Mesa, Arizona

Mesa feels more like an outdoor haven that happens to have access to a city rather than a city that happens to have access to the outdoors. In Arizona, warm weather means we enjoy hikes, bikes, and trips to the river in t-shirts while relatives up north and out east huddle around fireplaces. Usery Mountain Park understandably gets the most attention due to its beautiful landscapes and 3,500+ acres of outdoor adventures. This includes long backpacking trips, horseback rides, and family BBQ spaces. Nearby Saguaro Lake and additional local parks fill out the options for outdoor activities.

On the other hand, if you can’t handle summer temps that consistently clip 110 Fahrenheit/ 40 Celsius, Mesa is probably not for you. Mesa doesn't have a ton of shade, little grows here after all. Nothing is growing here. The air quality also isn’t great, in part due to the necessity of cars created by the extreme sprawl of the city. Mesa is one of the poster children for unsustainable desert cities. Those inclined to think about things like environmental sustainability probably aren’t the ones considering moving here in the first place, however, as Mesa is one of the most right-leaning cities in the country.

Mesa is the third largest city by population in the country without a significant downtown. This makes the lifestyle feel decidedly suburban. The city is working hard to change that though with a major housing and commercial district building effort that started in the late 2010’s. Apartments, condo developments, family housing and tons of new businesses are building the core traffic the area needs to support a restaurant and bar scene. Right now most people head to Scottsdale or Phoenix if they’re looking to “trip the light fantastic” but if you stick around it looks like that’s going to change.

If you want to check out what locals in Mesa get up to here's the calendar of events.

The Mesa economy is exploding. It is strongest in tech and healthcare. Data centers from Google and Apple are popping up all over the area which means all sorts of engineering, technician and operational data center jobs are in high demand. Engineers of all kinds are also in high demand. Electrical for the tech construction and civil for overseeing civic growth. Education is also a huge employment category as Mesa is the largest school district in the state. As with many affordable cities in the southwest, south central and southeast there are long haul wfh’ers moving her to take advantage of the low costs and warm weather.