'Don't move to Portland, Oregon' movement aims to de-hype the over-hype (Salem: how much, schools)
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Let's assume that of the 200 half are new residents. 100 new employed residents increases our population by about 250. Then there is growth in the service and construction workforce as a result. Technology employees typically make above the median income and the housing crunch only gets worse for ordinary wage earners.
My DD & family live in the Silicon Valley. The Bay area is full up, their housing costs make ours look like campsite rentals.
there's too much math and stuff in this post, nobody here will notice
I thought the transplants in the 90's would get scared when they felt their first earthquake and SF would go back to being affordable. Nah. I was wrong. Just like the SF Bay Area...Portland is never going to be " cheap" ever again. I watched this city change drastically in five years so I can imagine what will happen during the next five! It's hard to accept but there are people all over the country that can work remotely and are just trying to find a place to live that meets their lifestyle criteria, including a good airport. It is a free country and the wealthier and upper incone earners are choosing Portland. There is only so much room so the lower middle income to lower income families are going to have to live outside the city of Portland. The word is out and just like SF and Seattle... Portland is next to becoming a boutique city.
Great posting, however why would they move to Portland Oregon with State Income tax, thats nearly $8,000 a year in savings? I'm one of those who works remote and living in Portland had so much down side, traffic, State Income Tax, congestion so I went with Down Town Vancouver. I think its what Portland must have looked like many many years ago.
Great posting, however why would they move to Portland Oregon with State Income tax, thats nearly $8,000 a year in savings? I'm one of those who works remote and living in Portland had so much down side, traffic, State Income Tax, congestion so I went with Down Town Vancouver. I think its what Portland must have looked like many many years ago.
My husband works out of state for work and remotely, as well. We feel that the COL and home prices here make it worth our while to live here and the income tax isn't more of an issue than where we previously lived. We now are in WA County, rather than Multnomah County, so the property taxes we pay is less of an issue for us. We were really annoyed by the property taxes in Multnomah County which were high and we didn't see our tax money being used for the public schools. I think Vancouver is a great option for many but we feel comfortable here in Beaverton.
I get that people here, especially those that lived here for a long time are probably tired of all the liberals that have moved to this state and ruined a good thing. It is a shame that it will probably be near impossible to ever take the state back from them. It would be good to see some conservatives and libertarians running Portland and Oregon.
My husband works out of state for work and remotely, as well. We feel that the COL and home prices here make it worth our while to live here and the income tax isn't more of an issue than where we previously lived. We now are in WA County, rather than Multnomah County, so the property taxes we pay is less of an issue for us. We were really annoyed by the property taxes in Multnomah County which were high and we didn't see our tax money being used for the public schools. I think Vancouver is a great option for many but we feel comfortable here in Beaverton.
It depends on where you work, I think. People are going to gravitate towards where they work, or at least, I would. If I worked in Portland, I would want to live as close to Portland as possible to save me time in the car (which sucks). If you are a bit flexible, though, I think you'd have to be taking crazy pills to live in Beaverton instead of Vancouver. Both of them are just about the same garbage, mostly suburban, kid-oriented, nothing going on in either of them, same quality of houses and construction, and very similar pricing. The difference is one of them has 10% income taxes, which is ENORMOUS, and the other has 0% income taxes. Kind of a no-brainer. But if your job is in Oregon, it doesn't matter if you live in Vancouver, you're still going to pay OR income taxes. And, seeing as most of the higher paying jobs are in Oregon, it completely makes sense why so many people live here. There's absolutely no reason NOT to live in Oregon if you work in Oregon, honestly.
For me, working from home, I'm begrudgingly choosing Portland because I can afford to live in the city proper and I hate the suburbs with a passion, so the taxes are very frustrating but at the same time, I want the quality of life that comes along with being in a major city and not what comes with being in a suburb. I already "did my time" in Beaverton and living there for a year and a half was quite enough for me before the depression made me go out of "saving money" mode to "who cares what it costs, I'm living my life" mode and moving into Portland lol.
I think Portland is probably one of the most overrated cities in the United States. If it weren't for the fact I was born here, I can't imagine me choosing this place over almost any other major city. I've not been to many of them like Houston, Dallas, Chicago, etc., but I'm pretty sure I'd be happier in a place like Texas, with no income taxes, nicer weather, fewer liberals, fewer hippies, etc. But, this is where I am.
It depends on where you work, I think. People are going to gravitate towards where they work, or at least, I would. If I worked in Portland, I would want to live as close to Portland as possible to save me time in the car (which sucks). If you are a bit flexible, though, I think you'd have to be taking crazy pills to live in Beaverton instead of Vancouver. Both of them are just about the same garbage, mostly suburban, kid-oriented, nothing going on in either of them, same quality of houses and construction, and very similar pricing. The difference is one of them has 10% income taxes, which is ENORMOUS, and the other has 0% income taxes. Kind of a no-brainer. But if your job is in Oregon, it doesn't matter if you live in Vancouver, you're still going to pay OR income taxes. And, seeing as most of the higher paying jobs are in Oregon, it completely makes sense why so many people live here. There's absolutely no reason NOT to live in Oregon if you work in Oregon, honestly.
