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My husband has gotten a job in Gilsum, New Hampshire and we are moving to the area as soon as we sell our house in Southeastern Pennsylvania. (He's been coming home weekends and staying in a NH airbnb during the week for 2 months so far.) The question now is to where. We've been looking in the Keene area to the north, trying to keep a commute of under 30 minutes to Gilsum. Now we are looking at Bellows Falls, Vermont, which is only a half hour drive. He says it looks great, and some beautiful houses very fairly priced. Cute town, with a movie theater - Opera House, nice size library, etc. We homeschool our 5th grade only child, so school district is not very important, though I have heard that Vermont is not the best to homeschool in (PA is one of the worst, for that matter, so I figure anything else is the same or better than where we are now.) I did see that there is a very active homeschooling community in the Keene area and have heard of one in Alstead, though I haven't looked at any in Vermont.
So my question is: Does anyone have any input on Bellows Falls? Input on Vermont versus New Hampshire for a family with a young child? We are hoping to find something under $150,000 - even lower would be better like 120,000 or less - so that limits us quite a bit. It's hard to decide between a walkable life in town living (like Bellows Falls, or Keene) and a place with at least a half acre for gardening and chickens, etc. Any other suggestions?
Thanks so much!
Cheryl Joy
I believe you should consider income tax as part of your decision. NH has no income tax on job earnings in the state. If you however live in another state with income tax, I believe you have to declare (in resident filing) your outside state income for tax purpose calculations and then can use a deduction for taxes paid to another state (if paid). Since NH has no tax on earnings, your deduction credit would be zero.
VT has an income tax so you need to research this as my understanding is you would pay the full income tax to VT on your NH earnings. If you live in NH, you would pay no income tax. NH however does have high property taxes to offset the lack of an income tax. Be also aware that NH's government services and benefits tend to be less than the adjoining states.
My first thought would be to look in NH near Keene. It is a nice town and has a state university right in the downtown (Keene State U) which gives it a bit more vitality.
Thank you for your answer. Yes, I have been hearing about the tax differences. I wonder if it is a wash as to which is better. The health insurance is pretty high where he works, and someone told him that for our family of 3, the health insurance in Vermont would only be about $600 a year. So I guess we need to crunch numbers now.
the health insurance in Vermont would only be about $600 a year
That number does not seem believable. If families could get health insurance for that annual amount, millions of people would be moving to VT.
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