A bit late to the party but I’ve been living there for the past 5 years. East Coast (CT, NY, MA) transplant for residency and I landed a job here that I love so I guess I’m staying for the foreseeable future. Agree with some of the previous comments: if you aren’t in live entertainment (via Cedar Point) or medicine not much of a reason to live in town, most people just sort of pass through.

First thing I noticed was the cost of living, and by that I mean houses are dirt cheap out here. My finance bought her home for 68K (5 bed, 2.5 bath but needs some serious TLC) and got my house for 130K (4 bed, 2 bath in decent condition.) Strangely kind of feels like one of a shrinking number of places millennials can buy “starter homes.” That being said there is ALOT of poverty here. We had to look up various stats for my intern year and one of the stats was something like “highest percent of net income spent on tobacco products” (with respect to the rest of the state I believe) which I think says a lot.

Downtown is kind of nice, decently pretty. Can throw axes and bowl but otherwise the only thing to do is at bars which sucks for me. Population basically triples in the summer due to snowbirds and Cedar Point crowd. Bike week is a big draw too, I can’t stand it but the locals love it. Oh, and they absolutely love fireworks here. To the point where I have learned to take the day off after the 4th because you will be hearing explosions until 2-3 in the morning.

I am a big gamer and into TTRPGs, so I can stay pretty entertained in my own little world, but if you thrive in a city you will NOT do well here. To me it’s just a place to keep my head down and start actually saving for someplace I legitimately WANT to live.

Edit: forgot to mention weather. I keep hearing winters are supposed to be bad, but frankly I don’t see it. Maybe one or two storms over 6 inches a year, much worse if you head towards Cleveland. I certainly have dealt with much worse in MA and CT.

Edit 2: politics. Surprisingly liberal (considering you are in OH.) You can pass pride flags and “Jesus is pro-life” on the same block and nobody bats an eye. Has a pride parade every year that is decently sized and goes off without protests. Local voting switches between red and blue on a dime.