# 157. Why I Changed My Mind About Where I Want to Live | Chicago to LA Q+A (very honest)

## Метаданные

- **Канал:** Michela Allocca
- **YouTube:** https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XZLeorXEGvw
- **Дата:** 15.04.2026
- **Длительность:** 58:11
- **Просмотры:** 5,564
- **Источник:** https://ekstraktznaniy.ru/video/45856

## Описание

I’m officially back in Los Angeles after living in Chicago for the past year and a half, and in this episode, I’m walking through the full decision behind that move. This is not a dramatic story  - it's a clear reflection of what happens when you try something new, gather real data from your life, and then make a decision that actually aligns with what you value. I break down why I moved to Chicago in the first place, why it ultimately did not work for me, and what made Los Angeles the right fit again. We also get into a full comparison of Chicago vs LA, including lifestyle differences, social culture, career opportunities, and day-to-day quality of life. If you are thinking about moving, feeling stuck where you are, or questioning whether a big life change is the right move, this episode will give you a grounded and practical framework for thinking through that decision.

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## Транскрипт

### Life update: moving back to LA []

I'm officially back in Los Angeles. I moved out of Chicago about two weeks ago. I've been in LA for just about a week now. We are getting back into my routine. And today, I'm going to be answering all of your questions because I knew there was going to be a bajillion questions about this move since I chose not to speak about it until it was actually happening. But hopefully today we can clear some things up and you can get a clear idea of why I moved back to LA, why I left Chicago, my thought process behind the whole thing. Obviously, I've seen all of your comments. I have questions. And so, I just want to say on the upfront, thank you so much to everyone who has been so nice. I'd say pretty much everyone. I haven't really received any mean or horrible comments, but I really do appreciate the overall just like general support. I don't know what I was expecting to be honest. I kind of had no idea, but I've been very pleasantly surprised at just the overwhelming positivity and support with this decision. So, thank you so much for being so nice. It gives me hope that maybe the internet is becoming a little bit of a better place. Before we get into the Q& A though, I do need to give a major major shout out to Roadway for helping me pack my things up and move back out to California. So, if you didn't know or you are new here, Roadway actually moved me from LA to Chicago about a year and a half ago at this point. And they've now moved me from Chicago back to LA, they are literally the best. You all know that I'm pretty picky about how I choose to spend my money, but now that I've done a couple of big cross-country

### Why I chose to move to Chicago [2:00]

moves, this is actually my third one, but my second one with roadway because when I originally moved out to California from Massachusetts, I only moved out with a suitcase. I didn't bring anything with me. I can say confidently at this point that if there is one thing that is so 110,000% worth the money, it's a good moving team. The thing about Roadway is that they are super super professional. So, not only are they courteous and really helpful when it comes to packing up your space and taking care of all of your items, but the communication is exceptional. I never had any questions about when my stuff was going to arrive, when the moving team and what the run of show was going to be. They call in advance. They let you know their timing, and they are super clear about all of their communication. I've done a couple of moves in my 20s where I didn't have proper movers and I just relied on my dad who is the best. But at this point, it's just really exhausting and honestly impossible to move across the country without a good moving team. And this move in particular felt a little bit more complicated just because I was in between leases. I needed to time getting my car out here. My dad and I did a road trip. There were a lot of moving pieces. It's already stressful. It's already chaotic and I just didn't want to worry about my stuff. I knew that with Roadway, all of my things were going to be cataloged. They organized. arrive in LA in one piece and I wouldn't have to deal with the mental load of transporting and timing the transport of all of my things on top of all of the chaos that comes with moving already. So, if you're someone who is planning to move and you are contemplating if movers are actually worth it, take it from me. They are 110% worth every single penny. Obviously, I have a code for you if you are interested in getting a quote from Roadway. The code is your budget 10. I'll make sure it's up on the screen and it will give you 10% off of local moves and 5% off of longd distanceance moves. Okay, now with that, let's get into the Q& A because there have been so many questions. I'm taking most of these from my Instagram Q boxes. I've asked a couple of different times, so I've aggregated what the most popular questions are. I do have them up on my computer screen, which is over here. Obviously, if you are watching here on YouTube, which you should be if you are listening to the show in your ears, you can also watch it on YouTube. By the way, I am sitting on the floor in my new living room. I don't know how I'm going to set up my filming going forward. I actually like this spot. It's right in front of a window. I'm in a quiet neighborhood, so hopefully the sound is okay. But I have all of my questions up here. Also too, before we get into it, just because this is the internet and this is not my first rodeo, I do need to just say this on the upfront. I'm going to be sharing my opinion based off of my perspective and my personal lived experience. You may have had a different experience in either Chicago or LA. And you are allowed to have that because we are two different people who have had two different lived experiences and obviously have different lives and different perspectives. So if I say something that may be different than the experience that you personally had, remember two things can exist at the same time. And I would challenge you to use those critical thinking skills that I know you have because smart people listen to my podcast and really think about how my experience and your experience could be different but also exist at the exact same time because that is what life is. Okay? So, I don't mean to offend anyone. If I say something that is offensive to you, toughen up. Again, we can all have different experiences. I'm going to do my best to share what I actually think in an honest and constructive way. I don't want to [ __ ] on any cities. I don't want to, you know, make anybody feel badly about their own lives or experiences or whatever. Again, this is just my opinion. The other thing I want to say is normalize changing your mind. Okay? Because when I left LA, I was really not in a good headsp space. I now have that clarity and perspective. And so maybe things that I said back then, I feel differently about now because again, it's been a year and a half. I've had a totally different experience. And I now have new information to change my opinion, which is a very normal thing that we need to start normalizing and accepting that people can have a new experience and with that new information change their minds. So if you take anything away from this, it's a we could have different experiences and b normalize changing your mind. If anything, I hope to be an example of trying something new and using that experience to make a decision that benefits you. Um, I do feel like I've experienced a lot of personal growth over the last year and a half since leaving LA. I'm coming back to the city in a way that I feel like so so different. And I'm really excited for this next chapter in my life. So with

