Relocating

[Bonzo]

Kevin – good info on Burlington and PA; the latter really hasn’t called out to us much when we’ve been through there before, but it might be worth another look.  Thank you!

Ron – Actually, we’re not in New England…and now that I think about it, I don’t recall having ever spoken about my location, before, on this forum.  We live in the foothills of North Carolina, and honestly, it’s not a bad location for most of the things that we’re chasing…it’s just that we’ve been here a long time and we’re ready for a big change.

Thanks for the good wishes, Jon.  Last night, we were discussing the issue and speaking about some of the more nomadic suggestions that have come up…and we realized that being untethered – to a certain extent – is actually a really good idea right now.  That whole “let’s just pick a state and then figure out where to go within it” idea is solid: it’s workably solid.  As a friend of mine said: we don’t have to pick a forever home…we just have to find a place that we can live for a few years, to see if we really like it.

David – if you keep this up, I’m going to come crash on your couch until we find a rental and until I find a job, LOL.  We talked about it last night for a bit, and we’re going to see if there’s any way for Alaska to practically work while keeping that one primary income as Ron suggested.  It’ll be a week or two before we have that talk with the necessary authorities…but knowing that there are connecting flights to major areas (which is something I meant to look up last night) helps us quite a bit.  The time difference would be a bit of an issue, but I honestly think we could work around that; there are several people on my partner’s team that are on the west coast, and several more on the eastern side and in the central part of the country…so what’s one more time zone, at that point? As you said: we can adjust.

David Hartley – as a luggage question, yes, it’s a fascinating and rare opportunity…and it gets me away from a miserable job where the coffee tastes like arsenic.  Also, I’m pretty sure that we just became best friends.  May you live to be a thousand years old, sir.

Rat – Charlottesville is a cool place, but it’s just a bit too close to home…and to be honest, VA politics scare me a bit, these days.  I don’t like the fact that a single city – Washington – is yet again starting to push an entire state in a specific direction.  I don’t think that’s a healthy or sustainable shift.

[Monte Masterson]

I would absolutely move to Vermont if I were you Bonzo. Burlington is a very cool town and the state is left leaning politically. Also New England has the country’s lowest rates of religious fervor and the lowest crime rates too. The scenery is unsurpassed (or unmatched) in that region as well. You have the Adirondacks, Green Mountains, White Mountains and Maine all nearby….unbeatable!

The Amtrak Vermonter goes from Burlington to NYC and the Ethan Allen form Rutland, VT is only 2.5 hours to Albany and 5 hours to NYC. Boston of course is the closet major airport to drive to.

I remember taking a ferry across Lake Champlain from New York to Burlington in July of one year. Oh my God, words can’t even describe it. And then driving through Vermont with the fresh cut fields of hay and inhaling the clean, crisp smell in the air. It’s Paradise. The greenest hues of green can be seen in Vermont, no place else compares in my opinion.

Of course you have to deal with the winters and lots of snow, however New England doesn’t usually get near as cold as similar latitudes in the north central states where the cold arctic air masses sink down through those states in a U shape. Even though Vermont is a little ways from the Atlantic you still get somewhat of a moderating effect from the ocean in winter. Oh but the Nor’easters can lay down the snow!

I might retire in a couple of years and I’d like to spend May through October in New England and winters on the Florida Trail.

Albany, NY is another honorable mention. It’s the only city in Upstate that’s actually growing and it has a lot to offer. Quick Amtrack ride down the Hudson Valley to NYC.

 

[JCH]

On the drive from Philly to the Devil’s path, I was very impressed with the beauty of Princeton NJ.  I suppose it’s possible that we drove through the “nice areas”, but man was it pretty.

On another trip I was also very impressed with the area around Beacon NY.  Dirtbag suggested that area I think.

[HkNewman]

we don’t have to pick a forever home…we just have to find a place that we can live for a few years, to see if we really like it.

Another thing to look at is medical care and medical transportation as we age.  There’s more options out there for appointments (some similar to rideshare), but in case of an accident/emergency (more frequent as we age) requiring a hospital now .. how fast is emergency (whoops) transport?  So look for a fire station nearby with paramedic unit and then trace the path to the local hospital(s) with ERs, ICUs, etc.. What about physical and occupational therapists nearby?  Shopping if mobility impaired?

