Millennial paid $10,000 to move to Tulsa from LA has no regrets

I saw that it had a low cost of living and then I found out about Tulsa Remote.

I was looking for places with a lower cost of living. I was comparing the cost of living in different states and Tulsa came up. I was doing a little more research and Tulsa Remote came up.

I said, “That looks pretty good.” And then he decided to move.

I had already decided I was going to go there, and then I was looking at house prices and told my dad I was going to buy a house. He says, “You weren’t even there.”

I hadn’t been there until I went there to look at the houses. During that week-long stay in Tulsa, I found a house and made an offer.

What really made Tulsa more interesting to me was the history of Black Wall Street.

Courtesy of Jasmine Ball

I thought, “How cool would that be—to be a financial company that also goes to Black Wall Street?”

Obviously, it was super nice to have that program and incentive, but it was only part of the decision to go there.

I knew I couldn’t stay in California forever

I’m from Orlando, California – it’s the middle of nowhere. I went to college in Minnesota, moved back to Northern California briefly, and then moved to LA.

I don’t know if I would have started my business staying in California – definitely not so soon.

I started my company in December of 2021, so I had been in Tulsa for about a year. I stayed with my other company remotely for a year before that.

If I had stayed, I think I would have just continued working for someone else. But once I got to Tulsa and created that distance, I was like, “Well, I might as well do this myself.” So I did.

Finances were a big factor. But what really made me think that living in Los Angeles wasn’t long-term was that I’d get up and leave the house at 4:30 in the morning, and not get home until 10 p.m.: 30 and I would do this every time. day.

Half of that time I was in my car driving, stuck in traffic. I thought: “I can’t live my life like this”.

I literally did the math; I would spend years of my life in my car. I didn’t want to live like this. I can’t imagine being here at 60, having spent 20 years driving, when I could be living life instead.

That was what drove him.

Finances were obviously a big part of it too. In California, finances were so tight that you had to grind all the time.

I decided I didn’t want to compromise. I wanted to have the finances that I wanted to have, but I also didn’t want to have to grind to that extent.

Finding a place that could create a balance was truly life changing.

I have a house for almost what I was paying for a room in LA

In LA in 2020, I lived with three other roommates—one was my sister, and the other two were friends.

There were four of us in this five bedroom townhouse and the rent was $3800 a month – which was actually pretty good.

My share of that rent was $1,100 because I had the master bedroom.

I bought the house in Tulsa in November 2020 and it just sat vacant until I moved there in December.

It’s a three bedroom, two bath house with a two car garage, and my mortgage is $1,185.

It was a good time to move because interest rates were around 2.25%, which is crazy. So it was a no-brainer.

Utilities are significantly lower. I joke that I still have PTSD from the utility bills we used to get, especially growing up. I remember one summer we had a $600 electric bill – that’s ridiculous. In Tulsa, you can run your air conditioner all day and it only costs $100 or $200.

Water, gas – everything is less expensive.

Gas in California is almost $5 a gallon, and in Tulsa it’s about $3. By the time I moved, it was like, $1.70 and I was like, “What the hell?” I have never seen gas so cheap in my life.

It’s not just the cost of gas, it’s time.

My time can be much longer in Tulsa than in LA. I can actually increase my income because I can increase my productivity because I’m not spending as much time doing unproductive things.

Tulsa has something as simple as parking. You can find free parking everywhere. It’s always free after 5pm and it’s free on weekends. Parking in LA is atrocious. You’re lucky if you find a parking lot that costs $10.

I don’t think I’ll ever leave Tulsa

There are free events all the time in Tulsa, like concerts in the park. If you want to do something, there’s absolutely something to do – and it’s likely to be free.

There are so many different suburbs of Tulsa that you can go where you have parades. I can’t remember ever seeing so much to do in LA.

I spend most of my free time in Tulsa doing one of two things: playing volleyball or volunteering.

California has the beach, but I never really played sand volleyball, mostly because it took so long to get to the beach. To get to Santa Monica on a bad day was an hour and a half. On a good day, maybe 45 minutes. And it just wasn’t worth it after driving all week.

Tulsa has several different volleyball leagues.

Courtesy of Jasmine Ball

In Los Angeles, it was hard to find places to volunteer. Sometimes there was a full application—a 10-step process—and you’re like, “I just wanted to do something this time to check it out.”

But in Tulsa, it’s very accessible.

I volunteer a lot at the Tulsa Dream Center. They gave out free groceries every Saturday through the pandemic — rain, snow, shine. So I showed up every Saturday, and you didn’t have to do any training. At least in Tulsa, they make it so easy – instead of finding obstacles and reasons you can’t attend.

I didn’t necessarily move there thinking I was going to leave, but I always told myself, “You can always come back.” If this doesn’t work, I don’t like it, I can always go back to California.

But the surprising thing is that I really like it.

I don’t see myself moving anywhere else.

I like to travel and can buy more properties in other countries. I originally thought Tulsa was more of an experiment for a home base. And then it turned out to be something that I really liked.