Las Vegas, Nevada

Las Vegas is home to a diverse group of people from all walks of life, and all ethnicities. Many elderly people choose Las Vegas as a great place to retire, due to the dry heat, and the over-abundance of entertainment and recreational activities. Many families love living in Las Vegas because the job market is strong, and up until about a year ago, home prices were low, and it was very economical to live here.  Singles love Las Vegas for the obvious reasons....So much to do!  So many other young singles to meet and party with! Not to mention the more than 300,000 tourists that visit each month!! It's an adult playground for those 21 to 100! 

What other city in the US offers hundreds of casinos with nightclubs in almost all of them, not to mention pool parties every weekend in the summer, and hundreds upon hundreds of restaurants and bars also within those same casinos?  You could pick a casino, and eat, drink, gamble, dance, socialize, shop or just people-watch without having to leave the building! 

The hundreds, if not thousands of neighborhood bars began flourishing when an ordinace allowing any bar or restaurant owner to have up to 15 video poker/slot machines in his establishment. Any bar with over 15 machines is considered a casino, so it's not often you'll find a neighborhood bar containing more than 15 machines installed in the bar tops.  Every bar has video poker machines. You become used to seeing them everywhere you go.

Since the indoor smoking ordinace was passed about a year ago, some of the bars had to make a choice between video poker machines, or a restaurant, since smoking is no longer allowed in any area where food is served.  Since gamblers like to smoke while they are gambling, many bar owners quit serving food altogether, and kept the video poker machines as they were more profitable than the food sales. Some of the bar owners made minor changes to the interior of their bars, such as installing a wall to separate the gamblers from the diners, and therefore were allowed to keep serving food in a smoke-free environment while the gamblers could smoke freely in the bar area.  In the old days, you could even smoke in the grocery stores and drugstores where slot machines were installed, but now that is no longer allowed. Many of the gas stations and grocery stores with slot machines have lost a lot of money due to the smoking ordinace.  Of course, the casinos were not affected by this new ordinance. Smoking is allowed in all of the casinos, with the exception of the restaurants areas.

Just like any growing, metropolitan city, rental rates have been increasing steadily over the past 10 years, and although the cost of living in Las Vegas is relatively low, it's not as low as it once was.  However, you can eat and drink in Las Vegas for next to nothing which helps keep the cost of living down.  The quality of life in Las Vegas is great, and unlike any other place on earth.  If you can endure the 115 degree summers, you'll love living in Las Vegas and taking advantage of all the many entertainment options.

Las Vegas offers a limited array of public transportation. The Las Vegas CAT bus system runs regularly along the strip and the main thoroughfares within Las Vegas, Henderson and North Las Vegas. Some of the busier routes provide 24-hour bus service, while other, less-busy routes offer bus service until midnight. 

In addition to the CAT bus system, there is a monorail system that runs along the Las Vegas Strip, gently gliding folks from one end of the strip to the other. Although mostly ridden by tourists, it could come in handy for anyone who has visitors from out of town staying on the strip.

McCarran International Airport is conveniently located for easy access from any part of Las Vegas and is the 10th busiest airport in the country. 

Most residents of Las Vegas prefer to get around in their own, personal automobiles, and the freeways and surface streets are ever-expanding to accommodate the increase in traffic.  Until about 10 years ago, the only major freeways in Las Vegas were the I-15 freeway, and the I-95 freeway.  The I-215 "beltway" was built to eleviate the burden that the two main freeways were carrying, and has been a popular alternative route for millions of commuters each week.  The freeways seem to be constantly under construction, adding lanes to accommodate all the traffic.  If only they built them right the first time!!

As is the case in any city you are considering a move to, do your research well before deciding which area you want to begin your search for the perfect home. There are some areas of town that are considered to be more inner-city-ish than others, and some areas have much higher rental costs than many others. Sit down and figure out what you can afford, what area will allow you the shortest commute, and which area has the best schools for your children, if applicable. 

If possible, visit Las Vegas 2 or 3 times before moving here, and not for fun, for research!!  There is nothing worse than moving to a new city, and discovering after you've moved into your new apartment that you should have moved to a different area, or that you're on the opposite side of the city from your workplace!  Do your research!  It'll pay off in the end.