### Why I decided to leave Chicago [7:40]

that, and I think it's time to just get into the questions. So the first question here, and it's one that I feel like I have answered already, but because we're doing this specific episode, I'm going to answer it on the upfront to be super clear. And it is why did I move to Chicago? And why did I choose to move back to LA? So we'll start with why I moved to Chicago. I was recently 29. You know, I said this in my last episode or two episodes ago, 29 is the worst year ever. And I just felt like I lived in LA for, you know, almost 4 years at that point. And I wanted to experience living in a true city, which if you're not watching on YouTube, I'm using air quotes because obviously LA is a real city. But the thing about LA is that unless you're downtown, which is not a popular or transparently safe place to live, it just feels like a big suburb. And at the time, I was like, you know, I haven't really lived in a city postco. Like, I lived in Boston before CO, but I those first few years out of postgrad, like I just I don't think they should count because you don't know what the hell is going on. Um, and so I moved to LA right after CO and this was sort of my like adult city experience and I was like, you know, do I want to live in a true city? place where I don't have my car and like I'm getting that actual city experience? It was an itch that I had. I'm not a big fan of New York. I'm perfectly fine to visit New York. It's just not a place that I wanted to live. And so I figured Chicago, I have some friends there already, so that makes the transition a little bit easier and, you know, I'll get the city experience without having to pay New York prices. So I just decided to try it. Like again, I feel like people think there has to be some big huge major re reason or catalyst for moving to a city. And obviously the financials of it all are an important factor. And from a transparency standpoint, that really wasn't the driving factor for me at all because since I am a creator, I was able to sort of fund a lot of the things related to the move through content creation. Um, so I was in a unique position and I figured I would just give this a go. And my mind at the time was very open to like if I love this, I'm super down to stay. And if I don't, then I'll figure out what I'm going to do next. Maybe I'll move back to California. I was open to that. I don't know if I necessarily translated that online, but that is where I was mentally. So, that was why I decided to move to Chicago. I didn't really know what to expect outside of again, I have some friends here. I've been to the city. Like, I liked it. I had a good experience there and we'll see if this is the spot that I want to be in. Ultimately over the course of the year I was kind of waiting for that time where I would fall in love with living there. And that period never really came. And ultimately at the beginning of 2026 is when I made the decision that I wanted to move back to LA because my time in Chicago I feel like made me really clear on the things that I actually value that I didn't necessarily have the clarity on when I decided to move to Chicago. Like again I was 29. I'm single. I'm still single. Um, but I just felt like, okay, my life needs to move forward. And I feel like the only way I can push it forward is if I make a big change. And that wasn't necessarily what needed to happen to be completely honest. But at the time, that is what I thought I had to do. But my decision to move back to LA came from getting really clear on the things I actually value, which I think happened from being in a place that I didn't necessarily end up loving. transparently, I just didn't like living in Chicago. Like I think there's, you know, this underlying question mark of did something happen? Was there any big reason? And the reason is I just didn't like it. And I think that's a perfectly valid reason to not want to live somewhere, especially because there's nothing keeping me there. My family's not there. My job isn't there. Like nothing happened. There was no catalyst. I liked my friends. Like I just don't like the city and that's really the only thing. And I have been hesitant to share that because again I don't want to offend anyone. But at this point like people [ __ ] on LA all the time and they're allowed to do that and I can still love it. And I think the same goes for any city. Like people love it, people hate it. It's all depending on your personal and unique experience. But really I just didn't like it. I felt like the winters were too long. Culturally, I didn't feel in it's fit in. It's a very corporate city, which there's nothing wrong with that, but I don't work a corporate job. I'm not interested in working a corporate job. I don't want to talk about work. Like, I just felt like new people that I met, all that we talked about was work. I couldn't relate to that in any way. It's not a transplant city. And largely what I found based off of my unique experience is that the social life largely revolves around like going out to eat or going out to bars, which is just not something that I personally like to do. Are there other things to do in Chicago? Absolutely. Did I explore some of those other things? Absolutely. Did that change my experience? No. So, that's the reason why I decided to move to and move out of Chicago. I chose LA again for a couple of key reasons. One of the biggest ones, and sorry if you're on YouTube and I'm like looking around. I'm currently facing into like the courtyard of my apartment and people are walking by and it's a little bit distracting. So, I'll figure out how I want to do my setup going forward, but for now, this is what we're doing. Um, but back to why I wanted to move back to

