Where is the worst place you have ever lived?

I was recently thinking about the stint I did in southern Florida several years ago and how it literally was one of the worst experiences of my life. I am from Northern New York and in my first year of college my parents decided to split up and then move to different parts of the east coast. I decided to stay up here void of any family and finish school. A little bit into the winter my terrible garbage Dodge Neon had it's back windshield shatter into tiny pieces because of how cold it got and I was out of a ride to school as I wasn't living on campus. My mother who was living in West Palm Beach, Florida convinced me to drop out and come down to Florida to live with her, living there to get my residency and then completing school there. My then girlfriend and now wife moved across the entire country down to what is essentially the equator. I then got and apartment in a town called Lake Worth which is just south of West Palm proper, though anyone who has ever been on the south eastern coast of Florida will know that it is literally 80 miles of city so "towns" are just fake lines drawn on a map and not like single instances of people living in a community. Now I'm from a small town in NY of roughly 27,000 people so when I moved to a larger city I was pretty ignorant to like how large cities work. Apparently Lake Worth is 34th on the top 100 most dangerous cities in the country. I didn't do any research on areas and I literally looked at that one apartment and took it the same day (granted I was 18 and in idiot)! I actually managed to spend 8 months in that hell hole before I managed to get my shit together and move back to NY, where I have been ever since.

I learned a lot about living in an actual city, which was a huge change for me. I also learned that I hate almost everything about Florida. It is hot as hell every day all year and the culture of selfishness that permeates almost every facet of that state drove me nuts. I once witnessed a grown man beat the shit out of a homeless man at a gas station because he asked the guy for a dollar. The city of West Palm has a very segregated feel to it, old wealthy people live in beautiful gated communities guarded by dudes with guns, while everyone else slums it in the increasingly more run down city. Needless to say I was very happy to move back home and I feel I learned a lot about the world around me and gained a good appreciation for the small town I grew up in that throughout my adolescence I felt I was "too good for."

All in all, I am very happy I moved back and am now finishing my bachelors in Software Engineering at Oswego State, I learned a lot of lessons and now know that I will never ever live in Florida again.

Does anyone else have a horror story of moving to a new area that you then found out was hell?

I grew up in the eastern area of LA (mission hills and what not- moved around a lot but around there).

It's a shit hole. Compared to just about everywhere else I've lived (except places devoured by war which I won't count) it's seriously the worst place. I went on vacation down to Anaheim earlier this year and just going into LA a few times made me sick. Ugh. My nostalgia was used up on that one, I may never need to go back there ever again.

Kenyon Way in Little Hulton. Shit hole council estate where I was raised. It's weird, when I look at Little Hultons Wiki page it makes it look like a pretty nice place. Theres a nice picture of St Pauls church. It calls it a suburban village as opposed to a loose collection of 4 estates filled with piss poor people who were moved in from Lower Broughton and similar places years ago. The LH I know is full of burned out buildings and dead-eyed crack heads in tracksuits. But hey, Chris Eccleston is from here! He played Dr Who!

Planet Earth.

Fuck this place.

@cornbredx: Every person I have ever talked to who ever spent any amount of time in LA never seems to say anything good about it lol

Certain parts of North London are so fucking scummy and depressing it is unreal. Full of cheap, dodgy shops with dirty shop signs and litter everywhere, paint peeling off walls and generally just really unpleasant to be in. They are full of gangs too or assholes who want to sound like they are in gangs. It feels like you could get robbed most of the time. I guess all cities have bad areas but it still sucks. The place I actually live is slightly better but is surrounded with these shit areas.

Oh man, where do I begin? I had a couple of rather rough periods in my life that lead to living in some shitty or just unpleasant places. There were the institutional places like residential treatment facilities and psychiatric units, the depressing places like the YMCA, a couple of shelters and a dingy tiny apartment above a pizza place that didn't play well with my paranoia and freakouts at the time, and finally straight up homeless in an alley. And that's just the worst of it.

On the bright side, that was a long time ago, and I made it out the other side pretty undamaged. I have an irrational hatred of fluorescent lights, industrial cleaning products, and a number of people who worked in RTFs at the time (okay, that last one isn't irrational), but that's about it. If nothing else, I have stories for days about that time in my life.

What is a council estate?

@physicalscience: It's social housing for poor people. I guess the US version of that would be a project building? Basically a neighborhood full of low rent, local government owned accommodation.

