Dear gentlepeople, please teach me about living and working in Los Angeles

We stopped in LA during our wedding trip summer 2013. It was the worst part of the trip by far. Roads are in awful shape, traffic was horrific, and it was unbearably hot. Air was stale, the city stunk.

20 minutes to get to the Mulholland ended up taking 3 hours to get back on track. Blargh. Would not live there unless I could work from home.

That's true. I'm still trying to get my head around a "city" that occupies about 500 sq miles.

I did a 6 year tour there, so I guess I'll chime in. All of this will be very stream of consciousness.

First, the good: Tons of great food, tons of culture, you'll never be hurting for entertainment. In a city this big, you'll eventually find a few cool folks.

The bad: Everything else. Literally. It's eye-bleedingly expensive to own and operate a car. Traffic is life altering, as in you will likely change your work\social schedule to avoid traffic. You're near the beach, but you likely can't swim in it (they have E36 M3 advisories every morning with the weather, telling you how much poo is in the ocean. I'm not joking). There are mountains not too far away, but you likely can't see them because of the smog. You can't ski on them since they only have snow for one month out of the year.

Don't forget you live in a desert, and are also near an active fault line. Oh and mudslides. And fires. And riots. And they don't want you to have firearms. And there are water police. Yes, really.

On one hand, there is an amazing diversity of cars. The Irvine Cars & Coffee is the only place I've ever seen an LFA in the wild. On the other hand, the grind of traffic is soul crushing, and will quickly make you wonder why you ever thought owning an enthusiast vehicle was a good idea. If you own a Honda, it WILL get stolen. If you park on the street, your car will get hit\keyed\vandalized. You must drive like you intend to slit the person's throat next to you if you want to get anywhere at all. L.A. traffic will turn you into an shiny happy person.

Depending on your municipality, sales tax can be 7.5-10%. They are considering an additional $.80\gal tax on fuel. Don't forget this is the birthplace of Scientology. There are an unusual amount of people that are just flat-out trying to scam you.

There are some incredible moments to be had though. Driving mulholland, or angeles crest is breathtaking. Same for the redwood forest in NorCal. The Getty museum is unbelievable. Equally unbelievable was getting my miata complimented by Jay Leno...in his tank car. We were both sitting at a stoplight in Burbank. Unfortunately those little moments didn't make up for the soul crushing experience of the city. There is constant smog, and very little greenery.

Will you take advantage of all of the entertainment options? Maybe. Bearing in mind you'll be in traffic 1.5 hours just to get where you're going, then pay $20 to park, etc etc. Lots of people just say berkeley it and stay home, especially once you're out of your 20's and the glamour of it all has worn off. L.A. is a great place to be if you're filthy, filthy rich, or young and dumb and willing to blow all your income frivolously. It is a difficult place to actually make a living and build wealth. Doubly so if you have children.

When my work offered me a way out, I jumped on it, and haven't regretted a single day. They keep trying to woo me back, but it would take high six figures in order for me to find L.A. livable.

cliffs: don't do it.

As aircooled implied, I moved here earlier this year. I came from Florida. It is a lot more expensive for certain, but better pay more than made up for the increases. YMMV.

I rent a place in Koreatown, and work in the industrial part of downtown. Since moving out here, I downsized quite a bit (2/1 out east to a studio in LA), but not to any detriment of quality of life. Any entertainment I could possibly want is within a few miles. My 5 mile commute ranges from 15 - 30 minutes on surface streets, which I can't complain about.

I really don't know how home ownership works in this area for people that make less than a few 100k/year. My coworkers who own homes have 40+ mile commutes, typically to the east. Given LA's traffic patterns, this seems pretty miserable. I don't spend much time in Culver City, aside from looking at furniture; as deeply embedded as it is within LA, it seems like it would be a challenge to escape to the 'burbs north or east.

Gas is predictably higher, insurance is much higher, but the roads in the Santa Monica Mountains and in the Angeles National Forest are glorious. Weather in the LA basin is quite comfortable. When I first walked out of the airport in June of this year, I faced mid-70's weather, which is unheard of to my Florida upbringing. The valleys get much warmer in the summer.

How does the average slob like me survive there on $10 bucks an hour?

Same way you do in any other large city. You live within you means, which in that case would mean renting / sharing a small place, probably in an iffy neighborhood, drive either a crap car or scooter (or use public trans if you are lucky enough to be around some).

If you are not willing to make those sacrifices, then you need to find somewhere else. It's all a cost benefit thing. If it doesn't work for you, then best to look somewhere else. If you are living in squalor in LA and are not taking advantage of (or enjoying) it's benefits, there is little reason to stay.

Based on looking at the Washington DC thread, the general opinion here is that large metropolitan areas are hell to live in because of congestion / traffic. Realistically, it's all about what you value and what you are willing to give up (since this is a car board, that general opinion is pretty reasonable). Metropolitan areas definitely have advantage, and they definitely have disadvantages, you just have to make an informed opinion.