### Why LA fits my life better now [14:00]

LA. First and most importantly being like I have community here and I have friends here. I have a work and professional and creator community here. I also obviously love the weather. I love the access to nature. being able to travel. I just think that for the things that I value, which is spending time outside, being active, I'm a day person. I'm not a night person, and I feel like LA is a day city. This is just a better place for me to be. So, that's the answer there. Again, there's no like tea or anything. It's just I didn't like Chicago and I like California. And I did also get some questions about like would I consider moving to a different part of California? Absolutely, just not right now. Um, and the reason why is because obviously like I feel like the main places people move to in California are LA, San Diego, San Francisco. I don't have any community in San Diego or San Francisco. I love San Francisco. Like I could 100% see myself living there, but I don't have any friends there and I'm not really interested in doing the whole restart again. like I'm exhausted with restarting. I don't want to find not that I'm not open to make new friends because I absolutely am, but I don't want to feel like I have nobody in the city that I'm choosing to live in. Um, the other thing is like San Diego to me, I feel like from a pace standpoint is not the right place for me to be in right now. Like the thing about LA, especially again based off of being a creator, is like this is where the opportunity is for what I do for work. This is where the people are, the brands are, and events and whatnot are. So, if I'm not going to be in New York, then it just makes more sense for me to be here. Question number two is, am I renting or buying? Am I planning to buy a place in

### Renting vs buying and long-term plans [16:00]

California? So, in my current apartment, I am renting and I plan to rent for the foreseeable future. That's not changing just because I decided to move here. I do plan and intend as of this moment, April 13th, 2026. I do intend to stay here for the long term. That could always change. I've said this before and I feel like I have said this a million times, but I know that not everybody is like clued in to everything that I say 100% of the time. I will not be buying anything anywhere until it makes life sense for me. I have the funds to buy if I wanted to buy a condo or a home here in LA. I could do that. I am choosing not to because a it's an enormous enormous expense and b I'm still figuring my life out. Like normalize taking your time and figuring your life out when your brain is fully developed. Okay, what's with the pressure? And I know that's not where the questions stem from is like pressuring me or anything, but a lot of times that's how it feels like why are you still renting? At this moment, it does not make financial sense or life sense for me to purchase property. And I'm not going to just do it because I'm, you know, supposed to. I'm going to do it when it makes sense. I have no problem renting. I actually am very excited about the apartment that I'm in. I really do love it and I'm excited to sort of grow into this space. I love the area and I am still in a position where you know there's a lot of question marks in my life. There could be another person who enters the picture. I don't know. I could decide that I don't want to stay in California and I have again the freedom and flexibility to do that. I don't think that's going to happen but it could. I'm not obsessed with owning a home. I think the discourse around home ownership is like so annoying to be honest and we need to stop obsessing about it. And also I do think it's like

### Cost of living: LA vs Chicago breakdown [18:00]

natural obviously to be curious about what I'm doing from a financial standpoint because I am largely a financial creator. But at the end of the day like when I buy a home, believe me, you'll know. Moving on to question number three. How did I think about the cost difference? This was another like probably the most popular question. Um, aside from why am I moving? And I'm going to be like so so blunt here. It costs the same to live here as it does to live pretty much anywhere [ __ ] else that's interesting to live in. Like I'm going to be I don't know how else to put it. I People are comparing the cost of living in LA to living in Chicago. Whatever. My rent is the same. My living expenses are the same. The only difference is here. I have my car. My car is fully paid off. I've already paid for the first six months of insurance. Like the only difference is the car. And if I chose to have my car in Chicago, which I actively chose not to cuz I wanted to have the city experience, it would actually cost me more because I'd have to pay $400 a month to park my car in Chicago where here I park my car for free. So, my expenses are essentially pretty much exactly the same. People are obsessed with like taxes and gas prices in California. Gas prices are still high in Chicago. It's still $5 for a gallon of gas in Chicago. Maybe that is different in the suburbs of Illinois, but at the BP station that was two blocks from my apartment, it was five bucks a gallon the entire time that I lived there. It's still a major city, so it's still expensive to live there. In my opinion, it shouldn't be because, with all due respect, it's in the Midwest. So, why it costs the same for me to live in Southern California as it does the Midwest blows my mind. Okay, it blows my mind. The other element of this was like, did it did I, you know, think about my coast calculations or my fire calculations differently? it. No, it didn't cross my mind because I'm working towards a moving target and if my expenses adjust a little bit this year, which they will because when you move, obviously there's like one-off expenses. I had to buy some new furniture. Like my expenses will be a little bit higher this year than I anticipated. It's a cost that I can comfortably absorb. So, I'm not too worried about it and it will not impact my savings goals because I have control over my income and my earning potential, which is a benefit of being a creator. I can't remember if I touched on the taxes. The tax element of it all is like yes, it I will pay more taxes living in California, but again, Illinois, the tax rate is also high. In Massachusetts, which is the only other state at this point that I would live in, the taxes there are essentially the same as they are in California. And the difference here is my quality of life is like 10 million times higher and I can enjoy my life every single day. So the incremental increase in cost to me is 100% worth it. And it's not something that I used as the deciding factor. Obviously, I thought about it like I looked at it. I looked at what the impact would be on my monthly essentials with my car and how, you know, how many times would I realistically be filling up my gas tank and where am I living in relation to how frequently am I going to have to drive and all of that. like yes, I looked into that. But the big difference is now my like social and activity budget is going to go down, which essentially will offset the increase in my cost, the small increase in my cost because there's so much more for me to do here for free, which I think is what I really want to emphasize. Like, yeah, you pay a little bit more, like a little bit more to live in California, but like there's just so much to do that you don't have to pay for. And like that's what you're paying for. Also, why is everybody obsessed with the price of California and not the price of New York City? Like that's a can of worms that we're not even going to open. Nobody bats an eye when you choose to move to New York. Everybody freaks out about gas prices when you choose to move to California. Like, are we forgetting about New York City tax? Okay. And the fact that people are paying $6,000 a month for a studio apartment in New York with no laundry and it's a disgusting hole-in-the-wall gross place. like please I don't want to hear it when it comes to the cost. And I know that's not where these questions come from, but I think where I get defensive and like where it has started to bother me is like it's expensive to live literally anywhere. I guess what I really want to emphasize here is that if you want to live in any of the major cities, so we'll say, you know, New York, LA, Chicago, San Francisco, Austin, Miami, Boston, maybe. At this point, the cost difference is exceptionally minor. The only place or places I guess where you're going to have a very real intangible difference in the cost of living is if you're not living in a major metropolitan city. So maybe somewhere in the south or smaller Midwest cities, but even then like I've had people message me saying that a one-bedroom rent in Minneapolis is $2,800. So everywhere is expensive now. everywhere it's like kind of costing the same. And the thing about LA is that if you're flexible on neighborhood, you can actually find a one bed apartment for like I mean affordable is relative, but for you know low to mid 2000s. So it just depends where you're

