Anar76

I know it's offtopic, I'm just hoping I can have a little slack :)
It looks like im going to be moving soon (temporarily without the vette) :(
I'm really thinking about going to california, I've always loved just the idea of it, and I HATE the cold...
I know we have alot of california guys on here, so could some of you give me some hints about the state.. what places to stay away from, which ones are nice, which cities have jobs, which ones dont, etc... just kind of help me narrow down the choices ??? (it seems to be a pretty big state) :)
Thanks for any tips. and If anyone would be willing to maybe check out an apartment for me if down the road if I find something I like I'd really appreciate that too.
Thanks guys, :D

fauxrs

Yeah California is pretty big, and there are many many good places to live. It really depends on your present lifestyle and what kind of work you are looking for.

For example IMO San Diego is the best...San Diego is one of the most tech based cities in CA, but like everywhere else the tech industry has seen better days. there are many ISP's looking for good peopl as I understand - a big drawback to San diego is the Cost and availability of housing. Presently San Diego's mean average house costs about $330 grand, apartments are running at 1-2% vacancy, so you can imagine what that means about apartment costs (huge) If you are into the urban lifestyle right now about 60% of San Diegos new housing is being built downtown in the form of Lofts, apratments and Condo's, this will put you near one of the Centers of SD nightlife - the Gaslamp Quarter. The weather here has an average temperature that hovers between 58.9 in January and 70.2 in April our hottest days rarely go above 90 along the coast.

The Los Angeles Basin - is hell (just my opinion, sorry :( ) but some of the communities on the periphery are very nice - and even a few right in town are ok - Newport Beach - Santa Monica - Manhattan beach are all terrific places - Inland communities like burbank, pasadena, pomona and LA proper are less so. If you continue inland you find Riverside, hot, but affordable. LA is a monster city and while I am not personally aware of the job climate there there is certainly a large pool of jobs there. LA also has fine weather, but because of the topography sees slightly higher temps in the summer - the brown haze from smog is largly a thing of the past except on really rare occasions.

Californias unemployment rating is at about 6% I think that is about on par with the National average. San Diego is lower - about 5.3% I think - LA is right at the CA average - I think the bay area (san francisco) might be suffering the worst.

As you go up the Coast, there are smaller and very lovely towns. Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo, monterey, Carmel all come to mind as wonderful places to live. They are much smaller though and may not offer as much variety in job opportunities. Inland are towns such as Salinas, Fresno, Bakersfield, Stockton - these are all fairly rural communities, though some are of a decent size. I've only been to a few of them and only for very short stays so my opinion would be based more on heresay than anything else - but I dont think I would enjoy these towns.

San Francisco, San Jose (yes I know the way) Oakland, Berkley (sp?) are all part of that larger area often referred to as the Bay area, San Francisco is expensive to live in, but those other communities are not as expensive. It gets cold up there, plus there is more precipitation. There is some really awesome territory all over California - and it would be hard to put much of it down.

Southern California is blessed with nearly idyllic weather, Northern California has the forests, Central California has Yosemite National Park. You can hardly go wrong. It can be expensive here, understand that...but also understand that California has something like the 5th largest economy in the WORLD, so there is work to be found.

If you want some detailed info about California try here http://www.ca.gov/state/portal/myca_homepage.jsp

also remember the smog police live here - they will not like your 76 with sidepipes - so keep it registered where you are now - open an po box do whatever it takes to keep your registration there.

Hopefully others who live in elsewhere in CA will chime in to help you out.

Corvettes are always welcome :lol:

TIMSPEED

Move to Modesto, CA. We get nice weather 100% of the time. The only thing that ever sucks here, is the fog...cost of living is pretty cheap here too. :thumbs:

SanDiegoPaul

For example IMO San Diego is the best
HAH!!
:cheers:
A man after my own heart!

SanDiegoPaul

I know it's offtopic, I'm just hoping I can have a little slack
It looks like im going to be moving soon (temporarily without the vette)
I'm really thinking about going to california :smash: :smash:

Oh, MY!!!! Cut off my shifting hand! :mad Take my electric windows and tilt wheel. BUT CALIFORNIA WITH NO CORVETTE?? Come on now, be reasonable! :eek: :D

MN-Brent

I get the pleasure of travelling in CA: San Diego, Orange County, LA, San Jose, San Fran areas. I work in the electronics industry as an Application Engineer - technical sales guy.

It seems to me that the San Fran/San Jose area is really hard hit by the down turn in the dot com telecom bust. I recently went by a convention center close to the 3COM main building and there was a huge amount of people there. I said "hey what show is going on there?" My rep said "its no show, it a job fair!!." Many companies with empty parking lots now. Crazy stuff. It doesnt mean jobs dont exist there though. We run serious credit checks on all the companies now though.

LA/Orange county is more diversified away from this industry and you probably have better prospects there, although a few people I know from Northern Cal say it could fall into the water and it would be OK The problem to me is the overcrowding. All of our travelling there takes 2x to 5x longer due to the huge amount of traffic and large distance between locations. If you don't have a destination (job) up front, you might pick the wrong part of town to take up residence in.

San Diego is more close knit community and seems to have alot of medical companies located there. Ill never get over the highway signs closer to the border though that shows the family running.

Overall with Cali is I have to say I usually enjoyed my visits, meet good people, and I get to see alot more vettes on the road than in Mpls. The big thing to me is it seems if you havent already made it there, its gonna cost you big time to get what you want, cause the prices are going up in a big way.

my .02