@physicalscience: The only good thing I have to say about it is it's the only place I've ever lived where you can get amazingly good authentic Mexican food from some small little hole in the wall places that don't look like they have as amazing food as they do.

Seriously, most other places that sell Mexican food are put to shame after eating at those places.

But ya, LA sucks. The pollution alone is thick enough to legitimately make you sick if you stay there too long. It's not a place I recommend even vacationing to.

Anaheim is alright, though, and it's near all the places you'd wanna go to out there anyway.

I didn't necessarily move to a new city or anything but the first time I moved out of my childhood neighborhood was hell. My parents left NY and moved to Arizona. I wanted to stay in NY because I was doing well at my job and I had plenty of friends I wanted to be around. I moved to a new apartment that was much cheaper and nicer. After finding the apartment online, I went to meet the owner of the home and she kinda looked like Mimi from the Drew Carey show. It was definitely weird but I went through with it anyway.

Things immediately started to get weird as I was moving my stuff. I gave her the check for the deposit but I guess in my rush I forgot to sign it. I was loading and unloading the uhaul almost until 4am and every 30 minutes I got a text from her asking if I was done so I can sign the check. I continuously told her that I would sign the check once I was done with the move because I did not want to have to pay for too many days of using the Uhaul.

I collapsed on my mattress that night and woke up a few hours later to finish up cleaning up my old apartment... I was greeted by her two HUGE pitbulls at the front gate who seriously looked like they wanted to tear me apart. They were tied to the gate with super thick rope and huge chains. Now let me set the record straight and say that I'm not discriminating against pitbulls. I have one myself and he is the kindest, friendliest, most obedient dog ever. So really it just threw me off to see the complete opposite in hers. I later found out that she is absolutely crazy about her dogs and all I ever heard was her screaming at them and scolding them like if they were real people. I came home later in the day and the dogs were still outside but this time untied. I opened the gate (before i noticed they were not tied) and they dashed towards me. I quickly shut the gate and they both banged their heads on the gate. She completely flipped out that I "smacked them in the face with the gate." Get over it, lady..
A few days passed and every time I got home, she would call me or text me to ask me if I was the one that went through the door. Did she seriously always think someone was breaking in? I also bought a new cellphone and had it shipped to that house and somehow the package was "lost" even though someone signed for it according to the tracking. -_-

Finally, since I was still setting up the apartment and did not have all my internet or anything set up yet, I would often stay and sleep at my girlfriend's apartment. Especially since I didn't want to hear Mimi screaming at her dogs all night. Plus, my own dog was saying with my girlfriend at the time. Whenever I did this, I would still head back to the apartment before going to work because I also have two Guinea Pigs. They always have tons of food and water just in case one day I couldn't make it to the apartment before work.

Apparently, this lady did not know anything about guinea pigs and did not know the wheeking sounds they make. I got a call at 5:30 a.m. from her saying, "OH MY GOD! YOUR ANIMALS ARE SCREAMING! THEY'RE SCREAMING SO LOUD! I hope you don't mind but I went into your apartment and went up to check on them. by the way you should really throw out all those boxes in the living room if you're done moving. Also, my daughter thinks they're cute, can she keep them?" I drove immediately to the apartment and the guinea pigs were just fine but I was so pissed that she entered my apartment. I took the cage and took them over to my girlfriend's apartment immediately before they could be stolen. At this point I figured this lady is nuts and she might try to find different excuses every single time to enter my apartment if she has the keys. There were occasionally times where I saw things out of place so I think she did it often.

Once the guinea pig incident happened, I immediately packed all my stuff and moved out. As I loaded the uhaul to move my stuff, she continuously apologized for the apartment entry. I just ignored it and went on my way.

@planetfunksquad: Okay yea that is what I assumed it was, the word estate just had me sort of confused.

@physicalscience: Yeah, it's probably a name they were given to make them sound less shitty than they are ha.

I've lived in the same city more or less my whole life. Cant really complain.

My third and fourth years of college were spent in a variety of questionable dorms. The first was literally a converted broom closet in an abandoned old people's home. The place had hardly been renovated, and all the old fixtures were still present, including the grungiest shower and bath I've ever seen.

My second dorm there was in a condemned sorority house that had been converted into a temporary men's dorm because of overflow. It might have been kind of cool back in the day - there were two full rooms and I had my own bathroom, along with a loft-type area I used for storage. But it was clearly against all sorts of health codes for us to be living there, as the heaters rarely worked properly, the water in the bathrooms was questionable at best, and half the building was empty and locked down due to age and structural problems. It was demolished three days after that semester ended.

