Best of The Worst Places To Live?

[Zardnaar]

Kind of a spin off of the Best place to live in America and my pick somewhere in Africa 100k or less to live.

Basic idea where would you be willing to live in places with a less than Savory reputation if you had to. What would you be looking for?

Obviously crime and job opportunities are key. For the purposes of this idea you can pretend you are a digital nomad or have a government pension or can secure a low paying job. It just has to be cheap and you would be willing to live there if you had to. Doesn't have to be Bumblescum Population 200 middle of nowhere.

For the USA I would at least consider Detroit. Bad reputation but seems to be improving and the CBD area seems to be turning around. There's probably a better location.

For UK Blackpool.

I have seen some poverty porn type videos of British sea side towns. This isnt one of them. Very similar in size to where I live.

In NZ I'm not to familiar with rural North Island. But Timaru.

Gang problems in 90s, cheap by NZ standards (200k 6 years ago counts as cheap), 2 hours to Dunedin or Christchurch, coastal, 1 hour to mountains and ski field. 28900 people amenities of a large town (banks, supermarkets, some shopping, cafes, botanic gardens etc).

 

[Samson]

Can I get in with the same answer as the last thread, South Lake Tahoe? It is also the worst place because it is a standard american strip map transplanted into the hills? It really is ugly for a ski resort, and I have been to a lot of French ones.

I guess what is the priorities? Given the priorities of safe, cheap and speaks English somewhere on the coast in India seems a good option to me, perhaps Goa, but I have never been anywhere near there.

 

[Tee Kay]

Low crime has to be a must for me, I can handle poor infrastructure. Social media algo has been pushing cheap houses in rural Japan on me lately and I find myself very tempted.

 

[amadeus]

Social media algo has been pushing cheap houses in rural Japan on me lately and I find myself very tempted.

Be warned: there is a reason they are advertising to you and not the Japanese.

 

[gangleri2001]

Be warned: there is a reason they are advertising to you and not the Japanese.

Why is that?

 

[warpus]

Basic idea where would you be willing to live in places with a less than Savory reputation if you had to.

This is where I get to shine. Finally I can select Chicago as my answer. Yes, the healthcare thing is still an issue, but let's just bundle that in the "less than savory reputation" basket. I would totally live in Chicago if I was well off enough, was single, and was forced to select a destination with a less than savoury reputation.

Some part of New York City would be second on my list, although I'm not sure where exactly. Somewhere in Queens? Which part of NYC has streets with diverse sets of restaurants, so I could walk through the neighbourhood and have the option of eating in a Thai, Italian, Peruvian, Nepali, Polish, Japanese, Greek, or Ethiopian restaurant? I would also prefer if there were cute little bars and pubs there, wine bars, etc. Parks and parkettes to hang out in would be important too, I couldn't just live in a large city without having the ability to go chill out in a park surrounded by trees in some capacity.

Still would never live in Gary, Indiana.

 

[Farm Boy]

Gary's got a worse reputation than it deserves. North siders, sheesh.

 

[Zardnaar]

Gary does have a dire reputation.

Any hidden gem information on Gary?

 

[Farm Boy]

Not really. I would just skip adding it to the list. It's like any number of regional cities with regional problems, but close to Chicago.

 

[warpus]

Gary's got a worse reputation than it deserves. North siders, sheesh.

We drove through it once and it seemed like an industrial wasteland, but tbf we only got a limited view of the city from the highway. Gary, Indiana does seem to come up on many "worst cities in America" type lists and posts as well, and based on what I have seen of Gary on that day, I am not surprised.. but am open to be convinced that my initial assessment of Gary, Indiana wasn't accurate!

What are some of the best parts of Gary Indiana that would make it worth visiting or living in? Just looking at random google images that come up when you search for the city, it does appear rather bleak.. but of course first impressions can be deceiving.

 

[amadeus]

Why is that?

Short version is houses could be in disrepair where fixing it up to be livable would eat any savings and/or the houses are so remote that you would be taking a big hit to your quality of life by moving out there.

 

[Farm Boy]

We drove through it once and it seemed like an industrial wasteland, but tbf we only got a limited view of the city from the highway. Gary, Indiana does seem to come up on many "worst cities in America" type lists and posts as well, and based on what I have seen of Gary on that day, I am not surprised.. but am open to be convinced that my initial assessment of Gary, Indiana wasn't accurate!

What are some of the best parts of Gary Indiana that would make it worth visiting or living in? Just looking at random google images that come up when you search for the city, it does appear rather bleak.. but of course first impressions can be deceiving.

That good old Midwestern charm.

I'm mostly giving you crap. But really. It's like a lot of regional cities. It's just close enough to the third biggest city that people bother to look at it.

it's basically the South Side continued.

 

[Gori the Grey]

Obviously crime and job opportunities are key.

Yes, crime opportunities are key. I have to find some way to supplement that pension.