May be too far down the road and one partner could drive .. but my elderly parents had to move to senior/limited mobility living despite their plans funding a live-in caregiver (they had a semi-attached casita specifically built for this when they chose the basic design for their last “standalone home almost 25 years ago .. never used for its purpose), a new car that could almost drive itself (heh, almost .. there were some white knuckle intersections while they demonstrated it), being close to a major airport for travel (well at least they got 24 years worth in), etc..  .  Health problems can make a mockery of financial plans though.

[Bonzo]

Another thing to look at is medical care and medical transportation as we age.  There’s more options out there for appointments, but in case of an accident (more frequent as we age) .. how fast is emerging transport?

Very good point.  We’re just now at the point in our lives where that will become a concern in the future.

[Monte Masterson]

The only part of the US west of the 100th meridian that has seen anywhere near normal rainfall in the last 25 years is Oregon and Washington west of the Cascades. Otherwise the entire region is experiencing dried up lakes, forests vanishing in ever more frequent wildfires and overall drought conditions that don’t seem as if they are going to reverse anytime soon. Water restrictions are going to get much more intense.

The rising temperatures are no joke and I also wouldn’t consider moving south of 35 degrees latitude in the eastern US either. Each year gets hotter than the last. There is more and more talk about how the Rustbelt will be making a population resurgence due to the way the west and Sunbelt are getting so ungodly hot and dry.

[Jeff McWilliams]

PA, NJ, NY, VT, NH – Aren’t any of you concerned about ticks and Lyme disease, or factoring that into your relocation equations?

I live in SE Michigan and a climber friend of mine got it and is years into getting over the lasting affects. He basically got some sort of weird autoimmune disorder as a result.

I also have a triple-crown thru-hiker friend (Chris Hillier, aka “Wolverine”), who had a hiking companion catch lyme while hiking the AT 2 years ago.

Stuff ain’t no joke to me, and I’m a big believer in spraying my clothing with Permethrin.  According to the CDC map, all the NE states are rated as “high incidence” of lyme.

[David Hartley]

Lyme is definitely a concern. I treat my clothes with Permethrin (apparently the BPL spell checker doesn’t keep track of chemical names) every time I go out and have not had a tick attach yet on a backpacking trip. I have encountered way more ticks hiking in North Carolina than in the Adirondacks.

I don’t think any place is free of risks or issues.

[Jon Fong / Flat Cat Gear]

Going mobile

 

[Ray J]

Along with considerations of quality, close and broad medical care, would be fire departments.  As we age, we need those medical facilities.  We’ve had friends who lived out in very small towns, got something like a cancer and so spend two hours driving, one way, twice a week, to get to their treatment/checkup.  NOT fun when you might be doing chemo and the meds are working while you are still being driven around.

But fire departments to me also become a main point.  Yes it’s great to live out in the country.  But then that paramedic is that much farther away.  Perhaps there isn’t even a fire hydrant near that nice house.  And a small volunteer force might take time to get to the fire.  Our little town (part of the DFW metromess) had volunteer FD when we moved here.  But the place had hydrants and the volunteers stayed 24/7/365 at the fire house (which was over our back fence!  We used to joke, they’d just jump the fence).   Our FD converted to full time FD some few years after we moved here.

Just items to keep in your mind as you search.

[jscott]

So, in terms of water and medical services, with access to nature and a not-very-big city feel, I’ll reiterate: Eugene.

Pacific ocean is close by too.

[Bonzo]

Honestly, I haven’t put a great deal of emphasis on emergency services, because there’s so much variance between jurisdictions as to their efficacy…at least in my experience.  Proximity to a hospital and decent health care, yes…that’s a priority, but we’re very priviledged to have (for the most part) access to said health care wherever we move in this country.  Fire/police/EMS…that seems to be a roll of the dice pretty much everywhere, anymore, and also incredibly dependent on the staffing/leadership of those services on a local/individual level.  I also hadn’t given a lot of thought to something like a tick-borne illness; as proved by The Late Unpleasantness, diseases are certainly a concern for everyone no matter where we live, but I’m not sure that I want to geographically limit our options on account of them.

