Moving to South Carolina (Charleston, Mount Pleasant: wood floors, best neighborhood, home)

[emilybh]

Originally Posted by carrie0312

we are moving in July to summerville area i just want a true idea of the area. Help!!!!

Carrie,

There are extensive threads on Summerville. For a "true idea of the area", I'd fix yourself a cup of coffee and go back maybe five pages and read all the Summerville threads. They should keep you busy reading for at least a few hours. Then if you have a specific question. Post it.

[pbass]

Hey Carrie,

I grew up on James Island and know the area very well. It is a great place to live, especially if you like living close to the water and want to be close to downtown Charleston. You are only about 20 minutes from Folly Beach and 10 - 15 minutes from downtown. It is a good place to raise a family and there are a lot of young couples/singles that are moving back to James Island.

I currently live in Summerville. You can get more house for your money in Summerville and the taxes and insurance are less than in Charleston county. Also Dorchester 2 school distict is wonderful. That is the main reason we moved to the area. Summerville has more of the small town "community" feel than James Island, but they are both great places to relocate.

If you have any questions about the area or if I can be of any help when you are here visiting, please give me a call.

[clobrien]

Thank you for your responses! I am hoping to visit the area within the next few months and I will certainly check out the different towns.

Thank you and I will keep reading!

[Leone]

Over a year ago since my last post..my opinion hasn't changed but I bet the newcomers may have changed theirs. Perhaps finding my words ring true?

Enjoying the stench?

[BostonMedic]

Well I just read this entire thread....Leon, you have your opinion and I'm listening to your experiences. Sorry my friend but you got screwed.I am also listning to the other overwhelming positive replies...Framingham with palm trees.....Now thats funny. Framingham is becoming a social security nightmare.
I like the idea of driving 10 minutes to the "cape" if you will and to downtown. Every place has crime. Try living in Boston, kids are killing kids on a daily basis. Crack, Heroin mmmmmmmmm,mmmmmmmm good.I would rather have heat and a few bugs over -20 with the wind chill and 2 feet of snow. I have found that people up here are rude,arrogant and down right pissy. I want a change for my family and we are seriously looking at the Charleston area.

[Sportygal21]

Hi BostonMedic,
You are in a tough area I am up in Newburyport and it is a sweetier here but I think the south is where I want to be (I'll be a semi snowbird) I love being outdoors and as I get older/wiser the winters are just too harsh.

One of my favorite quotes:
"Life is what you make it. Always has been, always will be."
Grandma Mosses

[hotkarl]

I'm born and raised on LI, NY. I have had enough. It downright sucks here. The people are hostile, arrogant, rude, nasty, self-centered, you get my point.
I've definitely noticed the change here throughout the years. I grew up in an average suburb that up until about 20 or so years ago was for the most part a "Leave It To Beaver" style of life. Now the town that I grew up in, and still live in, has become over-crowded and a traffic nightmare. Queens has become so over-populated that it has overflowed into Nassau County and devastated the quality of life. I am miserable here. I'm sick of the wanna-be mafia guys and the gangsta/hood/urban type mentality. The economy is in the toilet and it has become way to expensive to even get by. I am paying $8500 a year in property tax for a cape on a 60x100 lot. What the hell am I paying for? So yes, I too am looking to make the move south. I've always had a fondness for the south, ever since I was a child. And, being a "retired" professional musician(at the ripe old age of 37) I've spent alot of time in the south touring, and always had a good time and was treated with respect. In fact, I can't even recall any bad incidents when being in the south.
I've been wanting to move out of NY for probabally 10 years now but life happens and things can't always work out like you planned. There's also the "fear of the unknown" factor, which I think was the biggest obstacle for moving. Leaving all of your friends and family behind, and even though it sucks here, you still have that comfort factor because you know where you stand.

My wife and I are more than ready for change, we really can't stand it here anymore, to the point where there is almost no quality of life. I have actually developed mild panic disorder over the past few years because things are so bad here. You can't go anywhere without some form of confrontation. Nobody here gives a damn about anyone but themselves. It's just no way to live. I no longer want my kids subjected to this, it just isn't fair. By the time they are ready to go out on their own it's going to be even more difficult for them to establish themselves here. I'm scared for them on all levels. The bottom is about to fall out here, it's only going to get worse, much worse.

I only hope that all the "Northerners" don't make it to South Carolina and destroy it like they did to Florida. Hell, is anyone from Florida even from Florida these days?

Not to be totally ignorant, there are plenty of good people from the North, really. Unfortunately, the bad far outweigh the good.

[SRCthatsme]

wow hotkarl i heard you on that one - i'm a mom in south jersey looking through these forums trying to work out a relocation plan for my family. we're 15 minutes from philly and I feel your pain; I'm afraid to let my 2 boys play unsupervised in our yard for a few minutes and it is a challenge going anywhere because of the general misery of the surrounding society. forget about quality of life - paying a fortune in taxes to live where, HERE??!! ha ha ha. speaking of taxes, NJ even has an "exit tax" now if you try to relocate out of state. (taxation without representation, huh?) it is amazing looking at these relocation forums and all the northerners trying to make their way down south. just hope too many northerners don't take the nasty with them, right? we won't let that happen.

[RelocatingMother]

My husband and I lived in Mount Pleasant and we loved living there...we moved away bc of work and we have been trying to get back ever since. I love the beaches, shops, farmers market, art, schools, numerous fesitvals and activities downtown, etc. We go on vacation in Mount Pleasant every year and we can't wait to call the Charleston area home again.

[OleTomCat]

SRS, I grew up in S. Jersey, Maylanding, Egg Harbor City....

I don't even go back to visit in the winter unless someone kicks.....

I feel safer here than almost anyplace I have lived....

I have lived here for nearly 20 years and once I realized that if I left the yankee in me up north I would be fine....