This is looking South from the most Southern point of Auwatukee. All desert from here. This is the Gila River Indian Community.
A beautiful view of the South Mountains from the I-10 going North. These are the mountains that separate Phoenix from Auwatukee.
Sun getting ready to set.
Wouldn't be that hard to get up and go to work each day if this was your view getting onto the highway.
My only souvenier.
This is coming over the bridge from Scottsdale into Tempe as you go over Tempe Town Lake. Tempe Town Lake is man-made and has an inflatable dam on 3 sides. If there is ever extemely heavy rainfall for days on end, they deflate the dams and let the water flow through the Salt River which normally has a dry riverbed. This is the ASU stadium on the right. This is where the Fiesta Bowl is played each year where Ohio State won the National Championship. Ohio State has played here for their bowl game 3 of the last 4 years.
A closer look.
This is a very nice picture driving up Campus drive towards the stadium and the heart of campus.
This is further up Campus drive. You can see the mountain at the end of the road. This is the mountain that you see next to the stadium in the first picture. It has the Arizona State "A" on its side.
This is in the heart of campus.
This is type of property in Auwatukee. This city is almost all residential and is still considered a part of Phoenix. This is on the south side and is separated from downtown Phoenix and the airport by the South Mountains. This is just a part of the mountains in the background right behind this house...the foothills. Very nice homes in this area and it is still close to central Tempe.
This is the house for rent. This rents for $1100 I think. It is very nice on the outside and has nice property. The neighborhood is great. The inside was a mess though. The landlord said there were replacing all the flooring and carpet, but it was very dirty inside. They had paneling ripped off from behind the sink/dishwasher island and it was just a mess. There are also two bedrooms on top of the garage which would be very hot I am sure.
Very nice looking home and property. Auwatukee was a very beautiful area.
This home is for rent in Chandler. Chandler is south of Tempe and is starting to get a little further out. If we were to work in Phoenix, this would be the farthest out we could go. With all the business outside of downtown though, I don't think we would end up having to drive into downtown. This house rents for $1200 a month. It is very nice.
This is the back of the house looking from the corner of the backyard.
Looks are deceiving here. This pool is very small, but the pool maintenance is included in the rent price. The pool pretty much takes up the whole back yard.
This is the view inside the back porch window into the open kitchen. A lot of the houses have an open kitchen like this because it saves space. They don't have to build up a whole separate room. It makes the homes look more spacious too. The bedrooms are off to the side and the hallway is leading to the front living room.
This is a home for rent about a mile into Phoenix from Scottsdale. This was a decent neighborhood, but this house the the few next to it were pretty run down. The rent on this place is $1050 a month and you can get really nice rental homes in the suburbs for $1200 a month. Again, you are paying for location, but I don't know who wants to live in this shack.
Check out the homes going up the side of the mountain on the right hand side. These are huge homes $1 million and up I am sure. The area is beautiful.
This is the main road leading around Camelback Mountain. This is considered part of Paradise Valley. Paradise Valley has mostly larger homes with much more land than other suburbs. The only thing that separates it from Phoenix is the mountain.
This house is along the way. You can see there is much more property around these houses.
This is the main highway driving into Scottsdale from Mesa. All of the highways are new, just like this. Once you are up higher on the highways, the views are amazing.
View of Camelback Mountain from the highway. Camelback Mountain is a small mountain that divides downtown Phoenix and Scottsdale. There are beautiful homes around the mountain, which is considered Paradise Valley.
Apartments in West Scottsdale. They have tons of apartment communities all over the suburbs. Most of them are pet friendly, have private entry-ways, and have enormous luxury resort style pools. Most have more than one pool as well.
There are golf courses everywhere. There are probably 20 in Scottsdale alone.
More apartments in Scottsdale.
This is a sample of what I saw in the closer areas of Mesa. There really isn't much to see in this suburb. There are a lot of Pawn shops, some strip clubs, and smaller/run down apartments. We won't end up in Northwest Mesa. The amazing thing is that even the poorer cities are still pretty clean.
This is just one of the Bank of America facilities outside of downtown Phoenix. Downtown Phoenix does not have a ton of skyscrapers like other big cities. The city negotiates with companies and offers them incentives to build in suburbs. So you find a lot of corporate headquarters and other large facilities like this all over the Phoenix-Tempe area. This one is in Mesa, the furthest West suburb of Phoenix.
This first home is in North Tempe which is right on the border of Scottsdale. We aren't really looking in this area. The houses are pretty old and the neighborhood is a little ghetto. This house is probably a little under $200,000. I just put it in here for comparison. This one is all about location!
This second home is in South Tempe. A house like this is probably about $250,000 or $260,000. This style home usually has a decent sized backyard. The house is a little older but you are paying for the location too. Tempe is a great area. Notice the green grass.
Check out the green grass here. Some homes have irrigation systems built in.
