Pros And Cons Of Living In Auburn Hills Michigan - Auburn Hills Michigan has earned the reputation of being a distinguished leader in southeast Michigan, not just in the retail, entertainment and manufacturing space, but the great amenities this city has to offer. With that being said, I am going to tackle the pros and cons of living in the city of Auburn hills, let’s get to it.
Auburn Hills is a place I know fairly well, being as I basically lived there for a short time with my now fiancé, going to and from their to my home in Brighton, and having helped a few clients call this fine city their home, so make some popcorn, put your phone on silent and enjoy the show.
Pros of Living In Auburn Hills Michigan:
PRO #1 - Location
Kicking this list off with the pros of living in Auburn hills, we have its location. This 16.68 square mile , upside down L shape has a population of around 26,000 people, and is perfectly situated off I-75 for north and south travel, and M-59 for east to west travel. Auburn Hills is located near Rochester, and Rochester Hills, Lake Angelus which is ranked the most expensive city in the metro area, so you could assume how that could help desirability, along with the business hub we call Troy, and Pontiac. Before becoming the wonderful city it is today in 1983, the area was actually a part of Pontiac township, and they have split and become highly independent of one another. I talk a lot about location being a pro in several of the cities across southeast Michigan, but Auburn Hills truly has a step up in the commute department, because the city has no delay when jumping onto the nearby expressways.
PRO #2 - Home Prices
Stepping over to pro number two for living in auburn hills, we have the home prices, which I’m sure is surprising especially if you are familiar with the area. As I mentioned, the city is surrounded by lake Angelus, Rochester, Rochester hills, and even Bloomfield hills which are home to several of the biggest and most expensive homes in southeast Michigan, that you’ll come to realize many top athletes and celebrities in this state call home, So if you meet someone famous be sure to get an autograph for me, it would be greatly appreciated. Let me put these home prices into some more perspective. This chart provided by the MLS shows the average sale price of the entire MLS in blue, Auburn hills in green, Rochester hills in yellow and Rochester in red over the last 3 years.
AS you can see, or if you’re listening to the audio version, follow my words, Auburn Hills comes in at an average sale price of just over $278,000, which was a 12.4% increase year over year as of the month of November. Rochester and Rochester hills are 1.5-2x more expensive than Auburn Hills, and the reason I compare these cities and areas is when you’re driving through these cities they tend to seamlessly transition into one another and it’s hard to tell exactly where you are unless there’s a sign saying welcome. So this chart helps put into perspective just how much these real estate prices fluctuate based on just a few miles. With all this in mind, it truly is reassuring in an economical standpoint that Auburn hills will have a leg up being surrounded by these highly developed and sought after areas just based on real estate prices alone. Of course there’s more factors to weigh, but it’s not like all these surrounding cities are deteriorating and creating an unappealing community that no one would associate themselves with, because let’s be honest, high end celebrities and athletes wouldn’t want to put themselves in that situation.
PRO #3 - Community
Moving over to pro number 3, we have the community. Since I have spent a lot of time in this area in the heart of Auburn Hills, during the pandemic when restrictions lessened a little bit I actually got covid and was told to walk around as much as possible, so I explored all the parks such as Riverside park, along with other outdoor offerings, and walked miles down all the city sidewalks, and just from that alone, I found this city offers a very close knit community. Of course it was something I had to experience from afar, but everyone knew each other to a certain extent, or was truly that overly friendly passing people on the sidewalk.
It’s sad how uncommon that type of confrontation is these days, so that’s why I made it a point to highlight it here. Here’s also a few reviews highlighting how great the community is from current and past residents in the city of Auburn hills. This first one talks about how family friends and close knit the community is from the restaurants and local parks, it just gives off a loving feeling. The next review touches on the safety and calmness of the neighborhoods, as well as the local small businesses that are always supported by the community. This last review touches on the area and how it’s a very tight knit community and how they were glad they were able to raise their child in a city like this.
PRO #4 - Things To Do
Stepping on over to pro #4, we have things to do, which further supports how community-based the city is, as they put on several events and opportunities for their residents such as: the riverside splash pad, knight amphitheater, Summerfest, paddle-palooza, river day fishing derby, feed your soul festival, Friday night music series, along with jazz and blues in the park which I'll link the description as well as put a link to their newsletter so you can get some insight on what’s happening, what their plans are going forward, and their priorities as a developing community. Without repeating myself too much, I’ll link a video I did a year or so ago touching on fun things to do in auburn hills which I'll link in the description as well, where I touch on the massive Great Lakes Crossing Mall, Top golf where you can show off your not so good golfing skills like I do, riverside and Hawkwoods park, along with a few restaurant options you’ll want to add to your itinerary if you're ever in the area.
