If you were retired and could live anywhere?

So I hope this off topic question is OK, as BMWMOA is a brain trust of well travelled smart folks. I am retired with a gov't pension and am on my 3rd year living in the Ca Sierra's which I loved to live in in my 20's till I got a real job in the SF bay area. I have had good ski seasons and summer hiking and love the two lane highways for riding my R1100S. This summer and last however have had me hunkering down in my house with AQI in the red or purple zone due to wildfires and temps frequently in the 90's to 100f. I am looking around as the west burns, and considering my options. I don't think it is going to get better with global warming. I would enjoy suggestions to Zillow etc. No I can't afford a castle in Monaco lol.

You couldn't get me to live anywhere there is a huge population base. So either coast is out. Far south is too hot in the summer. Far north too cold in the winter. That just leaves a few central states.

We are planning on moving in a couple years to Missouri, just north of Springfield. Not much winter, a bit of snow now and then that goes away in a few days. You can ride all winter if cooler weather doesn't bother you. A bit warm and humid in the summer, but used to that. Good roads all over with more in northern Arkansas.

You might enjoy the eastern Tennessee (maybe western North Carolina) area. The eastern mountains may not be as grand as the Sierras, but provide wonderful riding and hiking. The quality of life is good and the cost of living in small to moderate sized cities is reasonable.

Bankrate just did an article on places to retire/live-

Considerations...

Should you settle by the beach or in the mountains? Do you prefer golf or cross-country skiing? Perhaps most importantly, where do your kids, grandkids, friends and health care providers live? Those are deeply personal questions. In an effort to find some objective answers to the where-to-retire question, Bankrate crunched a bevy of statistics on costs of living, public health and other metrics.

Kind of interesting to read and what considerations may be important. Full story here-

https://www.bankrate.com/retirement/best-and-worst-states-for-retirement/

Seems like having a place with a "stable" support system, be it friends, family or service providers, becomes more important as we all "age out"

OM

This thread may help with your search: https://forums.bmwmoa.org/showthread.php?31135-Great-Places-to-Retire/page2

I retired last June (2020), with a state pension from teaching, so staying in New York was a no-brainer, since I don't pay state income tax on my pension.

I lived most of my life in westchester, where my parents and brothers still live.

DIdn't want to move too far from them, either.

We moved about an hour and a half north to Hillsdale in Columbia County, and love it here.

Bought a beautiful house on 5 acres with a nice 1/2 acre, spring fed pond for swimming.

Our dogs love it here, too.

Pretty rural, very friendly people, progressive minded for the most part.

Property taxes are about half what I was paying before.

i do a lot of bicycling, and the quiet roads and considerate drivers is a welcome from what I was used to in Westchester.

The lovely roads suit me well on the bicycle as well as the motorcycle.

Whether out for a walk, riding on two wheels, or driving in the car, people wave as they pass.

and they do it with all five fingers.

SPP

PoorUB said:

You couldn't get me to live anywhere there is a huge population base. So either coast is out. Far south is too hot in the summer. Far north too cold in the winter. That just leaves a few central states.

We are planning on moving in a couple years to Missouri, just north of Springfield. Not much winter, a bit of snow now and then that goes away in a few days. You can ride all winter if cooler weather doesn't bother you. A bit warm and humid in the summer, but used to that. Good roads all over with more in northern Arkansas.

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The above post sums it up pretty well for me. We have lived all around the US and much of the world thanks to Uncle Sam. We found wonderful things about almost everywhere we lived, but ... now that we are retired and older (and getting ever older by the day) the presence of family and mild weather is about all that is important. We are happy to stay right here in Middle America.

Slovenia or Croatia.

bluehole said:

You might enjoy the eastern Tennessee (maybe western North Carolina) area. The eastern mountains may not be as grand as the Sierras, but provide wonderful riding and hiking. The quality of life is good and the cost of living in small to moderate sized cities is reasonable.