My third and final shithole of those days was on the floor above a frat's level in the dorms. While the accomodations were much nicer than what I was used to, living above a bunch of useless bro-bro-bro tools and their non-stop bullshit was not what I needed my last semester or two.

Most of my adult rentals have been okay, but I did live in one house where the floors were entirely tiled, the wood fireplace was by the backdoor in a spot where it couldn't possibly heat the entire house, and the door frames were so warped that any time even the slightest breeze kicked up, it crept in. All of that would be okay if I didn't live in an area where temperatures drop to -20.

That is fucking wild man, glad to see things are much better for you

I currently live in a large Victorian house that has been converted into three different apartments. My landlady is the nicest lady in the world and the best landlord I have ever had; that being said, she does sometimes just walk into my house, whether I am home or not. A good friend of mine lives in the apartment above me with his girlfriend and she likes to walk around up there naked for some reason. Needless to say my landlady has not walked into either of our apartments un-announced since she walked in on my friends naked girlfriend lol.

Florida and LA seems to be both top choices...and I have been near both.

Looking back I noticed I live in "off the city" places pretty often. Lived in southern Miami before and 45min off LA (who actually live IN LA anyways!?). Now "off" SF.

Can't say any of them stand out from being the worst nor good either. Different stages of life and looking back probably contribute to varying priority and the likes.

If I have to pick a place I will not want to go back to it is probably Florida. Terrible weather, backwater feel, social and economical doesn't fit what I want, looking back it is quite weird since I didn't really hate the place, but now I definitely don't want to go back.

LA, traffic hell, but pretty convenient at a places.

SF, slightly less traffic, less convenient than LA, rent/house prices are insane.

Honestly I've been blessed to never really live in a bad area. I guess when I was a kid we stayed in a bad neighborhood while our house was being built elsewhere. But I'm only 18 and still live with my parents, so I still got a lot of time to live in bad places.

On another note, I love Florida. I've spent the last 14 years in northwestern Florida and northeastern Florida. The people are very kind. Seriously last week I lost my wallet which had my social security card in it at a Wal-Mart and within ten minutes somebody turned it in with everything still in it. Another benefit is the amount of great theme parks. Also you are never far from a beach, which might be the best part of living here. The weather in general is great. While it can get pretty hot and humid here in the summer, I will gladly deal with that over the snow up north during winter. One thing I do hate about how bipolar Florida is when it comes to rain. It will switch between pouring rain and beautiful sunlight multiple times a day. But overall, I love Florida and wouldn't want to live anywhere else.

Queensland, Australia. Fuck that backwards, conservative, corrupt state. A banana republic in all but constitution. Beautiful beaches and coastal living but apart from a select few, is generally full of shitty people and even shittier politicians with very narrow worldviews.

Ah yes, the "oh god the sun is burning me alive" and then 15 minutes later "why the fuck are hail falling on my head."

@cubidog1: lol I remember some sundays I would look outside and see it looked nice and clear out, get ready for the beach and get everyone else to get ready for the beach, then walk outside to the car and see a giant thunderstorm/rain cloud heading toward me. That place can really get some heavy as hell rain out of nowhere. I have been back to Florida since I left to visit family and I have smoothed my attitude a little bit on it, there are nice parts and bad just like anywhere else, I just think i got a really bad first impression by moving directly into a bad part of the city. I do think it is very interesting how when you say Florida everyone thinks of Miami even though Jacksonville is not only the largest city in the state, it is larger than Miami by several orders of magnitude. I still really hate the weather, but that might be because I live somewhere where it gets like in the negatives for most of January and nobody bats an eye.

I lived in Flint, Michigan for 5 years. It was the murder capital of the USA for several of those years.

I am glad I no longer live in Flint.

Jacksonville, FL. It wasn't that bad when I moved here 15 years ago but since then it has been built up a lot and the "nice" neighborhoods aren't so nice anymore. Also, just Forida in general. 80-100 degrees 9 months of the year with 60-100% humidity. In the few months of winter, it gets just cold enough to be too cold and annoying. We get maybe, 2 or 3 weeks worth of decent weather a year. I'm getting the fuck out of here the first chance I get. Thinking about the Pacific Northwest (Washington State, Oregon), or possibly somewhere in the Appalachian Mountains.

