes.

Well, the seemingly endless cookie cutter development is very evident in the Phoenix area as well. It's spread out much like Houston is ... and yes, Houston is bigger, but you're likely going to find the same kind of sprawling suburbia here like you do there. You are correct that Arizona as a state has more room and is less crowded than much of Texas. The population numbers say it all: 26 million in Texas vs. 7 million in Arizona!

Originally Posted by OneBeachBum

I guess when it comes down to it, I've spent so much time in the Southeast with green forests, humidity, mosquitoes, and so on, that it'd be nice to have a change of scenery and escape our comfort zone.

The scenery is much more diverse in Arizona than it is in Texas or much of the south. This is one thing I really like about AZ: when you want to escape the desert environment, or the summer heat in Phoenix, you can easily drive about 2 hours to the north or east & be in a much different environment within the same state, which consists of greenery, pine forests, and fresh mountain air.

[westcoastbabe]

Originally Posted by ElleTea

wow! Mine went up MAYBE $5 (if that? I can't remember honestly)? Clean record, full coverage. I'd do some shopping around if I were you!

Who is your insurance carrier, if you don't mind sharing??

[ElleTea]

Originally Posted by westcoastbabe

Who is your insurance carrier, if you don't mind sharing??

I have Progressive. When I got to AZ I got quotes from numerous companies and they came in significantly lower than anyone else. I have been satisfied with them.