Also, we are truly grateful for all of the input that everyone has provided thus far; here’s where we stand after reading, re-reading, re-re-reading and discussing all of these points:

• Washington may be a serious contender, particularly the areas of Bellingham and possibly near Olympia; if we consider the eastern part of the state, we’ll get better land prices but we need to seriously consider water and other resources in the future.
• Vermont, New Hampshire and Maine are good candidates for us, and offer a lot of what we want.
• Alaska may be workable and we need to keep it in the running, especially if we just park a camper on David’s acreage.
• We need to take a much more serious look at Oregon.
• The southwest, as beautiful as it is, may simply be too dry and increasingly hot to suit us…and the mid-Atlantic/northeast seems workable, but it’s not drawing us in like other areas.  Likewise, it’s time to move away from the Bible Belt and the general climate of the South/Southeast.
• It’s okay to be a bit nomadic; picking a temporary area and then branching out to find a place to truly settle will likely do us a lot of good…and if we don’t find that immediately, we can just go elsewhere and try again.

Again, thanks to everyone; this input has seriously helped us, already.  Please keep the thoughts and discussion going; with every post, a daunting decision is becoming more manageable and achievable.

[Bonzo]

Quick question: does anyone have any experience with the area around Olympia, Washington?  Looking at the scene in general, it might have quite a bit of what we’re looking for.

[Steve S]

Olympia offers long periods of gray with some rain — but you know that. Evergreen State College provides a bit of college town vibe. Tantalizingly close to the Olympics, Rainier, and Cascade destinations to the south — all of which can be damp — but a longer drive time-wise to trailheads than might be expected. Probably better access to truly interesting places than Seattle or Bellingham, when snow isn’t impeding access to trailheads.

[Bonzo]

Thanks for the input, Steve.  There is surprisingly little snow in that area, as well, but it seems like there’s easy access to it.

After some light research, western Oregon looks interesting to us as well, perhaps reaching as far eastwards as Bend…but like Washington, the real estate prices are surprising to us.  I think it’s good that we only want to be vaguely near a city, and not actually in one.  We’ve also seen a lot of exceptionally high rental prices…and given that most facilities want a proven monthly income that’s three times higher than the rental fee it’s not surprising that so many younger people have no hopes of home ownership.  Often, they don’t even qualify for a rental, individually, much less a mortgage…and the mortgages are cheaper than the rentals.  Something about that seems quite inverted.

[HkNewman]

We’ve also seen a lot of exceptionally high rental prices…and given that most facilities want a proven monthly income that’s three times higher than the rental fee..

Read something about that the other day as rental unit developers (the interviewed one develops single unit to multi-level high rises) say materials and labor costs have gone up, and now interest rate increases makes newer rentals pricier (also that the fees are unrealistic … but in which way?).  His firm looks at where the jobs will be, fwiw, so maybe look where the jobs aren’t?  Pretty sure these firms use the same decision processes

Posts above are talking about individual choices in moving but there’s also where are the crowds going? If going the same way, may need to put up with competition on the “buy” or “renter” side.

One example is a number of young people I’ve spoken with want to move to the Phoenix AZ area for its nightlife and year round BBQ and shorts culture.  So  the Phoenix real estate market will remain hot [pun semi-intended].

I spoke with one young woman a few days back who had just moved from San Francisco with her partner after their landlord said their rent in the Mission district would go from $2400/mo to $3200. This after her [workish] truck was broken into despite a security fence around the parking lot (she could see the encampment her stuff was at .. she retrieved most of it fwiw) but you have to wonder who’s going to pay $3200/mo to stay in a rundown, crime infested neighborhood? Note the Mission has always been a little “sketch”.   It’s not the “flowers in the hair” neighborhood, … my point being is something has to “give” =  I don’t know if it’s worth waiting to see if real estate or rentals will have a price hiccup.

[Brad Rogers]

I think the housing market is about to crash.   Prices are crazy inflated here and stuff is selling the day it lists with multiple offers.  A few people in my neighborhood have more than doubled their money in just a few years, but it appears it’s starting to slow down and I think it will crash similar to 2008.  Maybe not quite that bad but I think the inflated prices will start to return to normal in a lot of places (Not SF).

[Bonzo]

HkN – it’s a crazy rental market…but I only halfway believe the lines I hear about how the price of the rental construction is going up.  I’m in an industry that’s intimately associated with construction and there’s only so much price inflation to be had on that front…and when I see the prices of all rentals consistently rising, it tells me that the number one reason is very simple: because they can.  Right now, it seems that more people than ever have to rent…so landlords are making every cent they can possibly make on that necessity.  I’ve heard the story so often that it’s become a veritable litany: rent prices increase at every re-leasing, and for no discernible reason.  A 15% increase is common; sometimes, it’s up to 30%…and a great number of the leasing agencies in my area are now cutting their leases down from 12 months to 6 and increasing the prices twice for the same temporal period. It’s concerning to me, because this does not play out well for anyone in the long run.