Cons of Living In Auburn Hills Michigan:
CON #1 - Things To do
With all this in mind, it transitions into con #1 and that is also things to do and could be made into a second con as well for their being a lack of a downtown. As a few of the current and past residents have reviewed, this first one stating that they want the downtown to improve a little bit and be more active, and this second reviewer essentially stating the same thing along the lines of rebuilding a vibrant community that it once was. Yes, I listed a ton of things you can do in Auburn hills from shopping, top golf, restaurants, parks, and all the annual and weekly events the city puts on, but a common complaint tends to be that the city still lacks offerings. As I mentioned earlier about the location and size of Auburn hills, it’s relatively small, so everything doesn’t always fall in a 17 square mile location, so that’s where the other nearby communities tend to step up to the plate and offer what Auburn Hills lacks. For example, Auburn hills does have a downtown area to a certain extent, but downtown Rochester has the city beat when it comes to a true downtown feel, this is the town that you see on news headlines during the winter months when they go above and beyond with their lights and everyone from nearby cities comes and walks the streets while they put on several seasonal events. So I’d say this is a fair con to put into place in relation to the close by city offerings. What if you aren’t an adventurer of nature in the parks, a golf person at top golf, or someone who doesn’t want to spend their whole life savings at Great lakes Crossing? Then you’re pretty much hanging out until those weekly, monthly or annual events come in season so you can experience them.
CON #2 - City Offerings
Stepping over to con number 2, we have city offerings. This point can be debated a little bit since the city has parks, shopping, entertainment, etc. So there is some diversity in that aspect, but I would say city offerings, at least in this conversation is more about variety. Another complaint about living in Auburn hills is not so much that it lacks your everyday necessities a community should have, but the fact that it lacks some additional offerings such as residents or something else to do aside from spending heaps of money. So current and past residents are wishing there were more restaurants. And more things to do aside from just going to a park that people could do on a budget. As much as we’d like to have 5-10 more restaurants in our towns it’s hard to make something like that happen when cities like Auburn Hills have expanded as much as they possibly could with the area they have, so the solution here is to go hardly a mile or two down the road to the nearby cities. I know I have mentioned this time and time again, but in an area like this, the cities are so incredibly seamless into one another that the commute time to hop a couple cities could be 10-20 minutes depending on the traffic, which is my next point.
CON #3 - Traffic
Moving over to con #3, we have the traffic. If you didn’t know, Baker College has a campus in Auburn Hills and Oakland University is on the border of Rochester and Auburn Hills, so the traffic tends to be extremely heavy, as most students at the universities tend to commute despite their huge dorm offerings, at least at Oakland. Auburn Hills is also home to the FCA headquarters, formerly known as Chrysler, BorgWarner, guardian industries, Autoliv, RGIS, Joyson safety systems, GKN Driveline, Volkswagen/Audi, and of course the palace of auburn hills before it was demolished, so not only is there a ton of traffic going in and out of all these corporations, you can now feel at ease knowing there are an incredible amount of job opportunities in Auburn Hills to say the least, which has been the case for several of my clients moving from out of state coming for a new job opportunity in the automotive industry, it may be good to keep Auburn Hills on your radar of that is something you are planning on in the future.
For those of you that have lived, currently lived or past through the fine city of Auburn hills, what did I miss on this pros and cons list, drop your thoughts in the comments below!
MENTIONED LINKS 🔗
→Auburn Hills Michigan Event Page: https://bit.ly/3Gmdphm
→Auburn Hills Michigan Newsletter: https://bit.ly/3Gm3YhY
→Fun Things To Do In Auburn Hills Michigan: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1D5QWEd1Ps8&t=0s
Cheers,
Andrew
Andrew McManamon is a Michigan REALTOR® with Signature Sotheby’s International Realty and provides real estate services to Buyers, Sellers and Investors throughout SE Michigan including Livingston County, Oakland County, Washtenaw County, Genesee County & beyond. Andrew has become one of the rising stars of Michigan real estate agents. Prior to his real estate career Andrew was responsible for managing a senior living facility in Brighton, Michigan as a dining supervisor and an activities assistant. Andrew’s passion to help people is unlike any other, and he continues to strive to be best resource he can be. Andrew graduated from Cleary University in Howell, Michigan with a double major and currently resides in White Lake, Michigan.
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