SO CAL "Out Migration" heads to AZ (Particularly PHX) (Phoenix: for sale, apartments)

[KurtAZ]

Well Lovehound...if you are looking for views you probably won't find that in Chandler. This area is flat farmland with mountains FAR off in the distance. N Scottsdale (you have the money): McDowell Mtn Ranch, Greyhawk, that area might be good. Great views of the McDowells and they were protected through a Scottsdale City sales tax a few years back. Or further North in the Troon/Pinnacle Peak area...may be a little pricey up there though. Fountain Hills may be worth looking into. If you want Mesa...I would look at NE Mesa by the Superstitions...that area is beautiful as well. Usery Mtn/Red Mountain Ranch area has some nice homes.

[Burkmere]

Originally Posted by Lovehound

I live in Socal and own investment properties in PHX, and IMO neither market is in bubble land or even near it.

LA/OC is becoming frenetic in that affordable properties are nearing the end. Few more months and LA/OC properties will be only for the rich or for relocating CA-CA.

That sounds bad.

Don't worry...every so often a nice decline of about 30-40% in housing prices happens. Nobody sees it coming and everyone says you are crazy if you say it will happen.

[Lovehound]

My mention earlier re: Chandler was a mistake or maybe my mind just whizzed out the window that day. Yes of course I know Chandler well enough to know it's flat, and that it's not on my list of places in/near Phoenix that I would want. I have an even better view from Mesa although I'd have to climb on the roof to fully enjoy it! Funny, imaginative Realtors and how they market properties! Yeah I have a view if I can see an itty, bitty mountain peeking over the house across the street. Not!

Already considering N. Scottsdale, addding Greyhawk to my list, and Troon/Pinnacle Peak area. IIRC Pinnacle Peak has a crazy but great barbecue restaurant where if you come in wearing business attire they will cut off your tie at your neck and nail it to their wall: the Pinnacle Peak Inn, right?

Noting that Apache Junction has a great view of the Superstition Mountains and also protected status. I'm not quite sure what turns me off about Apache Junction and may be totally wrong about its desirability. It seems to me that last time I saw it there was too much intermixing of upscale and downscale areas, almost as if the zoning was messed up, or perhaps lack of planning from the beginning came too late to control growth to a more desirable outcome.

Damn, I remember when you could buy a 6-pack of houses in Queen Creek for maybe $300K total. Not that I want to live in QC (even though it's no longer a 1 lane each direction road) but I sure wish I had invested there. But of course in real estate it's difficult to time the market. In any case I wasn't thinking investments like I do these days the last time I was in QC.

[Lovehound]

Originally Posted by Burkmere

Don't worry...every so often a nice decline of about 30-40% in housing prices happens. Nobody sees it coming and everyone says you are crazy if you say it will happen.

Well like most folks I too have an opinion, and my opinion is worth about the same as anybody else's, perhaps $0.50 taking inflation into account. But. I think we are in a present stable growth trend in all desirable locations all across the country and in the time frame of the next several years I believe we will have a healthy, stable but growth market in all of those areas, particularly in Phoenix and in California.

I think of Phoenix as sort of a California for smart people who don't mind hot summer weather. I mean for money savvy people who are not impressed by the mess we call California. Note that I am a California native and current resident. I'm seeing more and more handwriting on the wall that says: Lovehound! Move before California's house of cards comes falling down and turns a beautiful place to live into a tax-and-spend hell. Fortunately even that won't harm California prices (my existing primary residence) and I'm sure I could do I-10 one last time with a honkin' big-a** check in my pocket!!!

You remember that whole thing about "you have to vote for it before you read it." That kind of thinking causes what California laughably calls a state government. Tax and spend until death, and then tax the estate if they can. They'd tax your departed soul if they could, tracking you down in Heaven or even in the biological place of eternal punishment.

The fact remains. You can buy a CA equivalent house for half the price in PHX. You can buy twice the CA equivalent house in PHX if you roll all the proceeds of the sale of your CA house into your new PHX home. I'm an investor/landlord. I know this because I put my wallet where my mouth is. I know from personal experience that these facts are true.

[KurtAZ]

If you are referring to Pinnacle Peak Steakhouse...unfortunately that is long gone. As is Greasewood Flats. There is a Four Seasons up there but I doubt they will cut off your tie and probably encourage you to wear it.

AJ has been, historically, the land of mobile homes and meth labs. It is changing...if you want cheap land there are still acre+ lots available out there. Just no direct access unless you want to brave the 60. Gold Canyon is a bit farther out but nicer.

