This is a telling essay based on a conversation with Jeffrey Vonderhaar, a medical equipment business owner who is in the process of relocating from Calabasas, California, to the Houston suburbs. Business Insider verified the property's price. This essay has been edited for length and clarity.
I moved to California in 1998 from Dallas, Texas and moved to Calabasas about 14 years ago. I have been running my current company since 2003.
Our company has a manufacturing side that makes prosthetic limbs and a physical therapy side, and we also manufacture post-operative rehabilitation medical equipment for orthopedic surgeons, spine surgeons, and others. He has a three-division company here, and I've been working there for a long time.
Pre-COVID-19, we had 33 employees. Now I'm down to 13 people, plus nine more that we have under contract.
California has served me well and this industry has certainly served me well, but it's just amazing. It's tough. It is difficult to survive not only as a resident but also as a business owner.
We buy a house north of Houston and move to Texas, which is much more business-friendly. We are driven by a myriad of issues and reasons.
California has too many rules and regulations for business.
California has many rules and regulations that are constantly changing. Taxes are never-ending. And, of course, prices are rising across the country. My home insurance doubled last year. It never ends. Forever, ever, ever.
But when people are giving away money, you have to find some way to get it back. And they tend to take advantage of people who have deeper pockets or are perceived to have deeper pockets, like corporations, and they just siphon off that money.
There are people being kicked out of California. If you're going to push out his 5% of his 10% paying taxes, you have to dig deeper and pick up that income from future people. So they're not going to stay with people making $400,000. They're not going to stay with people who make $200,000. They're going to go down to people who are making $50,000, $40,000, $30,000. It's inevitable.
I have two boys, ages 10 and 12. Due to COVID-19, we ended up moving into the private school system primarily because of all the rules and regulations that were in place. Their new school is a great environment. But outside of that bubble and the people we met, the Los Angeles metropolis is a bit of a scary environment.
Homeless people are littering there. I feel sorry for them. It's true. But the government must step up and respond to their needs. We recently witnessed someone walking around naked on the streets of Woodland Hills.
I have specifically experienced 3 break-in attempts at my business, and numerous at businesses around me.
There are Winnebagos around the corner of the business park where my business is located. They've been here for over a year now. So I won't let my wife stay here after 5 o'clock. I can't have a female employee stay there past 5 o'clock without a man coming out the door.
As a salesperson, traffic in California was always a problem. Several team members drive here and there. It can be a bit of a nightmare in terms of scheduling and logistics, but never mind that it's expensive at about $5.50 per gallon. I had to go to Beverly Hills and it took 1 hour and 17 minutes each way.
I don't want to completely bash California. It was very, very helpful to us. It's a beautiful condition that drives people into the ground and forces them out.
In Texas we got a big house with lots of open space
I have been doing business in Texas since 2016. We didn't push it that much. And now we're trying to change that.
My employees are really great, so I'm going to keep the business that I do in California, but I have to have a sustainable business for them in the future. And I don't think it will expand as much in California as it does in other areas. So we're focusing on another state, specifically Texas.
We looked at a house in Texas as an investment property in November and thought, “In the future, once my kids graduate, I want a place where my wife and I can escape and retire.” But then we thought. “Why are we waiting? Why are we prolonging the inevitable?” We thought about it for about a week and decided to take action.
We purchased a 5,400 square foot home on 4 acres for $1,275,000 with all the bells and whistles. It's located north of Houston. It's on the pond. It is a gated community with large open spaces. It's truly a wonderful land. There is a pool, barn, greenhouse, and chicken coop. 15 minutes from all kinds of stores and shopping malls.
We were there for 10 days around Christmas and I think some of our neighbors came to introduce themselves. Since we were not home, she left us a card with the children's names, ages at school, cell phones, and that she was looking forward to meeting them.
While the boys were sitting by the pond, another neighbor walked up with a card containing a plate of homemade cookies. I mean, it's like what you read in books or see in movies. But it was actually real life. So I thought, “We made the right choice.”
Moving to Texas is disrupting my business. Because I have to have a second front. But the rewards will be much greater, and they will be greater for my family. That's everything. Everything I do is for them.
Look, there are beautiful memories, beautiful nostalgic memories of our time in California. many. My children grew up here. It's time to close this chapter and open a new one.
I will be back again. It would be a wonderful place not only to live but also to visit.