### Chicago vs LA: pros and cons [24:00]

open to living. I was not open to more than two neighborhoods. I'm not going to share what those neighborhoods are obviously. Um, but I was very specific about where I was going to live and where I would live if I moved back here. And so my rent reflects that, but my rent is an appropriate portion of my income. So it's not something that I feel like stressed about. And it's again literally the same as what I was paying in Chicago. And I can actually live my life here. Moving on. Chicago vers LA pros and cons. What made LA feel more appealing this time? So, what Chicago did for me is shine a light on the things that I actually value? I absolutely took LA for granted because I got used to it. I got comfortable here and I feel like I was in the wrong neighborhood and I just didn't really know it at the time because I didn't have the right perspective. And now after living in like a true city and having that city life perspective, I realized it's not what I want. And I wouldn't have known that if I didn't do it because when I first graduated college and lived in Boston, like I loved living in Boston. And I think the big thing that I loved about living in Boston wasn't that I loved living in the city. It's that I had family and friends there. So it felt much more familiar. Whereas living in Chicago is kind of just like, okay, I'm here in a city. And like just because you're in a city doesn't mean your life opens up, especially if you don't have the right community there. Beyond that, obviously Chicago is a winter city. And I guess like I knew what to expect when it came to the winter, but I guess I didn't really know, and I'm fine to admit this, like I didn't know the severity of it. I think that a Midwest winter is very different than a New England winter. Now again that I've experienced it. I can understand it. And overall, it's just like not how I want to live. It's not something that I want. And it's also not something that I have to do. I have a unique situation where I have the flexibility to live wherever I want. And that's a good thing and a bad thing because it opens me up to so many different opportunities, but it also makes it difficult to choose a place to land. But now that I know what life looks like in all different parts of the country, like I've lived in New England, I lived in the South for college, I've now lived in the Midwest, and I've lived out here. I feel like I have a very clear perspective on the things that are important to me specifically to have a high quality of life. It needs to be a place that maximizes my career opportunities. where I can be out and about and like enjoy the weather and not have eight months of my life dictated by the temperature or the snow. I felt like in Chicago I had zero professional opportunities. I felt stuck in my apartment because it was so cold for so long. And then even in the summer when it's nice out, I did feel like a lot of the social culture was like, "Let's go drink on a patio or like let's go out to the bars or whatever. " And it just like that's not something that I like to do. I don't want to go to happy hour. sit on a patio. I don't want to have an apperal spritz. Like I just don't want to do that because I don't like to drink. So, I know for sure now that I prefer living in California, even compared to New England. I didn't have that clarity before, and I wouldn't have that clarity if I didn't actually try it. But to summarize the pros and cons, we'll start with the cons. Cons of Chicago, and I have a list here. Obviously, biggest con is the long, brutal winter. I think people really underell the severity of the winter. Obviously, if you move to Chicago, you know it's cold, but it's a difference. I think there's a big difference between knowing it's cold and enduring 6 to 8 months of cold, gray winter being inside. Like, it's just it was unbearable. It literally like I could not do it. I do think the only way to survive a Chicago winter is to leave for at least a month. So, I I'm never doing it again. Like, never say never, but like I'm never doing it again. Second con is that it's very corporate. That may not be a con to you. That is a con to me. I hate corporate America. I never want to go back. I think having a corporate job, if that's your career path, can be great. But I think we can all admit that there are a lot of negatives to corporate. It's not something that I can relate to. It's why I don't share a lot of career content anymore because I feel so separate and so outside of it at this point that like I don't feel comfortable sharing corporate advice anymore because I can't relate to it. And I had a really hard time connecting with people because I felt like a lot of conversation and discourse was around work and like I as much as I hope everybody loves their jobs like I don't want to talk about your job. Um my job either. So I think that culture like I just noticed it was a lot of business school people who were like pursuing the corporate path which again nothing wrong with that. It's just not something that I could relate to at all and I just find it very disinteresting. Number three is that most people are from the Midwest. This is not a bad thing. Obviously, I think the Midwest is a great place to live and to be from. It's just not the place for me. And because of that, everybody like already kind of knows each other. And it's just like these are my friends from childhood and college and whatever. And so it's kind of harder to infiltrate. I personally didn't have a hard time like meeting people or making friends. I think it was more just like everybody, not everybody, a lot of people from or living in Chicago like they're just Midwest lifers and it was my first experience living in the Midwest. And so I was kind of like I just feel like there's a little bit of a disconnect here. Number four, not a lot to do. Okay, you may agree with me, you may disagree with me. You're allowed to have your opinion. I found after about two or three months, I was bored. And it's because, again, I don't find joy in going to bars and trying new restaurants. Like, that's just not what I like to do. I like to be outside. And I know that now. Number five, even though it is a city, you do kind of need a car. The downside of needing a car though is that it's very expensive to have your car and the traffic is worse than LA. And people told me that before I moved there. I didn't believe them. I'm eating my words. I'm changing my mind. The traffic in Chicago was worse than the traffic in LA. And I stand by that. I also think that that's like a real thing. Like I saw that