I visited my relatives in a small town called Mesa last weekend.

I rarely saw an Asian person.

I guess there aren't too many Asians living in AZ?

I hear its nice to retire out there...... is it nice?

I know a few who does live there and some that will be moving there. Houses in AZ are cheap!!!!!!!! They're nice but cheap.

Cheap as in price or quality? I'm sure u can get alot of land also. Weather is nice and toasty.

To me, yeah, Arizona was nice. It's very desert-like, of course, but the weather was freezing while I was in AZ this past weekend. As a matter of fact, the taxi cab driver told me it snowed in the higher elevated areas of Phoenix this past Sunday.

The terrain looked awesome too. Cactus, shrubs, palm trees, a neat combination of plants. However, if you live in New York, and like the Pine trees, well, you will then have to venture to the northern parts of Arizona near Grand Canyon.

If you like hiking, campus and other miscellaneous outdoor activities, then Arizona is a great place to visit.

I also wouldn't mind retiring in AZ.

The houses are cheap, though the prices have risen in the last two years, and they are damn beautiful.

My relatives live in a newly devloped area in Mesa.

On the other hand, if you're looking to only socialize with Asians, well....I don't know of any places in the Phoenix area that has an Asian enclave.

I heard there's a growing Korean and Chinese population in Phoenix.




Houses in Arizona are cheap. But the prices are rising, so the good deals were available two years ago.

however, houses in Arizona are still cheaper than houses in California, Hawaii, New york (I guess), Massachusetts (depending on where you live), and maybe Seattle.

My cousin told me that you can get a three-bedroom house for $250K! LOL! Well, that was probably the price my uncle and aunt paid when they've purchased their house.

My BF asked if I wanted to move there since his brothers are. They're going to open a nail shop and a cable installation company down there. Well, since it's hot down there, it'll be good for my BF's HVAC business...lol When think of AZ, I think of a big empty desert.

I don't mean to say cheap like it's a bad thing. Lets use the word inexpensive. It's inexpensive considering that it's not heavily populated..lol

Those house prices are definitely cheap compared to NYC. Sounds nice out there... I understand Phoenix is more metropolitan..probably why more asians are there.

I'm retiring out to sunny AZ.

Oh yeah, your BF will definitely be one successful guy in the air conditioning industry. The Phoenix area gets super hot, like Vegas boiling fry hot, during the summer. I heard it gets up to 120F sometimes! So hot that the asphalt on the road could fry a raw egg.

Assuming you're Vietnamese, there is a good sized Vietnamese community in Phoenix. Not as big as the Viet communities in Orange County, Calif or NYC or Boston, though.

Okay, I shouldn't have said the word "cheap" to describe the house prices in AZ. But the deals are good, as more people are surprisingly moving to AZ, and the prices are increasing every year.

The Phoenix area is smack dab in the middle of the desert. However, if you venture to the northern parts of Arizona, it's more greener, rains a lot more, more pine trees, and great places to go hiking and camping. My past yoga instructor would also take trips to Sedona to meditate herself.




So ABC, are you going to retire soon? or is this a future plan of yours? I always thought you were a young guy.

But yeah, speaking of New Yorkers, I'm so surprised that a lot of them tend to move out to Arizona to retire.

I met a lot of old guys in the lobby of my hotel who were from New York city area. They decided to escape the cold winters of the northeast to live in the warm sunny deserts of Arizona.

Oh, and another "big thing" about living in the Phoenix area is GOLFING!! There are sooo many golf courses every where I went!

I wouldn't survive in AZ. I love the cold climates of the eastcoast. No, I'm not Vietnamese...lol My Bf's brothers' gfs are Vietnamese. And my BF/brothers are Lao/Chinese. And, I'm Thai. =)

I wouldn't mind traveling to the green area. Pine trees.

Hahaha---- Nah, i'm not even 30 yet. Not retiring any time soon. I work for a investment management firm and deal with retirees all the time. Just planning for my future.

Alot of New York retirees have condos in manhattan (for the summer) and places such as Florida and or the Caribbean (for the winter). And travel back and forth. AZ wud be a nice alternative. Thats my goal.

Ah, you're Thai. My bad. You look Vietnamese in that picture in your signature (if that really is you).

