September 30, 2016 was the day we officially closed on our first home in a town weād never lived in and had only been to a handful of times. We were moving out of NYC and heading to the vast expanse of Upstate, NY in the hopes of finding a better life.
Thatās not to say that we had a bad thing going in our old apartment in Bay Ridge, but Steve and I came to the decision that we wanted to have a less stressful existence and maybe even have something crazy like equity!
Why We Picked Rochester
One question I get asked when we meet someone new is āwhy did you guys come here?ā and I get it, Rochester probably isnāt on anyoneās āmost desirable places to liveā list. And to be honest we sort of like it that way.
Iām originally from Pittsburgh, PA and Steveās hometown is Cincinnati, OH. So Rochester felt very familiar to us right away: a blue-collar town down on its luck because of the loss of industry. But a little trickle of light starting to show through with tech startups coming in. We felt that making a bet on a place like Rochester would pay off if we stuck it out.
Also, this part of Upstate NY was bluer politically, which aligned better with our values than going further west in the state. We wanted to stay in the state of New York, too, and Rochesterās cost of living is crazy-good.
Itās also crazy-good because itās consistently ranked as one of the poorest cities in the country, so…yeah.
What Our Experience Has Been Like
Thatās not to say that weāve faced many difficulties here, but Iām also fully aware that could be our privilege showing through. Or it could be that we came here by choice and kind of made our own rules in terms of how weād live our lives and support ourselves.
Most likely a mix of both.
When I was working corporate marketing gigs, I had very little difficulty finding work. And while I would like to think that itās because I love marketing and that passion shows through in job interviews, I also have a feeling that having a resume showing addresses in Manhattan didnāt hurt. My pay was good for this area, though it would be a pittance in a higher cost of living city. (My pay while I was in corporate ranged from $65k to $75k as a base.) So that gave us a good little bump when we first moved here.
Steve, though, had more difficulty finding well-paying jobs here. He was previously a Fire Safety and Emergency Action Procedure Director back in the City. But those jobs donāt exist here so he was relegated to the back of the line at security guard companies. His pay dropped down to I think $11/hour and the company that hired him was fairly abusive. (Which unfortunately seems to be a standard in that line of work.)
Steve was the first one to move into full-time self-employed life as a freelance writer. While I took two years before I fully transitioned back into being a full-time entrepreneur. Thanks to where we live and the cost of living here, that made those decisions way easier, as we had lived on much less in Brooklyn and knew we could be fairly secure in our incomes here.
To humblebrag a little, since leaving Brooklyn for Rochester weāve been able to semi-retire from working and spend more time doing things we enjoy like traveling, house improvements, and spoiling the dog.
The Main Differences Between Rochester and Brooklyn
For all of the good that has come with our gamble to move here, there have been some stark differences weāve had to become accustomed to:
We definitely needed a (okay, two) car(s)
The area we live is absolutely not walkable. We tried once to walk to our local liquor store when we first moved here. And itās just SUCH a hassle. Rochester does have a public bus system, but from our preliminary google map searches, any time we needed to go somewhere it wouldāve taken twice as long, if not longer. We ended up getting two cars while we both worked outside of the home. But I think that weāll go down to one car once Moe dies.
We had to go back to conglomerate shopping
This is a little hoity-toity I know, but it was nice to have more small businesses around like indie movie theaters when we lived in the City. Itās a hard place to run a physical business here, Iām sure, so I get why.
Wegmanās is seriously amazing
Okay, so itās a grocery store, what could possibly be amazing about it? Our first trip to Rochester we went to their main store (the āTaj Mahalā as itās known) and had our minds promptly blown. The crowded ShopRite with its skinny aisles and perpetually leaking roof we were used to made us feel like we were at the grocery store Disneyland. I actually missed our exit when I was driving back to our hotel after visiting because I was so dumbstruck by how clean, large, and accommodating it was.
Give Up on IKEA
I think the closest one is either in Newark or Pittsburgh, so there just isnāt an IKEA. It was something I had to come to terms with. There were rumors that one might show up between here and Buffalo but I haven't held my breath waiting.
There isnāt as much available
Thereās no FiOS since Time Warner/Spectrum has an actual monopoly on the phone utilities here. And we really miss having that (though Greenlight is slowly making headway here. But itās been almost 4 years and theyāre only now considering expanding into our neighborhood). Uber wasnāt a thing here until 2 years ago, and Uber Eats came slowly after. There arenāt any car services that arenāt considered a worst-case scenario if youāve got a plane to catch before Uber came. And the busses donāt run 24 hours. So it became a culture shock to have to lower our expectations on things we had taken for granted as being readily available and accessible in Brooklyn.Ā
Everything here is a 20-minute drive from our house
This is one of the biggest perks and is something weāve proven to be true on multiple efforts. Rochester has an amazing highway system and itās rare that our trips around the city take longer than 20 minutes to complete. Compare that to when my friend Jarred lived in Queens. Iād have to consider the THREE HOURS it would take to get there on the subways (shout out to the R train).
There are way fewer beautification efforts
We see very little street cleaning and there are constant potholes everywhere here, especially during the winters. Most of the time youāll need to go to the suburbs which have their own governments to get any sort of effort taken. (Which I understand is a financial issue!)
Brooklyn has far superior snow plowing
Which you think would be the opposite, right? We live adjacent to, if not in, the Snow Belt. And there have been times where the snow has been so deep the majority of our cars were swallowed up. In Brooklyn, any time we had a freak snowstorm, the plows and salt trucks were out ahead of the storm. Here, we have to wait a day or so to be dug out.
We had to learn how to live in society again
Our experience living in NYC made us more outspoken, to put it delicately. As it feels like if you donāt stand up for yourself and what you want there, no one else will. Living in Brooklyn gave us an adversarial chip on our shoulders that we had to learn how to soften living out in āregularā cities. Thatās not to say we were jerks. But I know that the way one lives in NYC can seem abrasive in other towns.Ā
The thrift stores here are incredible
Seriously. Everything here is so cheap, and that includes all the thrift shops around. I have a theory that old people move down South and leave all of their belongings here because the abundance of vintage Pyrex and Depression Glass Iāve found for pennies on the dollar is stunning.Ā
I still havenāt found authentic Szechuan
My last whiny note: I really miss our little Szechuan restaurant back in Bay Ridge that had the most amazing pork-wrapped appetizers. I canāt find them anywhere here and as you can see based on the way Iāve described them, Iāve begun to lose the memory of what they were and why I love them.
Would we ever move back to NYC? Probably not. Living there for nearly a decade served our purposes at that time in our lives, and we have incredible memories there but I think that time has come and gone for us, and we want more space and less hassle.
Will we leave Rochester? Honestly, Iām not sure. Steve and I were fairly nomadic for a time and I know we both get bouts of Wanderlust, plus the winters are no joke. However, I think that it would be hard to find another place like this with the same cost of living, political climate, and amazing grocery stores easily. I think that weāll eventually move out of our home for the ānicerā part of our suburb, but unless something catastrophic happens, our current plan is to use Rochester as a home base and focus on traveling more often (after the pets are gone), and possibly finding a winter home in a cheap country with a better climate. Who knows what the future will bring…stay tuned?
Love your blog!
I have friends in Buffalo and they go to the IKEA in Burlington Ontario, which is about a 2 hour drive from Rochester.
oh, interesting! I was wondering if the customs clusterfluff would be worth the hassle, thank you for the heads up!