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My wife and I own a home in a rural / ex-urb area just north of Denver and East of Boulder that we rent out. We also own a home as our primary residence in a very nice suburb of Raleigh.
We have both early retired (mid 40s) and our retirement income will support living in either city just fine, but Raleigh leaves us with $900 additional spending cash each month unless we rent out a room in our Colorado home (at which point the monthly spending cash is roughly the same).
We are having one hell of a difficult time figuring out which city we want to live in most of all.
The Colorado house is an amazing 6 year old 2800sq ft high efficiency (mid 50s HER score) house with solar panels, amazing master bath, his and hers walk in closets, beautiful office area that has a double sided fireplace shared with the living room and an 1100 sq ft basement (not included in the 2800 sq ft) for our gym and movie theater room. This house also has a 3 car garage wired with 220V hookups for electric vehicle charging and modest mountain views of the Rockies. The area is quite rural and becoming a bedroom community with seas of houses and grocery stores at least 5 miles away. Any restaurants worth going to will be in Boulder, Westminster or Denver or roughly a 30 minute to 1hr drive away. Plenty of trails (including mountain biking single track which I love), amazing mountain hiking within an hour drive. We like the snowfall and drier climate along with far fewer pest insects compared to NC.
The North Carolina house is an older (35 years old) 1891 sq ft home that we have recently completed substantial repair work on (new siding with 30+ year materials, new roof with 50+ year materials, and the AC is now just 2 years old and is a 16.6 SEER unit). The gym is in the living room, our office area is in part of the family room and the kitchen is so small it is frustrating for 2 people to work on a meal at the same time. However, the forest feel of the area is amazing! You step on any of the trails within 5 minutes of our house and you forgot that you live in the middle of a major metro because you don't see any buildings at all for at least a mile or 2 of walking. The spring flowers, the fall colors, the several dozen colorful birds that visit our yard (which has many massive old growth trees) are amazing! We also go to the beaches 6 times a year minimum. The hot humid summers can be oppressive and frustrates my wife's attempts to have "nice hair" and the population of insects (particularly woodland roaches and mosquitoes) is daunting. Neither of us have been bitten by a copperhead yet, but we've seen dozens and almost stepped on at least 2 full grown ones in the 3 years we've lived here. 4 great grocery stores within 1.25miles, downtown within 1.5miles, every store and amazing restaurant you could imagine within a 30 minute or less drive (include a Forbes 5 star rated restaurant that we love to visit on our anniversaries).
Colorado puts us closer to extended family who all live in the west. We have 2 children attending college in NC (both nearby at UNC chapel hill and NCSU).
Since we no longer work, it won't be reasonable to try to get a new mortgage and buy the equivalent of the Colorado house in NC nor do we want to sink that much of our investments into another house to buy it outright in cash (creates a huge taxable event and diminishes monthly spending ability from those investments with the assets locked up as house equity given current interest rates). We find our location in the Raleigh metro area is near perfect but we'd rather live in a rural / exurb of Denver than a rural / exurb of Raleigh. The house in Colorado is near perfect (for us), but the location isn't as good.
Marijuana is not a concern one way or the other.
TLDR: we have a house just outside Boulder in a rural area and we love the house; we have a house in Raleigh metro with a near perfect location but the house leaves much to be desired and we can't easily buy a new house. Torn between house vs location [sometimes an outside perspective can bring to light elements you failed to consider being deep inside the problem at hand].
I assume you are considering selling one of them- otherwise I'm not sure the dilemma...
However, if you are wanting to be more full time in a particular location, I personally would choose Colorado simply because you prefer the home along with the weather and it is closer to extended family. Those three things seem to outweigh the others. I wouldn't necessarily consider where your kids are NOW as a part of the equation as college is such a short amount of time and who knows where they might land when they graduate and get jobs/ families of their own. It seems to me if the remainder of their extended and immediate families are out west, that might factor into their own decisions as well.
Also, if I may, you did not actually mention any negative things about Colorado, only that is is somewhat far from restaurants you like. If the area is developing, that situation is likely to change in time too.
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You've pretty much described the main reasons why I'll never live in the southeast again. Heat, humidity, and pests. Humid subtropical climates suck (esp. in the summer).