Thanks, it really has been a lot better. And it wasn't all bad; the first RTF I was at was actually great. Not so much the second and third ones, but there were still some good times to be had. Even my month homeless could have been much, much worse.

P.S.: If anybody here reads this and has done the RTF thing, drop me a PM or something. I'd love to trade war stories. Especially if the names "Glade Run" or "Adelphoi" ring any bells with you.

I live in the SFV now, so whoever thinks mission hills is a shithole must be pretty privileged. Worst place I ever lived was Leavenworth Kansas when the prison was still supermax. Working as a CO in a supermax prison is stressful. Living in the ghetto too is worse. While at the prison my brother had been assaulted once by an inmate and he was pretty worried since he had some issues. Luckily he tested negative for everything but it was pretty tense anyway. We got out of there eventually but I'd say that was the worst. Lived right next to a massive crack house. Spent a lot of time getting drunk and throwing bricks at wildlife. Had to keep police jackets in the windows so people stopped bothering us. I think it was us and our neighbors as the only white people living anywhere near there. The only good thing was around midnight-1am I'd walk down to a park and just listen to my Walkman. It was peaceful and nobody was ever around the parks.

The city I live in now...lived here my whole life. (If you want a clue, it's where Breaking Bad was filmed.)

I lived in Oakland for 3 years. Was mugged 6 times (Only the first 3 were successful. I was terrified at first but got real bitter and found out you can usually lie about what you have on you and tell muggers to fuck off). Had a car stolen. Home broken into.

REAL SHITHOLE. (Still though... Go Raiders! *Sobs in corner*)

Moved back to Portland and have been a happy camper ever since, even if we have weird vegan foodie losers here...

As a privileged San Francisco suburbanite, I really can't complain about the one place I've ever lived in. Sure, it's a boring suburb, but what suburb isn't boring? That's better than being dangerous. I have frequently been to some awful, awful neighborhoods before, but I've never had the pleasure of living in them.

Many of you have some fascinating stories. I hope that when I get my first own place that I won't have to add to this thread in the future.

Lived in Atlanta, Georgia worst two years of my entire life. Had my car broken into twice, got into two auto accidents in 48 hours a mile from each other, lived next to a house that was clearly just selling hard drugs all day and night. The worst traffic imaginable at first I thought it would be like any other place with a typical rush hour and all that, nope, morning afternoon 2AM didn't matter I literally stopped leaving home because it would take me forever to make the smallest trips and having to leave for work an hour early just in case was such a chore. I had a job outside of town and I was finishing up around 5PM everyday and I would literally just clock out and stay at work rather than try to drive home because I would literally be in traffic for 3+ hours for a 45 minute drive without fail.

Shitty roommates, I had to go from place to place because of owners losing their homes, the place is put together by a mad man you can tell the entire city was burned down because it makes no sense. TONS of streets with the same names (I'm looking at you Peachtree Street Bullshit) I really couldn't have hated it anymore.

Los Angeles is a craphole. Despite what Californians seem to think, and what most other people think, California is an awful state to live in. If you ever want to move here, stick to San Diego and maybe Orange County.

My first dorm suite was shared with 7 other guys. That's 2 people per bedroom, 4 per desk/common area, and 8 sharing two showers/toilets. Being 18 at the time most of the dirt and filth barely bothered me. Being almost a decade out now I don't know how that place didn't cause one of us to become ill in a serious way.

For a short while I didn't have a room. While living with my dad the summer before college he created a 4th wall for my room with a desk. Needless to say I was pretty miffed but thankfully that only lasted a few months.

And finally there was a home I rented with some friends. The place was a little older, had seen plenty of renovation, and should have been more of a cheap, transitional place to live. The A/C would usually give out twice in the summer, we almost always had roaches, the backyard was a complete mess, and the outside of the house almost looked abandoned. Cheap rent will make you live almost anywhere it turns out.

Oregon. Heads up to anybody that doesn't know about Oregon, if it isn't Portland, Eugene, or Ashland; it sucks.

Hackney Downs in London is by far the worst, it's almost always on the verge of becoming the thunder-dome.

Hackney is so bad that the London board of tourism tells you to avoid going there and to never take your mobile devices out in public. Hackney is also the place where first saw someone get stabbed and where the police walk around in groups of five. So avoid hackney if you can.