[Lovehound]

The place I remember was a HUGE barbecue and steak restaurant. They probably bought multiple cows per day to feed their happy customers! Yes it was a long time ago. I've been nibbling at Phoenix for quite a long time.

Yeah that's the feeling I caught too last time I was in Apache Junction: mobile homes, meth labs, nice houses and crappy houses and poor zoning control.

Yes of course Gold Canyon is on my list. And what is crazy about the Superstition Freeway? I haven't noticed any crazy until I near downtown, particularly in commuter hours.

It does bother me a bit that I have never stopped at Gold Canyon (just driven by) and know nothing about shopping nearby. I hate to think of doing 60 all the way to Mesa to do my shopping.

Is Gold Canyon still part of Phoenix? I'd hate to lose my access to the Phoenix library system. The GPDL (digital) library is one of the best in the US.

[Burkmere]

Originally Posted by Lovehound

Well like most folks I too have an opinion, and my opinion is worth about the same as anybody else's, perhaps $0.50 taking inflation into account. But. I think we are in a present stable growth trend in all desirable locations all across the country and in the time frame of the next several years I believe we will have a healthy, stable but growth market in all of those areas, particularly in Phoenix and in California.

I think of Phoenix as sort of a California for smart people who don't mind hot summer weather. I mean for money savvy people who are not impressed by the mess we call California. Note that I am a California native and current resident. I'm seeing more and more handwriting on the wall that says: Lovehound! Move before California's house of cards comes falling down and turns a beautiful place to live into a tax-and-spend hell. Fortunately even that won't harm California prices (my existing primary residence) and I'm sure I could do I-10 one last time with a honkin' big-a** check in my pocket!!!

You remember that whole thing about "you have to vote for it before you read it." That kind of thinking causes what California laughably calls a state government. Tax and spend until death, and then tax the estate if they can. They'd tax your departed soul if they could, tracking you down in Heaven or even in the biological place of eternal punishment.

The fact remains. You can buy a CA equivalent house for half the price in PHX. You can buy twice the CA equivalent house in PHX if you roll all the proceeds of the sale of your CA house into your new PHX home. I'm an investor/landlord. I know this because I put my wallet where my mouth is. I know from personal experience that these facts are true.

You are preaching to the choir. I moved out of CA after I retired in Oct. 2015. I lived there for 35 years. Of course it was financially advantageous for me to do so..I mean move. I must say it was lifestyle wise also. I can "visit" California for months at a time and adore the ocean and all the other supposed attractions (overrated) and still be way ahead financially.

CA is on it's way to two classes. The class that could care less what it costs because they have the means to stay there and want to for various reasons and the welfare folks who take advantage of Moonbeam and company's generosity that is ruining the state including he folks who serve the rich folks).

[KurtAZ]

It is not so bad now that they have widened it once you hit the county line...but it can get backed up during the Ren Fest and some other events out there. The 60 is notorious for accidents and congestion, of course that is most freeways now...I don't think we can go a single morning without someone getting into an accident during commute hours. C'est la vie.

[Lovehound]

I presume you mean Maricopa County? I'll appreciate if you could elaborate. I have the general layout of PHX but I'm not a native (although I am a property owner). I know maybe about as much as somebody who lived in PHX for a few months. My treks are primarily I-10 and US 60, out to about Apache Junction, although it's been years since I visited AJ. (And wow, that Apache Trail out to Canyon Lake where the Salt River comes from, that's a real thriller and I don't mean in a good way. Next time I'll take the long way around. Or the trail up then continue north and the long way home! Up is fine with the cliff on the other side of the road. Back is hell when you pass somebody and at the pull-out you can open your right door and see down 500 or 1000 feet, the fall you'd take if you step out.)

And I agree with Burkmere and the analysis about California becoming a state with no middle class, a microcosm of America which is also losing its middle class. Who ever knew how important the middle class was? I never gave it a thought when I was middle class until it started disappearing in the last couple decades. Now I call myself sort'a "uppa" middle class. Barely enough money to stay in CA, plenty of money to move to PHX. It's only inertia and being a native that keeps me from moving.

But those crazy people in Sacramento have a really big stick (financial) and if they start pointing that in my direction I'm making plans to join my expatriated cohorts in a state that has a government for the people, not a people there for any use the government wants to make of them: cash cows.

Last time I looked I don't have any financial udders. Maybe they atrophied when I retired.

[KurtAZ]

Correct...part of AJ is in Maricopa, part of it is in Pinal County. Should be signs when you drive out that way.