This website isn't big enough to list all of the entertainment and recreational things to do in and around Las Vegas!  For starters, as far as recreational things to do, there are:

Lake Mead National Recreation Area, Hoover Dam, Red Rock Canyon National Conservation Area, Spring Mountain Ranch State Park, Valley of Fire State Park (beautiful!), Mount Charleston (a great place to cool off during the hot summer months!), Floyd Lamb State Park, Old Las Vegas Mormon Fort State Historic Park, Death Valley National Park, and only a 3 or 4 hour drive away, Grand Canyon National Park and Zion National Park.

As far as entertainment goes, well, there are literally hundreds of casinos that offer Las Vegas-style shows, eateries, gambling, and not to mention the shopping! Las Vegas has become the shopping mecca for shopaholics everywhere! 

Once you become a full-time resident of Las Vegas you'll probably notice that your visits to the Strip become few and far between (unless of course you work on the strip!).  Most locals prefer to stay away from the heavy weekend traffic and high volume foot traffic that can be found every single weekend, and most weekdays, too, on the strip.

Downtown, although still heavily populated with tourists is less crowded and offers the Fremont Street Experience, a dazzling lit canopy that displays a wide variety of images that are in sync with the music blasting over the loudspeakers. It's a sight to see.

In addition to the tourist traps, you can find many a local park close to most of the neighborhoods in Las Vegas.  Desert Breeze Park is one of the larger parks, and in addition to free music events, and a very popular skate park, you can bring your dog to the dog park there, or swim in the public pool. 

Summerlin is host to an annual art festival, and Henderson is home to Sunset Park, where many events are held every year. 

Shopping abounds in Las Vegas. Grocery stores, banks, health clubs, specialty stores, home stores, department stores, you name it, you'll find what you're looking for within minutes of where ever you live. Parking is always free at all shopping areas and malls. 

The main shopping malls in Las Vegas are the Boulevard Mall (East Side), and the Meadows Mall (West Side). The Fashion Show Mall is an upscale mall located on the Las Vegas Strip. If you want a more hoity toity shopping experience, then the Fashion Show Mall is the perfect place.  A gigantic mall is being built in the Northwest part of the Valley, but won't be completed for a while. 

For years and years, jobs were plentiful in Las Vegas, especially in the service industry and the construction industry. The past few years has seen a noticeable decline in the construction jobs, and although there are many to be had, jobs in the construction industry are not as plentiful as they were, say, 3 to 5 years ago.  Hopefully, the construction industry will pick-up again soon. Service industry jobs (bartender, food servers, front desk clerks, maids, bell boys, valet attendants) are plentiful, and can be lucrative at some of the high end hotel/casinos.

Teachers are in great demand in Las Vegas, as are nurses. If you're looking for a job, chances are you'll find it sooner in Las Vegas than you would in just about any other city in the country. The salaries still need to be brought up to the level of those in other metropolitan cities, and little by little the salaries are increasing, but so is the cost of living, unfortunately. 

During the massive growth that Las Vegas experienced, schools were built as fast as possible to accommodate all of the newcomers to the city. Some of the schools are year-round, and some aren't. There are literally hundreds of grammar, middle and high schools in every part of the city.

For higher eduction, you have the Clark County Community College, The College of Southern Nevada, and of course, UNLV, the University of Nevada, Las Vegas.  The Valley also offers more than 60 vocational and business training schools for specialized educational needs. 

Unfortunatley, Las Vegas is #1 in home foreclosures in the nation.  This can be a good thing if you're in the market for a home at a great price. Many bank-owned properties are being sold at below value, and it's definitely a buyer's market right now. If you can somehow get a mortgage loan, you could probably find a very nice home at a very reasonable price. 

Las Vegas has 2 distinct seasons: Summer (very hot and dry for almost 6 months of the year), and Winter (not unbearable with daytime temps around 45-65 degrees, and nighttime temps dipping below freezing), and 2 short-lived, non-distinct seasons, Spring and Fall in Las Vegas offer the most perfect weather you could ever wish for, but they are both short-lived. 

It does snow in Las Vegas almost every winter, although it rarely sticks to the ground. A few years ago, Las Vegans woke-up to find over 6" of snow accumulated on their lawns, BBQ's, swimming pools and automobiles. Everyone in the city got their cameras out that particular morning to photograph the beautiful white blanket that is rarely seen in Las Vegas in such quantity.

It can go months between rains, and the monsoon season (July through September), is notorious for flash floods and intense lightning storms. People in Las Vegas drive horribly in any weather, let alone rain. When it rains in Las Vegas, the oil that has built up on the pavement rises to the surface and the roads become dangerously slippery. You can imagine what it was like that morning Las Vegans awoke to 6" of snow on the ground!!!  Yikes.