ranking. I don't know if those rankings have any real juice to them, but I saw that somewhere on Instagram. Number six, it's still expensive even though it's in the Midwest. This was the biggest shock to me. I And I stand by this. I'm just going to say it. It should not cost the same to live in the Midwest as it does to live on either coast. Period. Like enough said. The Midwest, there's no ocean. There's no coastline. The lake and the ocean are not comparable. And it just shouldn't cost, you know, three plus grand a month to live in Chicago. It shouldn't. My opinion, which I'm allowed to have. And number seven, there's nothing to do outside or around the city. Like I think that was another big culture shock for me is that in LA anywhere you go an hour 2 hours north south or east of the city there's like a whole new place to experience where in Chicago there's kind of nothing there besides the suburbs which like unless you have family there they're not really a destination like there's no need to go there. So, I just I just got bored, period. Like, I think that was really the biggest con. Cons of LA, obviously, very spread out. It's a big car city. You kind of have to have a car here, unless again, you live in a hyper specific two or three neighborhoods. And because things are very spread out, it leads to a very flaky culture, which I did not experience in Chicago. I did not feel like the culture in Chicago was flaky at all. But it is a very spread out city and I do think that that's a con. Next is obviously the homeless unhoused epidemic. It's a problem here. I'm not going to comment on that any further. And the high gas prices are another big one. But I do think that gas prices are high in any major city. So I'll leave it at that. A lot less cons of LA now that I have a different perspective. Um pros of Chicago. I'm going to be honest. I had a hard time coming up with them. I sat here for a sec thinking about it. One being the big city without the overwhelm of New York. I think is a big pro because New York is not for everyone. Um I also think New York can be a very exhausting and you know obviously exceptionally expensive place to live. Significantly more expensive than LA. So again I don't know why we don't talk about that in the same way or talk about it with the same tone. Um, so I do think the pro of Chicago is that the city is very clean for the most part and it's spread out and like structured very well, which is a pro for living in a city. Like there isn't trash all over the streets. You know, you have access to tons of restaurants. It has a beautiful skyline. So, you get that big city experience without I feel like the negatives of New York. But on the flip side of that, the energy is obviously very, very different. Like I would say Chicago doesn't feel like as crowded, which is a good thing, but it doesn't have the same life as New York. Um, the lake is nice in the summer. I enjoyed very much so walking on the lakefront trail and jumping in the lake all summer long. I think that the lake has its own beauty, not comparable to the ocean and specifically beaches of Southern California. However, the lake is beautiful. Um, the color is beautiful. It sparkles just as beautifully. I like that it has waves. It's very refreshing to jump into. Um, and I do think that the infrastructure around the lake in the city is great because it's easy to get to. It's easy to lay out there. They have beaches. They have the concrete beach. The path, it's all built up in the summer. Like, the city does come alive in the summer. And then the third pro are the seasons. That was a big thing that I missed when I lived in LA the first time and it was something that I thought about moving back here because the con of LA is that since the weather is nice every day, it can feel like Groundhog's Day. Um, but now I know that. So, I know how to prepare for it and I can appreciate the warm weather. I will miss the fall time and like cool down going into the winter because I think there's like a very special thing about wearing leggings in a hoodie and like being cozy and warm around that period like October, November. However, I will not miss the brutal winter in the super humid summer. I'll tell you that right now. Okay, pros of LA. 12 months of outside time. Like you cannot compare anywhere to LA weather. Like if you want are if you are somebody who values living your life outside and having access to good weather 12 months of the year, the only place in the US to go is Southern California. Um access to tons of stuff outside of LA. I mentioned this earlier. Two hours in any direction. You can have a weekend trip, a day trip. You have Santa Barbara. You have Ohigh. You have um San Diego, you have Orange County, you have Palm Springs, you have Joshua Tree. Like it's just endless. Five, six hours you're up to Mammoth, you can go to Yoseite. Like the state of California, and again, I don't think this is like a personal opinion. I think this is just like kind of a known thing, is the most geographically diverse state in the US. So, there's just so much to do. Number three, obviously the beaches. like I don't have to even get into that. You know, if you're looking for me this summer, I'm going to be in Malibu every [ __ ] weekend. Number four, diversity of things to do. You have access to city adjacent things, obviously, and all of the neighborhoods in LA are very unique and specific. You have access to nature. If you want to live in a quiet, more suburban part of town, that's also something you can do. That's something that I chose to do. I just feel like there's so many different things to do and again the city is so big so like it just makes things a lot easier. Number four are coffee culture. Sorry I lost my spot here. Coffee culture here is insane and obviously we have cafe looks here so that's also where I will be. Number six, entrepreneur mindset and community. For me, this is really important for the sake of my personal professional path. Being around other like-minded people who I can talk to about work and relate to about work is really important. I do feel like my business had a tangible decline last year because I had no professional community and I was not creatively inspired. I thought I would be, but I just wasn't. And here, you know, my seventh pro is that it's gorgeous. And because the city is so gorgeous, it leads to a lot of inspiration for me, and I've learned this. I need to be by the water, specifically the ocean. I need to be around beautiful scenery. I feel like it helps recharge my creative brain and my creative battery, which is obviously an essential thing for my line

