Have you ever left everything you know and moved to a new state? (renting, cheaper)

[Marks]

If things work out I will be doing the big leap soon.

[Delaneyland]

I have done it three times...first was to Nigeria in 1981, second was to Evanston WY in 1985, third was BACK to little Marbleton WY in 1988...enjoyed every move and wish I was back in WY right now!

[KoZmiC NinJa]

I lived in PA all of my life and we moved twice in PA to escape the
development and mean people who came with it....Philly assaulting
the outer areas....We came to Vermont and got everything we were
looking for and then some. I have never been so miserable. The
biggest mistake we ever made. It is an absolutely stunningly beautiful
place but it comes at too high a price. There is not a day that goes
by where I wish I could take the move back. Now, due to our inability
to live here and a death in the family, we are going to FLA. Im pretty
sure this is not going to be an improvement but I am trying to be open
minded about it. I love travel and new things, but doing it permenantly
was a mistake for us.

[Steve-o]

I picked up my Illinois anchor and let myself drift to Clarksville, Tennessee. After a few months I incredibly regretted my decision and promptly packed my bags and headed back home to Illinois. Ive never been happier. When I was in Tennessee, a certain Cinderella song could have been my life's motto: "you dont know what you got til its gone." I love Chicagoland, wont ever move again. Ive yet to find another area of the country thats even close, so here is where Ill say.

[ontheroad]

I've done it on several occasions--out of the country and to other regions. All but one were success stories.

[nomoresnow]

We're about to do it. I lived my whole life in a small, rural town in Northern New York until 8 years ago, then moved to a bigger small rural town in Northern New York about 120 miles away so we could be closer to an ailing FIL.

Hubby is fortunate enough to be able to retire at 55, so in Sept. (should we be able to sell our house up here), we're moving to a 55+ community in SW Florida. We do have a couple who are close friends of ours, but that'll be it. Like another poster said, it's really exciting, but scary too.

Thanks for posting. I'm really encouraged.

[caution]

Quick Answer:
Yes. Me and about one million of my closets friends do just that while on active duty in the US Military.

Parts of these frequent moves may be isolated by a common "culture" found at work, but that does little to lessen the impact of the first few moves. The hardest, other than deployment, would probably be when a young family moves overseas. That's a fair amount of change to absorb along with the move, especially if the mom and dad are 20-somethings.

After several moves, it becomes almost like a routine.

My only advice, get rid of stuff your really don't need long before you move because "moving and sorting it all out later" rarely works. You may end up with boxes from your last move left untouched a few years later -- bad sign. :-)

[ontheroad]

Sorry to hear this, and my one bad move was to a beautiful place with a good reputation.

If you come back to the thread, I wonder if you'd share what the disappointment for you is in VT.

Mine was culture-shock in the SW.

Originally Posted by KoZmiC NinJa

I lived in PA all of my life and we moved twice in PA to escape the
development and mean people who came with it....Philly assaulting
the outer areas....We came to Vermont and got everything we were
looking for and then some. I have never been so miserable. The
biggest mistake we ever made. It is an absolutely stunningly beautiful
place but it comes at too high a price. There is not a day that goes
by where I wish I could take the move back. Now, due to our inability
to live here and a death in the family, we are going to FLA. Im pretty
sure this is not going to be an improvement but I am trying to be open
minded about it. I love travel and new things, but doing it permenantly
was a mistake for us.

[BusySocialWorker]

yep - Hubby (boy friend at the time) and I moved from South Dakota where we were born and raised - jobs - family - all our friends to Denver - having never even visited when I started Grad school - we loved it for 5 years, then decided to move back to be closer to family... good experience, but it made our priorities clear

[KoZmiC NinJa]

Originally Posted by ontheroad

Sorry to hear this, and my one bad move was to a beautiful place with a good reputation.

If you come back to the thread, I wonder if you'd share what the disappointment for you is in VT.

Mine was culture-shock in the SW.

Sure Ill share , ontheroad !
I have many posts in the VT forum outling the misery so sorry
for redundancy to forum scanners like me

We came here, looked at many places, did the math, homework etc.
Obviously, we were spellbound by the intense beauty. Rutland Schl.
Dist. called and offered my Wife a very nice contract. Despite Rutland
being a place of no interest to relocate to , we took a chance due to
the built-in employment positive. We found a beautiful house in Proctor
life goes on....After as little as 9 months we knew were leaving. 15
months sealed the deal. For the sake of brevity, I could not find
suitable work. I was a mid-level computer operator in the pharmacuetical
industry with zillions of crossover skills in PA. I could find nothing here
that required any of those skills....Its all service and agriculture related.....
9.00 an hour, wack hours, etc. The taxes in our town went up twice
in 18 months, water doubled....Our mortgage got upped due to a new
flood law congress enacted...so on, and so on...The worst part though
was the lack of culture and amenities. Im not a MALL person so I
dont mean that, but there is NOTHING here. Nowhere to get a cup of
coffee after work. No reading rooms or gallery type shops/hangouts...
Nothing........There is just a pawl of gloom and negativity over the
whole town on any given day. In all fairness though, I think if we stuck
to our original plan and bypassed the Rotland area it might have been
different.