Different strokes for different…and I am in the minority, but here goes. I have lived in 18 different cities/towns around the world, and two of those twice. Yikes, most will say.
When I was 22, a very wealthy man told me, “When you think you cannot afford to leave, you really cannot afford to stay. Leave.” I took it literally as if you get too cozy and settled in your physical location, leave. He meant it about my career and explained that when I felt like my work situation was set and the perks were getting too good to leave, it was time for a new challenge. I ended up taking both my initial literal interpretation about location and his career explanation as words to live by. Thank you for that amazing advice, old sage.
I started viewing ‘my success’ as not how many ‘toys’ in the garage, but how many great experiences I enjoyed. I realize this is not normal. People generally like to settle. My brothers and sister moved to a city/town for their first job after college and not one has moved since. This would drive me and my wife absolutely bonkers. In our little squirrel minds, too much to see, do, explore.
We have friends we can and do visit, travel with, and snowboard with all over the world. We don’t have to see them every week.
Travel is fun, but you don’t get the same experiences as actually living in that location. We love where we live now (moved here in August from Singapore) and maybe will always keep a house here, but I can see the day in a few years, when we say, “Hey, wouldn’t it be fun to live there? Let’s make it happen.”
I really love where we live and I love our home that I’ve spent the last 15 years renovating. I’ve no intention of moving and my house is small to begin with, and one floor, so need to even downsize.
Eventually, I will inherit my mom’s Florida home and if we keep it I can see spending a few months there in winter. The good thing about that is my friend group here either has their own home there ,where they spend the winter, or like me has a parent still there.
When we retire, my husband wants to move to a state where it is kinder tax-wise to retirees. I prefer to stay here where we have friends and excellent medical services. However, it is very possible that our friends may move away before us.
Finally, we both agree that we will move to be near our only child wherever she will settle down. Our daughter has said she will be happy having us nearby. We have a few more years to make the decision.
@thumper1 I think Cleveland was a great place to raise a family. Our work/life balance was great; rarely any traffic jams to make us late for a kid’s game; I don’t know anyone who has ever complained about being house poor, and we do have three of the four pro sports teams. The winters are not THAT bad, and the other 3 seasons are perfect. But, outside of schooling, I have only lived in 3 places and I want to experience more than that before I am too old to notice.
Agree on Columbus. Cleveland being lakeside should have made it a prettier place to be, but the early city planners around here blew it big time and failed to capitalize on our huge lakefront completely. Can you believe that a private airport eats up so much of downtown’s waterfront property? Stupid. Things like that make me nuts around here. Rant over.
Another voice that loved their time in the Cleveland area. Super place to raise our D and while the Browns were a challenge, the Indians are a blast to watch. Love that there are state and national parks near by, kayaking, the lake, and even skiing at Boston Mills/Brandywine ; )
We’re not planning on leaving our current situation. My H is partially retired. I quit working a number or years ago (before retirement age). I fill my time with lots of activities–I’m the board of a non-profit and do volunteer work for two others. We have close friends in the area where we’ve lived for the last 38 years. We bult our house 15 years ago and still love it.
That being said, we also spend much of May to November in our vacation home (island off Cape Cod). The rest of the year we’re in our primary residence. The only thing I would change would be to spend 4-5 weeks in the winter in a warmer climate. (We currently live in MA). For the last few years, we’ve planned a few 7-day trips to a warmer climate. I have cousins in Vero Beach and we visit them very year. This year, I went to Costa Rica for a yoga retreat. We also planned a long-weekend trip to visit my brother, who recently moved to Sedona…
My kids are in NYC and Indianapolis and will probably be there for a while. Both kids love to go to our vacation place and we are able to visit them frequently. Also, my younger daughter’s significant other grew up in our town. They went to the same high school, but didn’t date and met again after college when they both lived in Philly. They both come here for holidays. At some point we may want to be closer to our kids, especially if we have grandkids (so far we only have grandpups).
We are trying to figure out whether we should stay or go when we retire. We live in a HCOL area, about halfway between DC and Baltimore, MD.
Why go - We pay taxes at the federal, state AND county level, and MD is not known to be a tax friendly state or good for retirees. Our property taxes are very high also. We can’t walk to anything, riding our bicycles on the street is not very safe, and we have to drive to get to paths, and there’s terrible traffic.
Why stay - We have great quality healthcare and many hospital systems available, lots of cultural events, museums, restaurants, And shopping, we’re not too far from the mountains or the ocean (within a couple of hours to each) and our 3 kids are spread between Philly and Northern VA. 2 of them visit us fairly regularly, but we suspect that will stop in the next couple of years. We have friends here, but some of them are moving away too.
I think I started a thread a couple of years ago about what’s important to consider for retirement. Maybe I’ll see if I can find it or start a new one.
Why leave? Nothing really holding us here - kids are scattered (would move to a location if all were in one place) - prefer more temperate climate - friends have moved on or passed away. We have very pleasant acquaintance level relationships here but it’s only our jobs keeping us here - which is why we came in the first place. Kind of sad, really…
I will, or rather should, be in a state that doesn’t tax government pensions. Last count, there are about seven if I recall with my state of MA being one of them. I do not want to keep my house we built some 22 years ago and even now with a D22, we aren’t connected to our town as she attends a private school in a nearby city.
For all these reasons, Florida is calling my name for at least part of the year. We are fortunate to have stumbled upon a lake community where we bought a second home in Maine where there is a combination of younger families as well as many retirees. Think jet skis, pontoons, and bass boats with not much in between. I hope to keep this house and spend summers here. It’s just two hours north of Boston, close to Portland, and my favorite cheesy Old Orchard Beach.
I grew up in Michigan only about an hour from where we have lived for the past 38 years in Ohio. I’ve never really felt like an Ohioan. My heart is still in Michigan! I wouldn’t go back to my hometown but I could be happy in one of the small towns just outside of Ann Arbor - so I can use AA2 easily and hop on 94 to head to our cottage or hop on 23 to get to Ohio and one son here and two kids in Columbus.
Columbus is a great place to live. Even though it’s only 2ish hours away, their winter temperatures of regularly several degrees warmer than here. We have 5 inches of snow freshly fallen on the ground, they have not a drop. This happens all the time! Not saying it never snows there but you definitely get the seasons but with less snow it seems.
When you retire and leave your work friends, they mourn. When you move away and leave your friends, they mourn. Whoever is left behind has the loss. Why move ? Sometimes there is nothing left at home.
I want a place with real snow. We get north of 50" where we are now. If climate change continues, I may need to head further north. Definitely want 4 seasons. But to me, cold and rain is far worse than snow (I like snow).