### How this move will change my content [38:30]

of work. I have to be creative. coming up with new ideas and if I'm not able to do that, it makes content creation really difficult. So like if you were to look at my videos from maybe a year, a year and a half ago, the times where I felt the most inspired were was not in Chicago, like when I was in Japan or when I went home. Like that I feel like is when my content was the best. So yeah, that actually kind of leads to another thing that I think is really important to note on that I don't think fits into any of these questions, but I'll just comment on it now. When I lived in LA postco, so we'll call it LA Chapter 1 versus now we're in LA chapter 2. In LA chapter 1, I didn't go on vacation once ever. And it's because I never felt like I had to because if I was going to go somewhere, I could just get my car and I could go to Santa Barbara or like Palm Springs again. I could take a weekend trip down to San Diego. Like I did that all the time. And yeah, I guess that's like vacation, but it wasn't me getting on a plane going on a trip where I like, you know, am staying at a hotel or whatever. where in Chicago, I felt like I constantly needed to have a trip booked or have a plan because that was my way of like escaping the city where I never felt the need to escape in LA. Like I never felt like I wanted to escape my life. And I do feel like that's a very common thing in Chicago, New York, and Boston of like everybody's looking forward to their next trip to the warm weather because it's their form of escapism. And I don't want to be building a life in a place that I feel like I need to escape, if that makes sense. So on top of the fact that like I have more stuff to do here for free, I also don't have to budget for travel because I don't need to leave. So, I think that's really important to highlight. Number five here is, will my content change now that I'm back in California? Hopefully. I think for sure. Um, because I feel so much more inspired living here. Do I think obviously the topics and whatnot are going to change so severely? No. But I do think that because all of my content in Chicago, like I wasn't really filming outside, I wasn't vlogging. I didn't have people to help me film. A lot of it was just me inside my apartment talking to the camera and I didn't feel like I could film outside. I always felt like people were looking at me. Even if they weren't, that's how I felt. And here, I just like I'm going to be doing more. I feel more comfortable here. I have friends here who can help me film and capture content, who understand what I'm doing, who I don't feel necessarily like self-conscious around asking. I feel like my life is opening up in a different way. And I personally feel happier and more inspired in this environment. So naturally, it's easier for me to capture content. Even in the first couple of days of being here, I've gotten so many messages of people being like, I can just see and feel through the screen like the vibe and energy of your content is different. And it's because I feel and obviously like we're kind of in that honeymoon phase of moving, but I just feel like there's more for me here and I feel more