We made a similar decision when we left DFW. We paid more for our house here, and it was about 1/3 smaller than the one we had in Texas when we moved in. We've since finished part of the basement (something we didn't have down there), so now the house is only 400 sf smaller than the Texas one. Did I mention we have a basement?
As for me, I'm in better physical shape than I was when I lived in DFW because I actually enjoy being outdoors here.
Plus RDU is really kinda in no-man's land. It's nice and green, but it's a couple hours to either the ocean or the mountains.
For me, personally, it's a no-brainer. Front Range all the way.
I assume you are considering selling one of them- otherwise I'm not sure the dilemma...
However, if you are wanting to be more full time in a particular location, I personally would choose Colorado simply because you prefer the home along with the weather and it is closer to extended family. Those three things seem to outweigh the others. I wouldn't necessarily consider where your kids are NOW as a part of the equation as college is such a short amount of time and who knows where they might land when they graduate and get jobs/ families of their own. It seems to me if the remainder of their extended and immediate families are out west, that might factor into their own decisions as well.
Also, if I may, you did not actually mention any negative things about Colorado, only that is is somewhat far from restaurants you like. If the area is developing, that situation is likely to change in time too.
I knew I'd forget something important with such a long post.
We will sell one of the houses. After taxes on the rental property the profits will be pretty close to the same between the two houses.
Clearly I must be leaning towards Colorado because I did fail to mention the negatives as you pointed out -
I'm not a fan of the heavy pollution of Denver proper; Raleigh has much better air quality.
The area does have fracking, luckily the neighborhood prevented new wells by improperly designing the pad and refusing to fix it for the oil company so only one existing well 1500' from our house that has been going for 15 years (I don't believe there are any plans for them to re-frack it).
...and I feel as if there are slightly better dining out options in Raleigh, but I often cook at home anyway.
The points you bring up about family are also a strong consideration.
Can you wait a little to sell your Raleigh house? Maybe wait until your kids graduate and then move? When the Apple Campus II is done and Google has fully moved in, your house might be worth so much more than it is now.
I understand summers suck here, but how awesome it is between October and June? Like I literally go hiking the trails in the nearby forest every morning before my work starts. I love the lushness of the place. Forest bathing is the thing that I didn't know before I moved here. It's incredibly calming. Nothing beats the Rockies, but this is definitely not the worst place to spend a couple of years. Especially because you can literally drive to some of the best beaches on the east coast. Plus, as you said the food is great here. Not just the restaurants but the availability of fresh local farms, co-ops and farmers markets. I lived in Boulder and Denver for over 10 years, and have been living in the Triangle area for 3. I do not miss the bipolar weather at all. I miss other things dearly but definitely not the summer hail storms, and snow blizzards in April.
Obviously you are smart with money -- you've retired by your mid-40s. But, it is crazy how fast the area is growing. But, it still doesn't feel overcrowded. I live by Duke Forest, it feels like I am in the middle of the wood, but I am under 5 min to DT Durham and less than 15 to the Research Triangle. When I see new builds and million $$ condos in DT Durham, I am like this is nuts. But people get paid well here for STEM, Biotech, university and research jobs. The economy seems very diverse. Obviously you can't predict the market and with the interest rates going up, the house prices may go down -- but with the influx of people into the area, I doubt it would slow down substantially. Especially if you are in a nice area of Raleigh. Something to think about.
Add my .02. I am actually moving back to the SE. And I am familar with Raleigh, I went to college near there.
Lived in CO for about 10 years. I dont have family here and I have 2 little kids. So those are big factors. Most of my wifes friends and network have moved out or stayed shuttered due to covid as well.
We go to Michigan every summer and when we come back in July or August the front range looks really dead. I miss the greenery a lot. WHile the SE gets hot and humid, I actually miss the humidity. Its great for my kids skin as well.
When we didnt have kids we hiked all the time and skied but having littles makes that difficult. Throw in kids activities those things have fallen off our level of importance. OUr kids just want to be in a pool all summer and not on a march. There is still hiking in hte SE that isnt huge on sun exposure. Waking up at 5 am to ski on the weekend is out of hte question. 2 summers ago CO was on fire and last summer our air quality was dangerous. Throw in the Marshall fire last week and its definetely something to consider when thinking about living here. The front range went something lie 70 straight days of bad air quality? Many were the worst in hte world. So our great summer weather last 2 summers has been spent inside anyway. I dont want my kids in that.