LOL! That's funny as I've met a few people at the convention I've attended in Mesa, who are from Boston, Maryland and NYC. They all said that they hate the cold winters of the northeast. One of the girls told me it was 6 F when she left Boston. I was like, "whoa...that's super cold!". Another girl from the northeast said that it's "depressing" to live in the cold area, yada yada yada.

However, me being from Hawaii, I thought the 43F weather in Arizona was freaking cold! LOL!! In fact I was the only bimboo in the group who was wearing a winter coat over my business suit! LOL!!

I would think the northern parts of Arizona would resemble upstate New York with the pine trees and camping grounds.

The difference between NYC and Phoenix, is that NYC has BETTER public transportation than Phoenix. Phoenix doesn't even have a subway or a light-rail system (though they're planning on building one in the near future). NYC is also more compact than the sprawling city of Phoenix (which is connected to Glendale, Tempe, Mesa, etc).

Nice---- are u still living in Hawaii? I've been there a few times....true paradise. The girls are amazing.

Yeah, i ageree the cold weather is miserable...luckily this winter in NYC has been somewhat mild.

Ah, I was right about you not being an older guy. Wow! Investment banking!?? That's a big money-making profession!! You must make at least six-figure salaries!


You will be living like a king after retirement!!





Yup, I live on Oahu, the main island with Waikiki, etc. I am getting sick of living here. it's a phenomenon called "Island sickness" where you get sick and tired of living on a small island.

The girls here are nice and beautiful for sure, and their personalities are great too, but some of them are pure gold-diggers, and others are either dumb or too stuck up. Believe it or not, there are white-washed Asian girls here in Hawaii, regardless of the huge Asian population in Hawaii.

I was born here and lived here most of my life. I definitely want to live elsewhere, which I will be, because I'm moving out of my house this coming summer.

Yes, it's really me....lol

That's how I feel when I go to Atlanta, GA. When it's a normal hot day for them, it's scorching hot to me.

Not investment banking but in the same profession.

I have relatives who were born and raised in Hawaii but have moved elsewhere once they graduated college... California and New York mostly.

What part of Hawaii did your relatives come from? (More like which island did your relatives grow up on?)

Yeah, that is the typical "brain drain" phenomenon Hawaii faces. All the smart educated people go off to the mainland for college. Then they decide to not come back to Hawaii because the pay and opportunity is better on the mainland than in Hawaii. Oh well, that's the price of living in paradise.

i live in the phoenix area

there has been a large growth in the asian population lately. i can't back that up with numbers, just something i noticed.

I attended summer school in ASU. I spent the winter there too.

I didn't know Arizona was cold during the winter. I thought the desert was hot all year. I think the lack of humidity allows such great differences in the weather. I rarely saw rain over there. In one year, I only saw two rainy days. When it rains, it rains heavily. I never saw any other place that had rain drops that were bigger than the ones in Arizona. You can barely see what's outside the windshield of your car.

arizona can get really cold in the winter but nothing to the point of ice forming on the streets or on cars. that's what i love about arizona weather. i don't mind the extreme heat during the summers because i love to go swimming. there's nothing like jumping into the pool when it's scorching hot outside ^_^

yeah that's true, when it does rain, it rains heavily. but when i lived in texas, the rain would sometimes last the entire night nonstop. in arizona, i'd say it would last only about 30 minutes to an hour.

Hello guys, I live in Phoenix. Been here for 5 years already. And I see a lot of Asians around, usually if you frequent Asian stores and restaurants.

Great weather here. One can handle the heat because where you live and work are all airconditioned. Not the whole state is hot during summer. There's a lot of cool escapes up north. Gets cold too during winter here in Phoenix but at least I don't have to shovel snow.

^^ However, it does snow occasionally in Phoenix. I remember that there was some kind of snowfall record set for Phoenix back in 2000, or something like that.

The winters in Phoenix is darn cold. When I used to live in L.A., I would drive to Phoenix, actually Mesa, to visit my relatives there. I swear it was 36F the night I arrived in Phoenix. There was also some snowflakes falling at night. It's not as bad as the winters here in the midwest or along the East Coast and New England area. But it's still cold during the winter, waaay colder than California and Florida.