### How I budgeted and planned the move [42:00]

creatively driven and inspired in this environment. And again, like I don't even know how to explain it. I wouldn't have known that if I hadn't gone to Chicago. Like I want I don't regret it for a second. I think it's really important to emphasize that like just because the city of Chicago didn't necessarily like work out for me doesn't mean that it was a bad decision or a decision that I regret at all. I don't regret it at all because it gave me this clarity and perspective. Moving on, how did I budget for moving? Um, I mean, the big thing here is that I mean, I've moved before, so I had a general idea of what it was going to cost me. I had set aside at the beginning of this year a moving bucket in my high yield savings account. I use SoFi. All my favorite high yield savings accounts are always in the show notes um and in the bio of my YouTube videos. But I had set some money aside at the end of last year. I talked about this in one of my like end of year wrap-up videos, how I finished the year with a little bit of additional money that was unallocated and so I put it in my high yield savings account. Originally that was for travel. I ended up earmarking it for a potential move because at the beginning of the year I had an idea that this was something that could happen. And then over the course of the next couple of months, every time I took a distribution from my business, I just put a little bit more in there so that I had money set aside to cover all of the costs, furniture, etc. related to this should I decide to do it. I also had pulled some money to buy out my lease if that was something that I ended up having to do. Luckily, I was able to get a sublet letter, so I didn't have to do that. And I had set money aside to double pay for rent in April, which I also didn't have to do. So, if anything, I feel like I sort of netted out in a good spot. Um, but yeah, I had an idea of what the costs were going to be from prior moves, and that was really my target. When you're thinking about budgeting for moving, I just think the big thing is to always think like it's going to cost more than you think. So, put together your budget for like how much movers would cost, how much it would cost to do a U-Haul and do it on your own, how much it will cost to buy new furniture, like the replacement cost of things, because there are natural things that you have to repurchase and replace. I can maybe do a whole episode on this if you're interested. Um, so figure out what that cost is and then times it by like 1. 25 because it will always, always, always be more than you think. Number seven, how did I find my apartment? This was another very popular question. I honestly I just found it on Zillow. You know, I was on Zillow for I would say maybe two weeks before I came out to California in February, and I was just keeping my eyes on things like I checked it every day, what would pop up. Um, and this apartment happened to be available. I scheduled a tour for literally this was my I think I landed in LA at like 11:30 a. m. and my tour for this apartment was at 1:00 on the same day. Like my friend picked me up from the airport. We went to Airwan and then we came here and ultimately like I this was the first apartment I toured. I toured a couple other ones. But when I walked in here I was just like this is the one. Like I love the vibe. I love the neighborhood. everything about it was what I wanted and it just worked out. And this kind of leads into another question I got which like what was my criteria list or my non-negotiables. So one is it had to be in one of the specific neighborhoods that I chose and like they're neighborhoods of neighborhoods like it's not even like oh I want to live in Venice. It would have been like I want to live in this fiveb block radius in Venice which that's not where I live but anyways I don't even want to get into that. Um, but they had to be within the specific neighborhoods that I chose. Next is it had to be in a comparable rent range to my spot in Chicago. I opened my range $100 in either direction cuz I knew that if I went under that, I was going to have to compromise on something, but I also obviously didn't want to go way over. But sometimes when you're looking for apartments, if you increase your budget by $100, it can like completely change what your options are. And luckily, I'm in a position where I'm able to do that, which I feel very lucky about. So, I ended up increasing by like a hundred bucks. Um, next is it needed to have good natural light and character, which it very much so does. I wanted to be not necessarily in like a pre-war kind of apartment, but I think the big thing is in my high-rise apartment in Chicago, and I think this added to the lack of creativity, is I just felt like it was a soulless box. Like, I had never experienced living in a high-rise, and I was very excited to have like a modern, updated kind of apartment, but ultimately through living in it, I learned that I just like it didn't feel like a home. like I didn't really want to live in it. It just felt like a big hotel room. So, in this apartment or like my next apartment, I wanted it to feel like it had some character and like it felt homey. And I specifically wanted to have rooms because my apartment in Chicago was just one big room, which I did not like. And then I had my bedroom, but all that was in my bedroom was my bed. I didn't even have room for proper nightstands. So like I just didn't feel like I had like I felt like my whole life was lived in one room which I didn't really like where here I have my main living room, I have my bedroom, I have a dining room, I have a separate kitchen. Like everything is in its own room which is what I really wanted. And then obviously I wanted to have like beautiful windows and stuff which I was able to find. Next is it needed to be walkable to the water. That doesn't necessarily mean it needed to be two blocks from the ocean, but I needed to be able to see the ocean at some point on like my daily walk, which I was able to do. Um, it needed to have in-unit laundry. This was essential and this was something that I wasn't willing to give up and that I was also willing to pay a little extra for. I do laundry like every single day constantly because I have contamination OCD. So, I'm always doing laundry. I wash my towels like every other day. I like throwing stuff in there. I like being able to do one or two things in there if I need it. I like having laundry non-negotiable. I did tour an apartment where laundry that I really loved that had communal laundry and I ultimately changed decided not to go with it because I was like realistically this is going to annoy me and I'm going to feel like I can't do my laundry and that's just not going to work. Um needed to have updated appliances. I feel like sometimes that can be kind of hard to find here just because a lot of apartments are, you know, like vintagey. But I do feel like a lot of landlords and like management companies have started to upgrade stuff like that. So all the places that I toured had updated appliances. Safety obviously is a top priority. And then I wanted to be on a quiet street that was not a pass through street. So the neighborhood needed to be safe. I wanted to be in like a more residential area as opposed to my last apartment was in Marv Vista and I was on kind of like an apartment heavy pass through street. So, it just I had that perspective. I think, you know, that lended to my space being very loud, which was something that I very much so complained about all the time in a lot of my podcasts back then. So, the street that I chose, I

