Living in Guadalajara

Guadalajara is the municipality at the centre of its metro area rather than the whole of it, which matters when you rent, because Zapopan and Tlaquepaque next door are separate cities with their own addresses. Inside Guadalajara, most renting happens in the belt west of the Centro Histórico, where Americana and Lafayette keep their Porfirian mansions and the bars of Av. Chapultepec, or further north-west in the leafier Providencia 1a Secc and Country Club, where the streets turn residential and the buildings newer.

What to consider before renting

This is one of the few cities in Mexico where you can live without a car. Three light rail lines cross the municipality and all of them reach the Centro, MiBici covers the Centro and Americana, and on Sundays the Vía RecreActiva closes Vallarta and Chapultepec to traffic. One catch: Av. Chapultepec has no station of its own, so Americana connects from Calzada Federalismo along its eastern edge, and Providencia has none either. Rents in the central colonias have risen with the short-stay rental boom, so for more space at a calmer price, Zapopan starts immediately west.