I can see the charm in living in a high density area and I can see the charm in living in a rural area, but I am also generally aware of the disadvantages of both.

Gearheadotaku wrote: How does the average slob like me survive there on $10 bucks an hour?

The average job in LA pays more than 10/hr. Its not proportional, but much higher. Even though wait-staff minimum is still something like $2.75, you would have to look hard to find a wait-staff job for under $10/hr. Even as a bartender I was making 8.75 to start and after a few months I was at 15.

Plus, depending on the bar, I was taking home $1500/week in tips, and that was only working Thurs-Sat. A good night was $500 in tips plus a $60 pay for the shift. As an entry-level mechanic's assistant I was making $25/hr flat rate. Not book time.

that all sounds wonderful, but it still sucked when my rent was $1700 and diesel was $5.64/gal. The point is, I loved LA so much, I would have almost lived in a gutter to stay there. I had an awesome loft in a crappy neighborhood. I was known all through that hood as "Blanco" because I was the only white guy. Really. I had a huge parking lot with a 40' storage container as my garage, great neighbors, and I was minutes from downtown and East Hollywood.

What I'm saying is... its all worth it. People talk about the high cost of living, but you're paid more. They talk about how awful people are there, but they are only 10% of the population. Everyone bitches about commutes, but everyone commutes. In LA, its just that your 40-minute commute is only 7 miles instead of 30 miles where you live now. Everyone talks about smog, but its light years better now, and nothing is as beautiful as LA after a rain when the air is so clear. The bad smog days are few, and getting fewer every year. Even on bad smog days, so you have some brown fog. Who cares? I'll take that and a sunny day any time instead of fog and rain in Seattle or Frisco.

Millions of GRM cars for cheap. Search LA craigslist for "car" in the free section. I promise there will be at least one BMW and one Mercedes in there. The free section on LA CL is like crack. So full of awesome freebies. You could almost make a living selling the free stuff you get on CL.

Dammit. Now I'm missing LA more than ever. LA is hard work. You have to want it. If you don't want it, its just another city. I want it. I wish I could be living in my old loft right now.

^^^ Sweet place there, Blanco.

It rocked a lot. I wish I had a good picture of the other half where the bedroom was.

Curtis, tha was a nice place. As another note; looks like I may be leaving town soon; I followed work here, so I'll be following it out (just a bit further inland in CA).

I could use a car connection in or around LA. I say go for it.

Interesting. SWMBO's friend is looking at relocating to LA and want's us to go with her as roommates. She is a masseuse and esthetician, she would have the most financial stability. My wife would go out with Starbucks, likely as shift management. Myself, the bulk of my employment has been customer service in a grocery store, but I could try to do something car related.

Sorry for the thread jack

I have visited and even though I am a city boy, didn't really like LA.

That said, my best friend, another Aussie, not a car guy though, lives in Redondo Beach and works at LAX, LMK if you need a contact who know his way around.

The last time I was inLA. it felt like I was in Connecticut five years into the future.

Woody wrote: I could use a car connection in or around LA. I say go for it.

If you need rust free cars, I can probably source them around here and in the Bay Area, too... .

It'll be interesting to see how this plays out, but so far it very much looks like a severe downsizing would be in order to make this work at all, and I'm not sure I'm willing to do that. Admittedly that's based on the usual cost of living calculators which seem to be producing unrealistically low numbers for LA.

Cost of living calcs tend to hit the big things; gallons of gas, quarts of milk, a dozen eggs, etc. Meats and eggs tend to be expensive because there isn't much local supply, but produce is often really cheap because its all local-ish. Here in PA, I get excited when Avocados are $1.50 each, but in LA they are often 3/$1 in season. I found that eating out was relatively inexpensive as long as you don't go somewhere with waiters named Serge or Francois. Your typical run-of-the-mill eateries are as cheap as anywhere else. Some things are off the charts expensive - dog sitting, gasoline, house prices. Some are on par - food, health insurance, cars. Others are cheaper - produce, labor, mexican food.

What are the actual stats on auto insurance? I actually found my rates to be on par after moving from PA, but I know PA tends to be a little higher.

Everyone needs to live there just once. In the words of Randy Newman;

Hate New York City It's cold and it's damp And all the people dressed like monkeys Let's leave Chicago to the Eskimos That town's a little bit too rugged For you and me you bad girl

I love L.A. I love L.A. (We love it)

Went down there yesterday. Place may be a little too cramped and crowded for me.

One thing I noticed was that even on a day most people took off, there were lots more interesting cars on the road than I usually see in the Bay Area.

Ah well.

Looks like I don't have to worry about moving to LA anytime soon then.

PHeller wrote: Would not unless two things: 1) massive pay increase to cover cost of living expenses. 2) could live within walking/riding distance of work because commuting sucks in LA.

QFT!