### What I learned and final reflections [50:00]

wanted to make sure it was like very, very quiet and not really a street that anybody would be going down if they didn't live here, which is how it is. What I don't have and what I had to compromise on is I don't have AC in this apartment which honestly I don't really care about because a I feel like that's pretty common in apartments especially on the west side of LA because we are closer to the ocean so like you get a little bit of a cooler temperature but B because to me that's a fixable problem like I can just get an AC unit if I feel like I really need it and everything else was like exactly what I wanted. Okay, next question. I have a couple more here. I think I have 13 questions and we're on eight. So, this is a long episode. What made me decide to move? The big one was this past winter like very much so radicalized me. Like I realized I had an epiphany where I was like, "What am I doing? Why am I spending my Saturdays at home in a place where it's like so depressing and gray when all my friends in LA are at the beach? like what actually what am I doing? My life is not meant to be like this and it doesn't have to be. So why am I doing this? Um and that was really it. And I'm a problem solver and a doer and like you know I talked to my therapist about it. I was like do we think that this is a rash decision? Whatever. And she was basically like when you first came in here the first thing you said to me was you were trying Chicago on. And that was over a year ago. So like I think it's always kind of been in the back of your mind, which maybe it was consciously, subconsciously, I'm not sure, but ultimately I had that sort of epiphany moment and I was just like I'm not doing this anymore. And as I've mentioned, my apartment allows subletters. I decided to just put some feelers out on my like apartment bulletin board to see if I could find one. Even before I decided to tour apartments out here, I got a bunch of inquiries. It really wasn't that hard to find one and I was able to find an apartment pretty quickly and everything sort of fell into place very nicely. So, yeah, it worked out. When did I decide to start thinking about moving? January. When I booked my trip to LA for February, it was something that I was already like very highly considering. I didn't want to obviously talk about it because I wasn't a 100% sure, but like quite literally the second that I stepped foot in this apartment, I was like, "This is the one. " Number 10. Am I sad to miss Chicago summer? No, not at all. Because I don't feel any sort of emotional attachment to the city of Chicago and I don't have to enjoy the summer because now I have summer 247. Um, next is what did I learn about myself in Chicago? I think the big thing is I learned two big things. One is I learned what I actually want out of my life which I think is really important. Um, I don't want to be cold and miserable. I want to be warm and glowy and I have the opportunity to do that. and I want to be in a place where I have endless activities, where I can explore my hobbies and have access to the things that I love. Um, but also what I learned about myself is that I can desenter dating and societal expectations of me and still have like a very full life. I feel like I was floundering a lot when I moved to Chicago because as I mentioned earlier in this episode, I was like, I'm turning 30. I'm single. I feel like if I say in California I'll never get married. And I think that was more of a mindset thing than a true reality to be completely honest. Um and I think a big part of that was I really did need to go to therapy and I did do that in Chicago. And I think that I probably wouldn't have done that if I hadn't pushed myself to a whole different place because I don't know what exactly the catalyst was for me to book it. I think it was like I was having a hard time adjusting and because it like wasn't the right place for me. Um, but ultimately we worked through a lot of my like limiting beliefs and you know how I think my life is supposed to be and what other people are projecting onto me and are these the things that I really want and do I have to have kids and does my life have to look like that? And I think the biggest thing that I learned is like my life can be what I choose for it to be and I have free will and I can choose how I want to live and it doesn't matter what other people think so long as I'm happy and I can say like pretty confidently at this point I'm very happy with this decision. I feel very optimistic about the things that I can do with my life now. I feel like there's so many things in LA that I want to do and I like I have so much travel this spring that I feel like I can't almost can't even settle in quite yet and I'm just so excited to be here truly. Um, last two questions here. Did I ever consider living in another neighborhood in Chicago? No. I don't think that moving to another neighborhood would have changed my experience tangibly enough to change my opinion on the city. Um, so no, in my mind if I was going to move, move because moving is annoying. And number 13, did I consider moving to any other cities or anywhere else in California? And the answer to that question is no. The only other pl I I'm very open to living in other cities in California, which I've mentioned. I just don't think right now is exactly the time to do that. In a perfect world, you know, I would love to see myself kind of begin migrating south over the next couple of years because I love Orange County and San Diego. I think the lifestyle down there is amazing. Even, you know, I'd be open to moving north as well to like the Bay Area if that's where my life takes me. I'm very open. The only other state that I'll live in outside of California is Massachusetts cuz that's where my family is. So, I'm not trying on any other cities. states. I don't want to do any more full reboots. I've done it enough. I can make friends anywhere and I can be anywhere, but I'm choosing to be here. So, we're going to wrap this episode up. Hopefully, you enjoyed. Hopefully, this clarified things. And hopefully in the times where I was a little more firm, you understand where I'm coming from. Sometimes I just feel like it's hard to communicate how you actually feel online because like you have to be thoughtful of everybody else. But there's no other way for me to just say it. So remember, we can all have our own opinions, experiences, perspectives. Just because I have one doesn't mean yours is wrong or invalid or whatever. And vice versa. If you live in Chicago and you love it, I am so happy for you. And if you live in LA and you love it, I'm also so happy for you. And if you live anywhere else and you love it, I'm also so happy for you. I hope with every fiber in my being that everybody finds the right place for them and has the confidence to make the right decisions. So anyways, shouts to Roadway. You're the best. I will make sure that the details for all of that are also in the description if you are interested in checking out Roadway. Obviously, I highly recommend them. The next time I move, I will be using Roadway again. And with that, I will catch you next week. Actually, my episode next week is filmed, pre-f filmed from Chicago. So, that will be the last one, I think, in that apartment. Anyways, talk to you later. Bye.