Buying guns living in California....

Move out of commiefornia as soon as you can. Any state that restricts your constitutional rights is bad news for anyone looking to exercise their American rights. Don’t even get me started on their taxes.

You’re missing out on so much...

 

too many people & too much concrete in Kalifornia for me

 

LOL

It is easy to enjoy shooting out here. No need to move just for some pew pew time.

 

Super long post here, sorry guys
So the best thing that can help you shoot better and more safely is if you take a shooting class or two. If that's not an option, look on YouTube for professional shooter's tips. Safety, ESPECIALLY with a handgun because of the short barrel, is paramount. Guns are great, relatively safe fun until someone gets hurt or killed because of a negligent owner. Also, it is so much easier to learn the right technique from the start than to break bad habits that you teach yourself. Ask me how I know.

As far as what guns to look for, this is a topic too many people fall too deep into. What I would suggest is a long rifle, preferably bolt action, iron sighted .22lr to learn on, and a pump action shotgun in either 12 or 20 gauge.

This will give you one of each category of firearm to practice with. The problem with buying multiple guns right off the bat is you typically never take the time to learn the fundamentals of gun safety, proper technique, and how to be accurate with each. Also, if you buy a semi-auto you will most likely want to burn through more ammo, which gets real expensive here in Cali.

Both the shotgun and a rifle with open sights are great to learn how to hold a long gun, practice your trigger pull, and aim. The shotgun would help with learning not to flinch with a little recoil as well as recoil management and getting on target quickly such as with clay pigeons, and the rifle will teach you how to hold it steady and squeeze off very accurate shots, and also allow for a ton of shooting with cheap .22lr. The skills from both of these will also transfer over to accurately shooting your Glock, though all handguns are inherently harder to shoot than rifles/shotguns.

One thing that is hard to master, and I haven't even mastered it yet after 14 years of shooting, is pulling the trigger smoothly with higher recoil guns. It's easy with a .22 because it doesn't hurt to shoot, but you have to teach yourself to pull it slowly and smoothly on guns that kick a good bit. Your trigger pull will make or break your accuracy, even if you have great form otherwise. You will really see this with the pistol. If you jerk the trigger, you will pull your shots off target. You don't have to pull it overly slowly, but make sure it's smooth and you don't move anything else but that finger so you keep your sight alignment.

I'd try to take a couple classes for shooting rifles and pistols first, and just go from there. As far as brands for the .22 and shotgun, I have really come to like the CZ rimfires. Super nice, pass down to your grandkids quality for a reasonable price. As far as shotguns go, there is one that rules them all for me. The Remington 870 has a few different variants at different prices and you can choose whichever style you like. I have owned mine for 11 years without replacing a single part or having a single malfunction, and it is a great home defense gun. I keep it loaded in my gunsafe with 000 buckshot.

That's another thing, if you plan to keep one loaded for home defense, you must have a gun safe or locking case. It is illegal to have it just laying around if there is a reasonable chance there will be children (under 18) in your home. If you spend as much time learning the laws as you do researching the first guns you would like to buy, you will be able to keep yourself out of trouble much more easily. California's laws are so jacked up and hard to interpret that it's especially important here.

Good luck, and let me know if you have any questions!

 

Nice first choice on the Glock. I started with the 19 myself. Here is the link where you can check whether a hand gun has been certified "safe" for non exempt citizens of Ca.

https://www.oag.ca.gov/firearms/certified-handguns/search

Practice, practice and more practice. Also on the CalGuns website there are a couple flow charts to help you determine whether the hand gun, rifle or shotgun you want is legal.

Ammo purchases now require a background check. $19 for your initial if you are not in the system. $1 if you are, which you are since you just recently bought a firearm. I think if you are required for the $19 check it is a 10 day wait before you can buy ammo. Dont quote me on that. They log brand, type and quantity; what it is used for who knows.