Also my house has been burgled 4 times in the last 3 years and I cant get insurance they will not cover this part of Hackney. I now keep everything behind a locked door in the upstairs of my house. When I go to bed or leave the house at night I leave a note telling the burglars not to bother.

I plan to move in a year or so and leave Hackney for good and never return to this forsaken knife infested hole.

I lived in a rather iffy part of Gateshead til I hit school age. Not many memories of it aside from being threatened with a knife and a brick coming through our window which was seemingly the last straw for my folks.

The first house we bought after getting married ended up being (we were both new to the town) next door to the local drug kingpin and his 5 sons, who I'd had to shout at within the first couple of weeks.

We got back from work one day to find they'd bricked our front windows...

Because of the abuse we were getting we ended up getting a police surveillance camera camera fitted but that just made them worse - As well as throwing stones at us when they walked past they'd now moon at the camera.

We sold the place after less than a year and lost a lot of money. Happiness is priceless though. ;)

EDIT - That was in Birmingham, UK and now that I'm remembering it (it was almost 20 years ago) I'd had to do more than shout at the lads. I caught them breaking into the empty house next door and, like a good citizen, phoned the police - We were the only house that could have seen them so the problems began not long after.

@viciousbearmauling: Yea the guys on the Bombcast seem to talk about Oakland like it is harmless but I'm pretty sure it is in the top five most dangerous cities to live in.

@cornbredx said:

Anaheim is near nowhere you wanna go.

Yup. I live in Portland now, but grew up in Bend. You might as well rename Bend "Meth-Head City"

@physicalscience: I thought the tech-bro scum have most of Oakland gentrified.

Newton, KS. Two horrible years I'll never get back.

I've only lived in two states, but I've spent a fair amount of time in several cities.

1-Boston....Ugh...Full of history and such, but full of huge assholes

2. Philly- Just felt dirty. Nothing seemed clean. Cheese steaks were good though.

3. Morgantown, WV....if this is the best WV can offer.....stay away

4. Cookeville, TN( I went to college there) literally nothing to do except eat at chain restaurants and.....go to class?

@the_ruckus: Do you live in Hackney?

I can honestly say I've never lived anywhere bad. Even when I lived in L.A., the part I was in was nice. Most of the towns I've lived in have been the type where you can periodically leave your door unlocked and not fret about being robbed.

When we decided we wanted to move back to Arizona to be closer to our family we stayed with my grandparents in Safford Arizona for a month, and they were getting pretty sick of us, so we had to kind of rush to find a place. The one we found had a serious bug problem, and I know we had some rats at one point too. The worst part was the completely ineffective swamp cooler. The 2 summers we spent there were miserable. Also being a newcomer to a small town sucks.

@unilad: yeah brought up in Dalston and if going to the make argument that it is not bad where you live in Hackney then your living in the redevelopment zone. and your very lucky.

@the_ruckus:

I spent one drunken night walking through Hackney back to a friends house in Stepney Green, and saw a dude bleeding out on the street from a clear stab wound. Rough. I don't badmouth Birmingham anymore.

For my upcoming year I'll be moving in with some school friends, they were in the place last year but one of them bailed so I'm filling that spot. I get the incredibly poorly insulated converted garage with the incredibly sketchy gas furnace in the corner. But hey, the rent is cheap as shit compared to what most people I know are paying for they're university rentals.

Also this area used to be thought of as one of the most dangerous areas in my city according to my parents, but it's not like it's a dangerous city by any means (Ottawa, Ontario) and I'm pretty sure they're thinking of how it was in the 80s - early 90s.

It may be shittier than what I'm used to, but it is by no means terrible.

@nrain: Hackney is no joke. And welcome to the I have seen someone being stabbed or being beaten near to death in Hackney club.

I prefer to spend my nights out in Camden its little bit safer plus the music scene pretty good there these days.

I had the pleasure of living in Acton for the second year of my Uni course. My dislike of London in general aside, the apartment I lived in there was pretty fucking miserable. The place was filthy when we moved in, and by the time we left the floor in the bathroom had nearly caved in from wood rot. One of the bigger issues were the fact the property was infested with mice, which was a nice suprise when they got in the cupboards and ate my food on multiple occasions. But what killed me was the stoners that lived upstairs. None of them had jobs or studied, and they would play music and smoke weed every night till somewhere between 3 and 5am. Any time I spent at home I had to endure the thumping bass from upstairs, combined with the sound of the boiler, which was literally in my bedroom.