Dallas

[TulsaFan-inTexas]

quote:Originally posted by sauerkraut

I lived in the D/FW area in the 1980's and I loved it. The weather is better than Olkahoma, it's milder and warmer. Texas has no state income tax and they also do not tax food I beleive. The drawbacks are prop. tax is higher in Texas and they do have some violent gangs there. Texas has motor vehicle safety inspections and smog/emmission inspections for cars. Fort Worth has a great jog/bike trail system The Trinity Trail, miles of open car free jogging. Oklahoma's income tax rate is a bit on the high side, and Oklahoma taxes food, Oklahoma has alot of toll roads too.

The Trinity River Trail is going through a lot of revitalization and upgrades lately sauerkraut; you'd really like the improvements. All in all, I enjoy living in the Fort Worth area much more than I would in Dallas. But, I do like Dallas. Yes, many of the problems people have noted about traffic and such is true. The downtown area in Dallas has really blown up big time (in a good way, i.e. Victory Plaza) over the last five to ten years and many more improvements are on the way. The transportation systems (Dallas Area Rapid Transit and Trinity Railway Express) are covering more and more of the metropolitan area all of the time. There is even a four or five mile section of the railway (DART) in North Dallas that is all underground. BTW, the DART and TRE rail systems are superb. They are clean and safe. The double-decker train that runs from Fort Worth to Dallas is awesome. I harp on Texas some, but they are making some great improvements around the area.

[sauerkraut]

Indeed, that prop. tax on a $140,000 home is very high. In Columbus, Ohio such a home would run about $1,500 in prop. taxes- depending on what part of the city you live it. When I lived in Texas I loved the Trinity jogging trail, The warm mild climate lets you jog in every season. I ran there in Jaunary shirtless many times and it was about 70 degrees. It does always get cold at night in a Texas winter but it sure beats Ohio's weather. The Dallas Metroplex has great summers clear blue skys and lots of Sun! I miss the weather. I lived in Fort Worth in the early 1980's and moved to Arlington, Texas in the late 1980's. I moved to Ohio in 1990. I understand that Trinity jogging trail is now 35 miles long. Back in the 1980's it was only 14 miles long. I ran many miles on that pavement.[]

[sauerkraut]

I remember Trinity Park in Fort Worth used to have a little train that ran around the area in the summer it was full of people, kids and families. They also have planetarium near the area I think it's on Mountgomery Street We went there a few times. Texas has alot of fun things to do. I wish I still lived there. The only bad thing is the high crime/gangs in parts of the city and heavy traffic all over.... May 1st they had a "Mayfest" in Trinity Park a TV station and a radio station used to do a tug-of-war contest over the river, the loser team wound up in the river. I guess they still have "Mayfest" every year.

[TulsaFan-inTexas]

Sauerkraut's old stomping grounds! Sorry, I'm in picture mode today.

[grahambino]

that is true, one of the nice things about Dallas was (is) DART.  I had used it several times, once to go downtown for OU-UT and once to go to a Mavs game.  Its great not paying for parking at the station, paying 2.00 or so to ride a train downtown and not have to hassle with parking and traffic.

[sauerkraut]

Yes Tulsa Fan In Texas- I have to agree with you that Fort Worth is nicer than Dallas. Dallas has more crime and traffic, traffic and more traffic and that was 20 years ago. Today the roads must even be worse. Arlington is nice too, but I understand alot of apartments are section 8 now. I used to live at the Indian Creek Apartments at Park Row and highway 360 it was not a bad area and rents were low, today they have alot of crime there, it's also bad on Collins all the way to Lamar. They had a famous night club there (Colins & Lamar) in 1980 called "Players" it was the "in" spot to be. A Thom Thumb Page food store was in that area.It was a brand new state of the art store back then. It brings back alot of memories of my youth.

[sauerkraut]

WOW, Thanks for posting those pictures. They look great. That one building in downtown Fort Worth is all new. Yes that's my old famous jogging trail by the Tandy Center & downtown Fort Worth,...To the west down past University Drive the trail opens up and it was mostly all open field in my day. Today alot of those fields must be built up. After work I used to drive from my job in Grand Prairie and  catch I-30 West and go down to Trinity Trail for a quick run. My wife never liked that much. I took my running gear to work with me. I went for a run one hot afternoon on the Trinity Trail and the far western sky had some dark clouds I figured I had time for a short run before the storm hit. That storm moved in very fast, I had to turn around and race back to my truck. I just made it back to my truck with 5 minutes to spair before the storm hit. As fast as the storm it it was over. Ah Texas. No Place like it.[]

[TulsaFan-inTexas]

That's the Pier One building, finished in 2004.

[doren50]

The low Oklahoma tax argument is bunk! My brother in law is a developer in Dallas and I have seen the numbers. For someone with $100,000 in income and a $350,000 home the Dallas property tax number is less than the SUM of the Oklahoma State Income Tax and the Tulsa property tax.

[TulsaFan-inTexas]

You could very well be right doren. All I have to compare from are the property taxes. For all I know, with my income up in Oklahoma, a state tax might negate any advantages that low property tax values would have.

[TheArtist]

What about utilities. Have a friend that lives down that way and he said the utilities each month are higher than here.  I could have been wrong on what I heard, for it does sound strange that gas, electric, water, etc.  utilities would be any different.

[TulsaFan-inTexas]

Utilities are pretty high. My house is electric and gas (gas for hot water/heater). The average electric gas bills for the summer and winter are (for me, wife, daughter):

Summer
Electricity: $180
Gas: $40

Winter
Electricity: 90
Gas: 90

So, either way you cut it, I run about 200 dollars a month in utilities. And my bills are actually pretty low. Many of the larger houses in the area run 500 and 600 dollar electric bills in the summer. My neighbors' say their electric bill in the summer is more like 300 dollars a month, and it's just two people. Our house is pretty well insulated.

[inteller]

according to the cost of living calculator I only have to make 114000 to maintain my current standard of living in Dallas.  I'm not sure if it takes taxes into consideration though.  not bad though, only 10% more than Tulsa.  at least its not like Hawaii where I'd have to make $243000 to maintain my standard of living (yeah right).

[TulsaFan-inTexas]

inteller, you're correct that the cost of living here isn't that high, compared to other major cities. For a major city/metropolitan area, the cost of living between Dallas/Fort Worth and the cities in Oklahoma are probably closer than in any other major metropolitan area.

However, you have to be careful where you live because property values do seem to be getting out of control somewhat, especially in Dallas county (and probably soon to be FW).

I have a friend that lives in Richardson (North of Dallas), his 1960s home (comparable to mine) is appraised by Dallas County at $270K. That's about twice the value it was appraised at when he bought it 10 years ago. Many people would say, "Wow, what a great deal, my value has increased 100 percent!" However, he can NEVER sell his house for near that much, and hIs property taxes are twice that of mine, so he pays $600 a month in property taxes alone.

Tarrant County, with the exception of places like Colleyville, Southlake, and other very high dollar areas where the median home value is something like 400K is rather reasonable and probably very close to the cost of living in Tulsa or OkC. I wouldn't doubt that Hurst, where I live, is probably even less than the cost of living in Tulsa proper.

[TulsaFan-inTexas]

In fact, I just did a cost of living comparison between Fort Worth and Tulsa. The cost of living calculator at bankrate.com says it would take a 1.6 percent INCREASE in my income to live in Tulsa. It quotes the Home Price as being the major difference, an increase of about 5%.