For me, working from home, I'm begrudgingly choosing Portland because I can afford to live in the city proper and I hate the suburbs with a passion, so the taxes are very frustrating but at the same time, I want the quality of life that comes along with being in a major city and not what comes with being in a suburb. I already "did my time" in Beaverton and living there for a year and a half was quite enough for me before the depression made me go out of "saving money" mode to "who cares what it costs, I'm living my life" mode and moving into Portland lol.
I think Portland is probably one of the most overrated cities in the United States. If it weren't for the fact I was born here, I can't imagine me choosing this place over almost any other major city. I've not been to many of them like Houston, Dallas, Chicago, etc., but I'm pretty sure I'd be happier in a place like Texas, with no income taxes, nicer weather, fewer liberals, fewer hippies, etc. But, this is where I am.
Have you ever thought about Milwaukie? It has that connection to Portland without the Multnomah taxes? Though I totally agree with you, this city could use more conservatives and less liberals, it might actually be a decent city then. Texas is definitely an option for me, unfortunately my company doesn't have an office there to transfer so I would have to actually look for a job rather than just transfer.
I wish Oregon and Portland could be more like Texas and the cities in Texas. We need more Fortune 500 companies to increase the income levels here and push out the lazy liberals that plague this city.
Hahaha so true, we really do. This state does a terrible job at attracting business, though, and really how could they do a good job of it?! The taxes are horrendous and the city government in Portland basically doesn't care about business. Why would business matter when we could be building more bicycle lanes for the yuppies?! I mean, really, priorities people. Let's spend another few billion dollars on public transit and bike paths in the rainiest city in the U.S. basically because why would we want to do anything that might actually make this state not so mediocre?!
Traveling East sure was an interesting thing for me. I just had two shoots in Walla Walla, WA, and Baker City, OR, which kept me mostly in Oregon until I veered off at the end to Walla Walla, so I stopped along the way in small towns and chatted with a few people here and there, and quite a few more in Baker. They all basically resent Portland and the liberals here because they have nothing in common with them. It's two different worlds. Basically everyone I talked to is a gun owner, preparing for hunting season, living on a good plot of land, and they're in small towns. They want to be left alone. I don't blame them! But in Portland, the attitude is, "Oh, you have more money than other people? COOL, you can give it away to the government where we'll fritter it away ons stupid nonsense you don't care about because you're not worthy of your money that you earned!" It's a very strange, very unAmerican attitude that makes it tough to tolerate living here. Frankly, there's no way around saying that most people here are just not strong personalities. They are bleeding hearts. They don't have what it takes to make it in the real world, so they want to make the real world softer, more complacent, and more tolerant of lazy attitudes. That does not encourage innovation or greatness, but mediocrity, which is why you have so much mediocrity in this city.
My dad owns a senior living place out in Milwaukie that I recently shot. I, uhh, didn't like that area to say the least. I thought it was pretty ghetto. Maybe I missed the good area or something, but every time I've been out there I just wasn't digging it.
My main problem is high standards, so as much as I would like to move to Vancouver to avoid the income taxes here in the future, I couldn't find a damn thing I liked for $600,000 in Vancouver. The houses SUCKED badly. Maybe if I was doing a little check list of, "Ok, where are the 3 kids going to sleep, where do we eat, what school district is near," etc. I would be happy. But I don't care about ANY of that, so what you're left with is unbelievably mediocre and depressing planned homes in boring, shoddy neighborhoods where I just couldn't handle that. No way. Even my hatred for liberals and taxes wasn't enough to trigger the move to Vancouver. Yet, there is allure there, and I know one day it'll probably be an option, assuming I'm with my girlfriend of course and she doesn't leave me ha ha. If it weren't for her, I wouldn't be up in the PNW anyway, no matter where it was. But if I had $2-3 million, I'm very attracted to Evergreen Highway and something along the Columbia River with a view of Portland from afar, no state income taxes, and something grand. The problem is if I'm going to be in a dump of a city like Vancouver (sorry, my dad got it right all along, that city is the armpit of the world) then at least I'm going to be in a mansion over there where I don't have to leave my house because my personal assistant is the one doing the errands and I'm just enjoying my river view, home theater, pool table, arcade room, etc. That's the key to living in the rainy PNW, you need to pick a place where you don't have to leave your home for 8 months of the year and you can be completely self-contained.
I hear ya, I always laugh when I am driving into work and it is raining out as those idiots on bikes go riding over the Hawthorne bridge in the rain. Nothing like getting soaked on the way into work.
There are definitely parts of Milwaukie that are decent, but mostly blue collar, nothing like what you would find in Lake Oswego. I definitely wouldn't want to be spending that much on a place in Portland because eventually this boom that is causing houses to get overpriced is eventually going to rupture and a lot of idiots are gonna get burned.
I hear ya, I always laugh when I am driving into work and it is raining out as those idiots on bikes go riding over the Hawthorne bridge in the rain. Nothing like getting soaked on the way into work.
If you're going to complain about bikers in the rain, you really should make sure it's a day when it actually rains.
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