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We just came from a long trip out west, it sure was good to see the Appalachians as we drove into the Pigeon River Gorge heading east on 1-40.

WNC taxes the crap out of you, but it's worth it.

mntngrown said:

So I hope this off topic question is OK, as BMWMOA is a brain trust of well travelled smart folks. I am retired with a gov't pension and am on my 3rd year living in the Ca Sierra's which I loved to live in in my 20's till I got a real job in the SF bay area. I have had good ski seasons and summer hiking and love the two lane highways for riding my R1100S. This summer and last however have had me hunkering down in my house with AQI in the red or purple zone due to wildfires and temps frequently in the 90's to 100f. I am looking around as the west burns, and considering my options. I don't think it is going to get better with global warming. I would enjoy suggestions to Zillow etc. No I can't afford a castle in Monaco lol.

Click to expand...

I *almost* moved our family to Grass Valley in the early 90s.... had a lot of business in the Bay Area.

After looking at what's happened in NorCal over the past 10 years or so, I thank the good Lord I didn't.

Nice to visit, though.

Why live in any one particular location. Like many my wife and I are on a fixed income since I retired. We sold our sticks and bricks dwelling and now travel the US in our RV and take the bikes and all of our worldly possessions with us. We currently do volunteer work and this allows us to spend a period of time in a location to see and do things when we are off duty. And then when that gig is up move somewhere else and sight see on the way.

As an example we have spent the last 3 months volunteering at a Corps of Engineers park in Idaho, come August 1 we relocate to Sierra Vista AZ and start a new 3 month gig August 9th, Then off to the Texas Hill country for another. And so on.

Anywhere, I Know for sure it would be North America. I've been lucky to travel to a lot of places, mostly developed countries and while there are some cultures, history and lifestyles that I really jive with, the taxation and laws and immigration make it very unappealing to seriously consider a move. My financial situation at retirement (in 35 years) may dictate more of where I go than I would really prefer. I will say also, global warming (human made or not) will drive a lot of migration. The northern states will be the most hospitable from a climate & rainfall and for crops than we are admitting at the moment. The coasts will be harder to live on. My property today will be worth 10X in 35 years because I'm 2 Hour inland and will have much longer summers in 35 years. it'll be an incredibly desirable place to live.

So for now...NH/VT is fine and I'm already here establishing myself. I'd do Idaho / Montana as well and would consider northern Michigan. I'm not opposed to Alaska if it wasn't so hard to leave Alaska. Riding AK to MT is a Long ride.

I retired two years ago and my wife and I both have enough pension income that we could retire and live just about anywhere we wanted in the US. We ruled out the vast majority of the country and decided to stay in Virginia. We had lived between Richmond and Charlottesville but moved west to the Blue Ridge and live about two miles from the entrance to the Blue Ridge Parkway. We have four seasons, fun roads, plenty of nearby micro-breweries, and a reasonable cost of living.

New Zealand South Island.

25 years ago when my wife and I both retired from the Navy we put both kids in our motorhome and drove around until we found a place we liked.

It is pretty hard to beat the Black Hills of South Dakota.

Four seasons, no income taxes, plenty of great roads to ride, access to medical is good, five hours from Denver, Regional airport with direct flights to both coasts in Rapid City.

After all 650,000 Harley Riders can't be wrong one week out of the year.

Thanks for ideas

I will check the articles. Paul, I was looking at New Zealand real estate on the web yesterday. I have only been to the north island but seeing all the beauty from the movies filmed there, I am considering a trip to the south.

bigjohnsd said:

25 years ago when my wife and I both retired from the Navy we put both kids in our motorhome and drove around until we found a place we liked.

It is pretty hard to beat the Black Hills of South Dakota.

Four seasons, no income taxes, plenty of great roads to ride, access to medical is good, five hours from Denver, Regional airport with direct flights to both coasts in Rapid City.

After all 650,000 Harley Riders can't be wrong one week out of the year.

Click to expand...

If my wife and I weren't so settled here in Raleigh, we both agree that Rapid City would be one of our top choices. It could still happen.

