I have always thought KC's greatest asset is "it's cheap" and it is. It's location also makes it easy and inexpensive to access both coasts and all of the midwest. It's a great city to live in if you want to see the country on a budget and I did just that.
I think KC is a great city, but I can also see why so many people choose to pay crazy prices for homes and live elsewhere. KC prices actually need to go up, especially urban areas. Houses in urban KCMO are just so cheap, too cheap. West Plaza homes go for 150k. In most major cities houses in an urban area like that would be much higher and typically urban areas like that will be much more desirable and in demand than most suburbs. Till there is more demand and it's as popular to live in urban KCMO vs Overland Park, I don't see a lot of new urban core construction for a while in KCMO. Everybody in KC might have a cheap mortgage, but I have learned that people in KC spend a freaking ton more on those cheap houses. That's why there is a home depot or lowes every couple of miles in metro KC. People go crazy with homes. I did the same thing. Now I'm less interested in that and so is everybody else. It's just different.
So my plan to live on the east coast and then go to the west coast or Denver for a while should be just fine because I don't think KC will change a whole lot in the next decade or two. I will be back and maybe by then, the city will have changed enough for me to really be interested in it again like I was while growing up there.
I do tell everybody about KC though and really enjoy showing off the city to people out here. People out here have no idea what KC is like, how big it is, the topography of the area, the attractions it has etc. So many people really do think "Kansas" and rural when they think KC. I honestly don't even understand how so many people think the city is so small and rural, Kansas or not. But I can make jaws drop by showing them photos and that's when I miss KC's good assets, which it does have plenty. I'm just enjoying some time away for a while
![Smile :)](./images/smilies/icon_smile.gif)