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Moving to Houston, TX

mototopo

Well Known Member
Hi all,
after long thinking with my family we decided to give a substantial change to our lives. We'll move to Houston from Italy this summer!

Unfortunately this means I have to sell my RV-7 project (by the way, it has been on hold for the last couple of years due family/job/money difficulties) but I hope I can continue to be a member of the RV comunity (who knows.. maybe in the future I'll start over again!)

Any advice for a new Houston resident? :eek:
 
WELCOME

I live on the north side of Houston. Plenty of RV's at Conroe airport and EAA 302. There is usually a monthly meeting for lunch in the Houston area. Plenty of activity to the south and west as well. I'm sure they will chime in.
 
Welcome to Texas! This will be very different from Avellino and will be a great place to have an RV and fly. There is so much to see that can be easily reached by an RV that I would suggest taking the money you get selling your kit and look into buying a flying RV-6 so you can explore the US. A decent one can be bought for ~$50K.

The cost of living and cost of flying in the US is so much less than Europe you should take advantage of it. 100LL in the Houston area is around $3.20 a gallon (about .78 euro per liter).

Just my thought after moving to several countries.

Regards - TJ
 
Comment from Southeast Houston. The "Houston area" is pretty diverse and sprawling. 125 km from Conroe to Galveston. Ranges from coastal in the southeast to wooded in the north and eastern parts. Prairies on the west side. Plenty of growing, renewed urban in the central areas as well. Spend some significant time researching before committing to one area.

Also, there's still a buyers market in the US for airplanes. I would imagine you could find a good deal on an outright purchase or partnership on a small GA plane fairly easily here. Housing is still a little soft. Particularly where the flat energy sectors have caused stress (west side?). East side is booming with chemical manufacturing. Entire area is doing very well with infrastructure and institutional work.

Be glad to answer specific questions if you like. Been in Houston 28 years.
 
Hi guys, thank you for all your replies.

I'll probably settle in Cypress because there are some friends of my wife that live there and that will give us some help for the first busy period (house rental, driving license, school enrollment for our daughter , job searching, shopping for a couple of cheap but working cars...) so I'm afraid I'll not be able to buy an aircraft for the first period :(

By the way, sooner or later I'll need to contact a local flight school to convert my EASA PPL license to FAA and, eventually, continue the training to achieve a CPL +ME +IR (my dream in the not-so-far future is to find a decent job in the GA market). Any advice?
 
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Hi guys, thank you far all your replies.

I'll probably settle in Cypress because there are some friends of my wife that live there and that will give us some help for the first busy period (house rental, driving license, school enrollment for our daughter , job searching, shopping for a couple of cheap but working cars...) so I'm afraid I'll not be able to buy an aircraft for the first period :(

By the way, sooner or later I'll need to contact a local flight school to convert my EASA PPL license to FAA and, eventually, continue the training to achieve a CPL +ME +IR (my dream in the not-so-far future is to find a decent job in the GA market). Any advice?

Not advice per se, but the Pilots of America Forum (aka the Blue Board), http://www.pilotsofamerica.com/community/forums , has a lot of info related to the GA job market as it is one of the largest aviation forums out there so it covers a much larger spectrum of the GA community than VAF does.
 
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Claudio,
My big sister lives in Katy, TX (west Houston). Lived there about 40 years, so if you need 'a local' for Houston questions, please feel free to reach out.
v/r,
dr
 
Claudio

We have a builders group that meets monthly. That will help motivate you. I am based at EYQ northwest part of town. We have 3 RV's on the field. Watch here on VAF for meetings when they get announced.

Welcome to Htown
Daryl
 
Well, a lot of good stuff has been covered already, so I'll just say: I hope you don't like hills, 'cause we don't have any in Houston. On the plus side, if you can get 10' off the ground, you can see thunderstorms coming about an hour away.

Also, get ready to become intimately acquainted with the technology of air conditioning. It's about the only thing that makes this city habitable for six months out of the year.
 
Wow

Claudio
Sooner or later we will follow you.
With a bit of envy.... Here my biggest good luck .
Don't forget to update us about your new life.
LC
 
Doug: thank you very much, sooner or later I'm sure I'll need some in-depth informations, I'll let you know.

DarylT: I'll plan to attend to your monthly meetings....by car :( Thanky our for the invitation

N546RV: That's something I'll miss a lot. I come from a small town surrounded by mountains... I'll need a little bit of time to accustom to the new landscape and... I'm already packing my summer clothes :eek:

Lucio: Ciao Lucio... la decisione ti assicuro è stata difficile, un cambiamento radicale... ma è anche emozionante pensando alle nuove opportunità. Ti farò sapere :)

Do someone has any suggestion for a good flight school in the area?
 
KCXO

40+ RV's at KCXO located in Conroe, TX. Houston is 40 mi south of Conroe. You don't have to wait for our monthly meeting. Something going on every day. Just show up!
 