Doug

PGlaves said:

New Zealand South Island.

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I have enjoyed watching some NZ TV programs via streaming services. These programmes (800 Words and Brokenwood Mysteries) make the NZ North Island look pretty nice.

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt4380324/

https://www.imdb.com/title/tt3640276/


Retirement location was pretty easy to pick for us. We moved to Ohio in the 1970s after college. On retirement we moved back near my wife's family in the piedmont region of NC. Riding year 'round is pretty nice with a variety of interesting places to visit.

Is anything wrong with where you are? God has planted me all over this world for a month or more in my places in order to be a valid status point for giving advice. Or at least to be honest about reality. We have been traveling over 3 or 4 months per year for the last 10 years. We just sold the Airstream for a diesel pusher bus and am hoping to stretch the time out for at least 5 to 6 months per year. The WORST PART ABOUT TRAVELING is the durned pets......

It is getting harder and harder to find a farm sitter!!! The show goats are gone over the last 3 or 4 years and with them have gone the pasture guard dogs for the human pests, coyotes, vultures for the babies (goats), and ex-wives. The mules have gone from riding buddies to pasture pets. Many hours and miles spent with them providing a slow-easily plodding through forest that is briar and rattlesnake infested So now all that pasturage has become more of fighting weeds and mowing them. So that is maybe a negative cause you cant hire a farm hand to take care of that as well as the doing the animal chores..... barn cats, dogs, mules. It's not funny cause we just lost the well trained to do nothing house cat. Though one had to turn off the IR burglar alarms by covering them with painter's tape so that his movements didn't trigger the IR movement alarms. We dont talk about his loss though cause I can see in the mental picture of the fella in the claws of a hawk, drooped and dangling, caught at his shoulders, flying limply across the valley just above the tree line while the hawk soared to it's roost, to finish off the job with beak and talons.......poor little guy, just going out to do his number

We are scheduled out to spend this fall heading up into the Northern wilderness checking out the backwoods and weight limit of the covered bridges of Vermont and New Hampshire while the natives there are preparing to head down into my country. We plan on someway avoiding the environs of Boston. From what I understand, has enveloped all the way past Worchestershire where I spent many years learning how to ditty bop and encode messages and then how to figure out how to capture those bops and then to decode them, at Ft. Devens. NOT GOOD VIBES.......Instead, , we want to make a loop over to the base of Niagra Falls, In Raincoats , and over to some kind of boat that carries one over to the base of the falls while keeping my wife's underwear dry for a change........We are still honeymooners dont ya know!!

Finally, we are scheduled to spend from mid-November till late January down at Key West where the Navy has another one of their fine outfits, if you arent IN THE NAVY, at a place with the bus right on the beach front , perched on a place called Sigby Island Naval Station, for $17 a day. That alone is one reason to go there and spend as long as you can...........
Lastly in LATE January we spend a GOVERNMENT ALLOWED max number of days over at the EVERGLADES, Flamingo Campground, attending a Kayak/Sailboat REGATTA at the campgrounds and GOVERNMENT RESORT area that was mostly blown away by a hurricane several years ago. Now it is being rebuilt, with government wisdom, by using tenting, plywood, and travel trailers.

So, home by March.........Anyone want to plant themselves for the winter in Northwest Georgia??????? Where, according to my afterthought below, I have paradise already. lol.....It is.....only, problem is, to much work for an old retired guy and I need to pawn it off to some ignorant person who wants a FREE RESORT VACATION while learning how to be a farm hand. Driving a tractor, running a: industrial chipper, chain saw, bush hog, fertilizer spreader, and a few other "fun" implements while performing modern handiwork............God Bless

Honestly, still looking and traveling looking for ANY PLACE BETTER than what I have been blessed with. You'll see. :

You wouldn’t recognize “Devens” now Dennis. Staying away from the Boston area ought to save you some traffic aggravation.
Hope your trip goes well.
OM