[spdrun]

Are your sure your “Chinese” traveling companion wasn’t actually an American? My instincts tell me she probably was if she had a son going to college and now employed in the US.

Possibly a dual-citizen, since she claims to have come here in the mid-80s, but she referred to herself as Chinese.

[spdrun]

I don’t know about not flying. On the plane back from CA about a year ago, I had a stop in PHX. I sat next to a Chinese lady who had just bought a condo in AZ because she wanted a rental for her son, who had moved there after college.

Foreigners are buying up a lot of property as well (good thing in my book – I don’t consider myself very American).

Real problem with both Phoenix and LV is climate and lack of water. This won’t get better with global warming, and they’re borderline intolerable 5 months out of the year as it is!

[spdrun]

I can’t speak to LV, but asking prices in Phx have basically flatlined in the last month after going up for about 8 months. Inventory there is now holding steady, if not creeping up slightly.

(Good!)

[spdrun]

Did you get a job writing for The Onion after you left? 😀

[spdrun]

Two months isn’t really enough to know NYC. Two decades might be … i.e. I’m still learning every day!

Materialism is everywhere, but I’d argue that NY (or any city where people walk!) has fewer ways to display it day-to-day than more suburban locales.

Being out in public space, especially when walking tends to make everyone equal. That guy you’re caught in a doorway with when the rain comes might be homeless, or he may have 10 million bucks in the bank. It’s not what you have, but what you know and what you do.

[spdrun]

You mean like CA where you haven’t made it unless you’re an actor in Hollywood? Or San Diego, where everyone is retired, in the military, or a gov’t contractor? That’s as much of a deluded and warped opinion of CA as yours is of NY.

The finance sector exists and does have a certain fawked-up subculture to it. Fortunately, it’s not the only industry in the city. Plenty of tech companies have set up shop in the past 15 years, pharma, universities, biomedical research, design, telecoms, engineering firms, government/UN. In fact, very few of my friends work for the big “downtown” banks.

Yeah, living in the ‘burbs if you’re single wouldn’t be ideal. Far better, hipper, and possibly cheaper to live in Queens or Brooklyn if you’re actually working in NYC. If you’re working in the ‘burbs, some places might by OK since they’re more like self-contained small towns.

I live in NYC. I’m in CA for work sometimes and am considering purchasing investment condos there, hence this forum. I’m also looking in NJ — better cap rates right now and the market is getting flooded with foreclosures and shorts as we speak.

This being said, I’d never actually live in NJ by choice, but rentals there comp out nicely right now and have the advantage of being near by.

Lastly, I’m not sure if I could cut it in the CA job market. A lot more of the jobs require letters after your name, whereas the attitude here is that if you can do it and have good references, you’ll get paid to do it.

[spdrun]

G-d am I glad that I live in a city where you can show up for a date by subway train, on a unicycle, or by taxi, and so long as you look, dress, and act human, no one will say boo about it since 50% of people don’t even own cars. I’d expect San Francisco proper to not be that different in this respect.

This being said, I probably get more compliments about my car (old Mercedes in very good shape) than anyone in an Accord will 🙂

“What are you doing tomorrow…?”
“I need to head out to Jersey to do some work on my rental house. I’m free Sunday, though :)”
… or …
“I’m going to Dubrovnik, back in a week.”

[spdrun]

An old Civic has its uses — it separates the materialistic c**ts from the women who actually care for a guy on his own merits. She dated the person, not the car.

If she wanted to date a car, she’d be better off renting one for $30/day. A lot cheaper and better for the sanity.

[spdrun]

I know people over 50 (including my parents) who were re-hired. This is in NYC, with quite a lot of young people, not Detroit or Harrisburg.

[spdrun]

If only they could do the IIHS tests with actual insurance executives in the front seats!

[spdrun]

You can put a CrapplePort(tm) in any car for about $150 🙂

[spdrun]

That this whole country is financially forked? (As is true.)

[spdrun]

I thought that TX requires a “balanced” budget in every year, which explains the problems. Then again, I’ve also heard of them using accounting tricks to appear balanced.

[spdrun]

Generally, one can’t schtupp properly until they’ve learned to orgasm via masturbation 🙂

[spdrun]

Pwnt. (Though I thought the market in TX is relatively healthy — no major bubble nor bust — so I’m surprised that sdg needed to sell short.)

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