Cypress

Hi Claudio,

Cypress has 2 local non-towered puplic airports KEYQ (with Flight School) and T51, Close by there is a Class D airport KDWH with multiple flight schools to choose from. I'm based at KEYQ along with Daryl above, unfortunately Daryl is getting to the age he can't count anymore, we have 4 RV's on the field 2 RV-7A's, 1 RV-6 and 1 RV-4, sorry Daryl:)
You will enjoy Cypress, I've been living in the area for 15 years, Moved here from Scotland 20 years ago so I know what your facing.

Looking forward to meeting you once you get here.
 
I moved to friendswood on the south side about a year ago. There are about a dozen rv's around here. I have an rv6. Houses sell for $250-$600k, friendswood has #1 school system in houston, ranked second safest town in Texas and is a 20 minute drive to houston/hobby airport. It is hot, flat and the winds are rarely ever calm, but you will get acclaimated to it. Welcome to houston
 
It looks like there are more RV in Houston than in whole Italy!!! One more reason to come there!! :D

Thank you for your inputs, any information is welcome.

I hope to have the opportunity to meet all of you in person once there, one of my first need will be find new friends :)
 
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Check out KLVJ South of Hobby

We more that 14 RV's of all variants located at Pearland Regional Airport. Come down we would love to visit with you.

Mike
 
Texas is an awesome state, it has almost everything anyone would want for climate. In the east side they get a good bit of water and on the west side it is desert.
The Houston area is quite humid and warm during the summer months but the winter months it rarely get below 40F degrees.
My wife's brother lives in the Austin area and maybe some day I will be able to talk my wife into moving down there so we can also bath in the sun. Up here in Minnesota many of the days either winter or summer are covered with clouds and many times the clouds are so low VFR is out and IFR is in.
I hope you enjoy your move to Houston. Be careful not to go swimming in the water areas south east of Houston there are alligators in them.. Great fishing though..
 
We don't have those kind of animals here!!!!

...I just hope there are not so many spiders....(I'm arachnofobic!!) ...if there are, please don't tell it!!! :eek:
 
Alligators?? Ouch!!! :eek:
There alligators in that water? Nah.

20150316_135742.jpg


Came across this little ~12-14 footer in Armand Bayou last Spring Break. Great kayaking area near Clear Lake and the space center.
 
Welcome to Houston! Being from Brooklyn the one thing you can't get here is good Italian food. I miss that. Although every other year my family (Sicilians) make about 400 jars of fresh sauce. Takes all day and about a case of wine keeps us going, But it's a great time. Been on here for years and getting ready to pull the trigger (you will get used to that as well ""lots of guns in Texas) on an RV10. I am based out of David Wayne Hooks (KDWH) and have a Christen Eagle II, aerobatic biplane. Hope to see ya.
Mark
 
Ok... I'll stay away from the water!

Hi Mark, making homemade fresh sauce is, unfortunately, a tradition that we are going to loose.. Not so many people still have the time (and patience) to do it.
About Italian food, well, I'll miss it a lot. Fortunately, my wife cooks very well. I'm sure we'll be able to find all the needed ingredients... you are all invited for a homemade true Italian lasagna! :D

Hope to get a ride in the Christen Eagle!!!
 
Claudio,

Welcome to Houston.

One thing you should be prepared for is that native Houstonians, and longtime transplants, have a very different sense of distance.

The Greater Houston area is over 10,000 square miles (26,000 square km) so we think nothing of driving 35 to 50 miles (56 to 80 km) to a store or restaurant. We also tend to refer to any distance under 25 miles (40 km) as just around the corner or just down the street.
 
Hi Rattler,
thank you for the information.

I come from a small city where "around the corner" means exactly that... you can go from one extreme of the city to another in no more than 20 minutes!
 
Here I am!

Finally, after months of preparation and tons of documents, I arrived in the US on the beginning of August. Now that some of the most important things are done, I'm starting looking around for a good flight school.

I live in Cypress and I read good online reviews about "The Flight School Inc." at Weiser Airpark that is just a couple of miles away from my home. Any feedback on this school?
Any other suggestion?
 
The Flight School

I also live in Cypress a couple miles from Wieser. I learned to fly there back in the 90's before the flight school changed its name. I would say that it is a very friendly place, the whole airport is very friendly. The flight school won the AOPA recommended flight school award 2 years running, if you learn to fly there you will be a master of cross wind landings as the prevailing winds are north/south while the runway east/west 09-27.
There are 4 RV's, on the field including mine.
Good Luck in your search.
 
I grew up in Houston once upon a time. I hope you like heat, humidity, mosquitoes, traffic, and cockroaches. The summers are very hot, the winters surprisingly cold, but the other two weeks of the year are fine.

The people are lots better than the above, of course!

:)

Ed
 
Jim, thank you for the information. I'll manage to go there in person to give look.

Ed, heat and humidity are terrible...I hope I'll get used to them asap! Not so many mosquitoes so far (at least, not so many more than I'm used to in south Italy) and just found only one cockroach :D
 
Welcome

Welcome to Cypress Claudio! I am one of the of 4 RV's at EYQ. See you around the airport some time.
 
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