Some time ago, our health insurance provider pulled out of Florida.
Our new health insurance cost quite a bit more money, while at the same time offering substantially less coverage than the old policy.
Unfortunately, there was no better health insurance available in this part of
Florida for Federal retirees. Between this and the fact that Bill has yet to get used to the terribly humid Florida summers (15 seconds outdoors and he's sweating like a horse), we decided to consider alternative places to live.
Since the local newspaper had reported that the majority of people leaving the area were moving to Las Vegas, we studied everything we could find on the Internet about living in this city.
All things considered, Las Vegas sounded like a good place to live, so we decided to go there and take a closer look.
Our
departure was
Wednesday, the 26th of March, 2003. Since our flight out was delayed a total of
10 hours because of mechanical problems and missed connections, we
didn't get to our hotel until late at night, so unfortunately we missed our first day
of sightseeing. Thursday and Friday were
spent looking at houses in various Las Vegas neighborhoods, and Saturday we took a short driving tour north to Mt.
Charleston (the highest mountain in Nevada), followed by a walking tour of the Las
Vegas Strip.
Note the following, which is in no particular order:
Our minimum requirements for a house were that it be at least 1,800 sq. ft., 4 or more bedrooms, 2 or more bathrooms, and a 2-car or larger garage. All of the houses below met these requirements.
For what homes cost in Las Vegas ~ we could sell our Cape Coral home, buy a home in Las Vegas, and possibly have enough money left over to buy a small condominium to use as income property.
Almost every house we saw had tile roofs, which is very nice since this type of roof will most likely last a lifetime. On the other hand, I was told clay tiles were necessary since asphalt shingles can melt on hot summer days!
At the date of our visit, Las Vegas was the fastest growing city in the U.S. This was very evident from the huge amount of construction we saw as we traveled around the city. The Las Vegas valley covers a couple of hundred square miles, we drove over most of this area, yet we were never out of sight of construction projects!
One of the other striking things that we saw was that all the roads, even residential streets, were w-i-d-e! What's better is that all these streets have sidewalks, something which is a rarity in Florida. These wide roads were very, very nice!
Bonnie and I had not been to Las Vegas since we were married there on January 1, 1994. There have been a huge amount of changes to the Strip since then, so many that it was barely recognizable as the place we had visited years earlier.
I've decided that gambling in casinos is not a good idea, so I did not gamble at all this trip. Bonnie did ~ she lost $12.00 playing 5¢ slot machines. If you only lose $12 gambling in Las Vegas, you're a winner!!
Las Vegas is hotter in the summer than Florida, but the humidity is very low. The heavy humidity in Florida tends to make hot days hotter! Because of these two facts, even though Las Vegas is hotter in the summer the heat is much, much easier to bear than Florida!
The last time we were in Las Vegas, we found it to be a very inexpensive vacation (as long as we avoided the casinos). This is no longer the case since attractions, meals, and hotels all seem very expensive now! Outside of the tourist areas, prices seemed comparable to Florida, with the exception of houses which were about 33% less expensive than similar Florida homes, and gasoline which was about 17% more expensive.
After we returned to Florida, we spent a couple of weeks of head scratching as to whether or not we wanted to relocate to Las Vegas. Ultimately we decided that Las Vegas was too crowded and too expensive for us. But ~ we still want to move out west!
A total of 113 photographs were taken, 75 of which have been posted on these web pages. The pictures below are of the 17 houses we toured, and near the bottom of this page is a link to the photographs taken in and around the Las Vegas Strip Saturday . . . enjoy!
 |
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
 |
|
|
|
 |
|
I walked out in front of #13, then snapped a picture of the view to the right. |
I walked out in front of #13, then snapped a picture of the view to the left. |
 |
|
I walked out in front of #14, then snapped a picture of the view to the left. |
|
 |
|
|
|
 |