I think I could live almost anywhere. Sure, Gary, why not? I live in my head mostly in any case. And here.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

Basic idea where would you be willing to live in places with a less than Savory reputation if you had to.

This is where I get to shine. Finally I can select Chicago as my answer. Yes, the healthcare thing is still an issue, but let's just bundle that in the "less than savory reputation" basket. I would totally live in Chicago if I was well off enough, was single, and was forced to select a destination with a less than savoury reputation.

Some part of New York City would be second on my list, although I'm not sure where exactly. Somewhere in Queens? Which part of NYC has streets with diverse sets of restaurants, so I could walk through the neighbourhood and have the option of eating in a Thai, Italian, Peruvian, Nepali, Polish, Japanese, Greek, or Ethiopian restaurant? I would also prefer if there were cute little bars and pubs there, wine bars, etc. Parks and parkettes to hang out in would be important too, I couldn't just live in a large city without having the ability to go chill out in a park surrounded by trees in some capacity.

Still would never live in Gary, Indiana.

It's still my opinion that you might enjoy a holiday in/around Vancouver, BC and Vancouver Island. It's cosmopolitan to the point that there are areas of Vancouver where the signs aren't in either English or French, and there are parks everywhere. Plus loads of opportunities for hiking, biking, sailing, you could go on ferries, even a cruise up to Alaska and back. I never had enough time to explore everything there that I wanted to. To do it properly would take more than the 3 or so days we had. If I were to do it again, I'd want to spend at least 3 weeks.

As long as this is hypothetical and geared toward living... there are other places in BC I'm more familiar with. If family history had gone differently, I might have inherited a nice large house in Vernon - big corner lot, with a small cherry orchard. I could have been very happy living there, with mountains around (not as high as the Rockies; it's a different range in that region of BC), lots of trees, mild winters (they do get snow), a nice, walkable downtown area a walkable distance from the house, and not too far from Okanagan Lake and a beach.

However, that was back in the '70s, my great-aunt died first and so any properties were willed to my great-uncle's family. And who knows what that part of the city is like now?

 

[Zardnaar]

Point of thread is live in the worst places mire the worst you're willing to go if you absolutely had to.

And you have some income but not a lot. Not to nitpicky. Harder for me as a lot of our bad spots are reputation only and kinda tiny rural locations.

 

[Tee Kay]

Short version is houses could be in disrepair where fixing it up to be livable would eat any savings and/or the houses are so remote that you would be taking a big hit to your quality of life by moving out there.

well this is the "best of the worst places to live" thread so obviously I posted in the knowledge that it's not great real estate.

it's like when I entertain moving to very remote locations in Outback Australia, I will have to change a lot about my life but at least I won't have to deal with so many people.

 

[Zardnaar]

well this is the "best of the worst places to live" thread so obviously I posted in the knowledge that it's not great real estate.

it's like when I entertain moving to very remote locations in Outback Australia, I will have to change a lot about my life but at least I won't have to deal with so many people.

Well you don't have To go to kangarooville in the outback.

Any comparatively cheap places though. I looked at West Australia north of Perth. Geraldton and Carnarvon specifically.

Wasn't sure on detail though eg are they actually expensive. The trade off is location and isolation in WA.

 

[Valka D'Ur]

Point of thread is live in the worst places mire the worst you're willing to go if you absolutely had to.

Yes, and? Vancouver and the Island are wonderful places to spend a holiday, but the cost of housing/rent is astronomical. That's what qualifies it as a "best of the worst" candidate.

 

[Zardnaar]

Yes, and? Vancouver and the Island are wonderful places to spend a holiday, but the cost of housing/rent is astronomical. That's what qualifies it as a "best of the worst" candidate.

Wasn't ained at you.

Vancouver Island has a bad reputation?

 

[Valka D'Ur]

Wasn't ained at you.

Vancouver Island has a bad reputation?

For being expensive. That whole region of British Columbia is insanely expensive for anyone trying to buy, build, or rent.

Vancouver itself has its high-crime areas. I'm not sure about the island, as I never spent more than 3 days at a time there, either in campgrounds or in a rural area where my great-uncle's family lived. It was out in the middle of nowhere, the family was into logging and fishing, and it rained the whole time we were there. I was bored stiff by the people who lived there (the only thing allowed on TV was tennis, which I am NOT interested in), so except for meals and using the bathroom, I spent that time holed up in the Winnebago, reading books.

Thank goodness I'd had time for a book run before we left Vernon to go out to the Island and down to Washington state. I had a medium-size box of science fiction novels, Roman historical novels, Archie comics, history/anthropology books, and some others. I remember the woman at the bookstore staring and asking if all of that was for me. I told her I had eclectic reading tastes and yes, all of it was for me (including the two French language books), except for the murder mystery - that was for my grandmother. I had all this stashed in the upper bunk in the Winnebago, and it saved my sanity.