Moving to Tucson, AZ? Complete Moving Guide - 2021

Tucson is rated as the second most populous city in Arizona. The city is home to 539,216 people who are mostly millennials, according to Arizona Demographics. The median age of the city's residents is 33.4 making it a great place for singles and young families.

How Is the Weather Like in Tucson, AZ?

If you hate winters and like a sunny climate, you'll enjoy moving to Tucson, AZ. The best time to visit Tucson for warm weather events are early June to mid July and from mid August to late September, according to WeatherSpark.

Commuting around Tucson, AZ is fairly fast compared to other similar size cities in the U.S. The average commute time in Tucson AZ is about 22.2 minutes, according to Best Places. The national average is 26.4 minutes. How do most residents get to work in Tucson, AZ?

• Up to 73.6% of Tucson residents drive their own car alone
• About 10.9% of Tucson residents carpool with others
• Up to 3.7% of Tucson residents work from home
• About 4.1% of Tucson residents take the mass transit

Tucson has its share of culture and the city proudly displays them. Some of the best cultural events to explore in Tucson are:

• Tucson Festival of Books

  A celebration of literature, both children and adults participate in this open-air and free-for-all annual book festival hosted at the University of Arizona Mall. Bookworms come here to discuss the latest books, meet their favorite authors, and discover new publishing houses.

• The Fourth Avenue Street Fair

  The free-to-all street fair is held twice a year – in December and late March/early April. The fair brings together 400+ arts and crafts booths, 40+ food vendors, street musicians, jugglers, and kid’s entertainers. Annually held at Historic Fourth Avenue, the fair is celebrated with much jubilation.

• Tucson Rodeo (Fiesta de los Vaqueros)

  One of the top 25 pro rodeos in the United States, Tucson Rodeo tests the ranching skills of both cowboys and cowgirls. The 2.5-mile stream of horse-drawn coaches, outfitted riders, folk dancers, and marching bands is also the world’s longest non-motorized parade.

• All Souls Procession Weekend

  The annual community-powered festival modeled after the Mexican holiday Dia de los Muertos is held in November every year and almost 150,000 people celebrate on the streets of Tucson in the company of myriad altars, performers, installation art, and creative pieces. The celebration ends with a two-mile-long procession that ceremonially burns a large Urn filled with the hopes, offerings, and wishes of the public for the ancestors.

Tucson boasts of a rich historic past and its line of impressive museums display the city’s cultural history and heritage.

Some of the best museums in Tucson even celebrate technology.

The museums that display the history are:

• Tombstone Courthouse State Historic Park
• 390th Memorial Museum
• Tucson Museum of Art and Historic Block
• Arizona Historical Society Museum

The technology-themed museums in Tucson are:

• Pima Air and Space Museum
• Mini Time Machine Museum
• Franklin Auto Museum

The museums in Tucson that focus on arts include:

• Tucson Museum of Art
• Center for Creative Photography

The zoo cum museum dedicated to indigenous animals and plants of the Sonoran Desert:

• Arizona-Sonora Desert Museum

The city’s vibrant music scene is visible at the Tucson Symphony Orchestra and the Arizona Opera. No lover of classical music should miss them.

Tucson is a great place with its scenic surroundings and fabulous food scene. The economy is thriving here with tourism and tech-related companies being the best paymasters. Despite a high average salary, the cost of living is much lower than the national average and houses are cheaper even in the best neighborhoods.

Interestingly, Tucson is also free of natural disasters. Tornadoes, floods, and earthquakes are very rare in this city and its surrounding areas.

Tucson is extremely hot in summer. Though the winters are warmer, summers are too unbearable here. About 143 days of the year are over 90 degrees and the temperature crossing 100 degrees is common in summer. The city also records a high rise in the number of crimes in Arizona, 42 per 100,000 people, which is even higher than the national average. The presence of venomous reptiles, such as black widow spiders, tarantulas, scorpions, and rattlesnakes is another major reason that many people skip moving to Tucson.

Some of the areas you need to skip living in Tucson include:

• Fairgrounds
• El Presidio
• Parkway Terrace
• Alvernon Heights
• Roberts
• Santa Rita Park
• South Park

Unemployment, crime rate, high home value, and many other reasons make these areas in Tucson not suitable to live in.

Some of the best parts of Tucson to live include:

• Desert Palms Park
• Eastside
• Poets Square
• Houghton
• Harrison East-South

These neighborhoods are ranked the best to settle in Arizona for their low cost of living, better job opportunities, and crime rate. Read more about the best neighborhoods in Tucson on our Tucson moving guide.

Tucson has got both many positives and negatives and here are a few things you need to know before you move to Tucson.

• The winter is warm in Tucson but summer is extremely hot
• The outdoors are amazingly beautiful
• The cuisine is amazing, especially with its Mexican influence
• The economy is thriving
• There are many venomous reptiles
• The temperature crosses 100 degrees in summer and venturing out at noon is almost impossible
• Some of the good natural parks in the country are in Tucson and surrounding areas

Though the winter is warm in Tucson, the summer is extremely hot and on average, 143 days a year are above 90 degrees. The temperature regularly crosses 100 degrees. Moreover, Tucson is notorious for venomous reptiles, such as scorpions, black widow spiders, tarantulas, and rattlesnakes and you may find them at garages or corners of the study room at nights.

The crime rate is also extremely high in Tucson, especially gun-related and violent ones.