My wife and I own a home in a rural / ex-urb area just north of Denver and East of Boulder that we rent out. We also own a home as our primary residence in a very nice suburb of Raleigh.
We have both early retired (mid 40s) and our retirement income will support living in either city just fine, but Raleigh leaves us with $900 additional spending cash each month unless we rent out a room in our Colorado home (at which point the monthly spending cash is roughly the same).
We are having one hell of a difficult time figuring out which city we want to live in most of all.
The Colorado house is an amazing 6 year old 2800sq ft high efficiency (mid 50s HER score) house with solar panels, amazing master bath, his and hers walk in closets, beautiful office area that has a double sided fireplace shared with the living room and an 1100 sq ft basement (not included in the 2800 sq ft) for our gym and movie theater room. This house also has a 3 car garage wired with 220V hookups for electric vehicle charging and modest mountain views of the Rockies. The area is quite rural and becoming a bedroom community with seas of houses and grocery stores at least 5 miles away. Any restaurants worth going to will be in Boulder, Westminster or Denver or roughly a 30 minute to 1hr drive away. Plenty of trails (including mountain biking single track which I love), amazing mountain hiking within an hour drive. We like the snowfall and drier climate along with far fewer pest insects compared to NC.
The North Carolina house is an older (35 years old) 1891 sq ft home that we have recently completed substantial repair work on (new siding with 30+ year materials, new roof with 50+ year materials, and the AC is now just 2 years old and is a 16.6 SEER unit). The gym is in the living room, our office area is in part of the family room and the kitchen is so small it is frustrating for 2 people to work on a meal at the same time. However, the forest feel of the area is amazing! You step on any of the trails within 5 minutes of our house and you forgot that you live in the middle of a major metro because you don't see any buildings at all for at least a mile or 2 of walking. The spring flowers, the fall colors, the several dozen colorful birds that visit our yard (which has many massive old growth trees) are amazing! We also go to the beaches 6 times a year minimum. The hot humid summers can be oppressive and frustrates my wife's attempts to have "nice hair" and the population of insects (particularly woodland roaches and mosquitoes) is daunting. Neither of us have been bitten by a copperhead yet, but we've seen dozens and almost stepped on at least 2 full grown ones in the 3 years we've lived here. 4 great grocery stores within 1.25miles, downtown within 1.5miles, every store and amazing restaurant you could imagine within a 30 minute or less drive (include a Forbes 5 star rated restaurant that we love to visit on our anniversaries).
Colorado puts us closer to extended family who all live in the west. We have 2 children attending college in NC (both nearby at UNC chapel hill and NCSU).
Since we no longer work, it won't be reasonable to try to get a new mortgage and buy the equivalent of the Colorado house in NC nor do we want to sink that much of our investments into another house to buy it outright in cash (creates a huge taxable event and diminishes monthly spending ability from those investments with the assets locked up as house equity given current interest rates). We find our location in the Raleigh metro area is near perfect but we'd rather live in a rural / exurb of Denver than a rural / exurb of Raleigh. The house in Colorado is near perfect (for us), but the location isn't as good.
Marijuana is not a concern one way or the other.
TLDR: we have a house just outside Boulder in a rural area and we love the house; we have a house in Raleigh metro with a near perfect location but the house leaves much to be desired and we can't easily buy a new house. Torn between house vs location [sometimes an outside perspective can bring to light elements you failed to consider being deep inside the problem at hand].
Raleigh EASILY.. less risk of losing house to parched/wildfire environment of Colorado, $11K more/year due to lower housing costs in NC, less isolated locale, still close to mountain region and have the benefit of being driving distance to the ocean. winters are tolerable, summers aren't extreme and no worries about elevation impacting health long term
Raleigh EASILY.. less risk of losing house to parched/wildfire environment of Colorado, $11K more/year due to lower housing costs in NC, less isolated locale, still close to mountain region and have the benefit of being driving distance to the ocean. winters are tolerable, summers aren't extreme and no worries about elevation impacting health long term
Raleigh's a good 2-3 hours from the mountains and 2 hours from the ocean.
Summers aren't extreme? BS. Raleigh's summers are hot and disgustingly humid. The city routinely gets mid-upper 80s and low 90 degree temps with dew points in the upper 60s/low 70s.
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