Regarding going to where the crowds and jobs aren’t: I don’t have an inherent argument to that plan, with the exception of the fact that I need a job.  Due to the way prices are, right now, we can’t make a go of it on a single income…so I have to find something.  It’s okay if we think about it for awhile, but my partner cannot bear the burden of supporting our household, alone…and I would not want that to be the case, even if it were possible.

Hopefully, some of the problems with finding a place will be alleviated by the fact that we actively want to avoid cities and urban areas; being near to them is nice, but I wasn’t kidding when I said that we would be fine within 90 minutes of an airport: there’s no reason to be anywhere near the expense of a city center when we don’t have to be.  A small town or rural setting will be perfectly fine with us, and actually much-preferred.

Brad – I don’t know that things will crash as they did before, because those conditions no longer exist and – for the most part – cannot exist…but I think we’re seeing a downturn, and I think it’s going to continue.  I see a lot of “price reduced” listings, lately…so, hopefully, this means we sold at the correct time and can make those dollars go further when we move in the next few months.

Regarding the move itself, we’re contemplating taking a portion of the sale money and going to look at prospective areas for a few weeks; my partner can use this as a working vacation, so we could – theoretically – see what it’s like to live and work in some of the areas that we’re considering.  We’ve discussed it extensively, and neither of us thinks we can make even a remotely-educated decision without some kind of direct, on-the-ground experience…so that’s what we need to give ourselves.  The tentative plan is to hop a flight to one end of our area(s) of consideration and then work our way through it, slowly, stopping at a few places along the way.  So, for the PNW, we would possibly fly into Oregon, work our way up through southern Washington, northwards, and then maybe grab a flight from Seattle to Anchorage.  For New England, it would be a flight towards Vermont, and then a trip vaguely eastwards…in theory.  That plan came up last night, so we’re still working through whether or not it’s really possible. ;)

[JCH]

You’ve may have already looked at this, but I would be drawn to the southern border of Olympic National Park.  Some of the little towns along Washington State Route 8 look very inviting, close to the park and Olympia regional airport. 1.5 hrs to SeaTac/Seattle.  Looks like homes are surprisingly affordable in Montesano.  Aberdeen,  Elma, McCleary, etc. also promising.

ONP has pretty much everything someone interested in being outdoors could want…rugged Pacific coast, Hoh rainforest, Mt. Olympus and on and on and on.  Added bonus, Mt Rainier and the Wonderland Trail nearby.  Mowich lake (perhaps the most beautiful place I have ever seen) is 3 hrs from Montesano.

[Bonzo]

JCH – We are absolutely looking at that area; it seems to be slightly rainier than we’re used to, but I think we would rather have more moisture than less, judging from the past few years of droughts everywhere.  I will put Montesano on the list of places to investigate closely; housing costs are one of the things that we’re doing everything possible to mitigate.   Thank you for the specific suggestions!!

Edit: Just looked closely at the stats on both Aberdeen and Montesano; I’m amazed that in an expensive state, the costs of living are actually below the national average!

[Link .]

If you make a stop in Aberdeen you will see why house prices are cheap!

[Bonzo]

If you make a stop in Aberdeen you will see why house prices are cheap!

Meaning?

[Link .]

It is super depressed and run down lots of cheap get your nails done salons and dollar stores where most people shop because they are barely getting by, I have a good friend that had grown up there at got out as soon as possible by riding a vespa on the freeway in the pouring rain(very dangerous and illegal.)If you enjoy drugs you might like it.

[JCH]

@Link – YIKES!  So much for looking at Google maps and searching for info :(   I don’t remember seeing that as we circumnavigated the park on a 2 week trip 6 years ago, but I certainly wouldn’t dispute (your) first-hand knowledge.

Are the surrounding areas similar…Montesano?

[Link .]

Believe me I have lived in WA. my whole life and have been to Aberdeen numerous times and as I have said know people who have grown up there, including some famous ones and it is not a place I would want to live. Here is a statistic for you

With a crime rate of 42 per one thousand residents, Aberdeen has one of the highest crime rates in America compared to all communities of all sizes – from the smallest towns to the very largest cities. One’s chance of becoming a victim of either violent or property crime here is one in 24.

And from an article from a couple of years ago which has been true for years

The collapsed logging economy has been replaced by despair, homelessness, drugs and alcohol.

[Author]

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