"Why" do you live in upstate NY? (New York: section 8, best suburbs)

[carolinajack]

i am a southerner who moved to upstate for graduate school and lived there for 10 years and fell in love with the place. Never thought I would or could but i did.

affordable rents, affordable property minus the taxes, good decent people, lots of outdoor activities(state parks, lakes, mountains, quaint towns). excellent historic sites, great restaurants, arts, family activities, nothing not to like except the taxes

[nynoggin]

I live just below lake george new york and just above saratoga springs. It is great to live here. It is beautiful to see many things to do it is wonderful i would not live any where else[IMG][/IMG]

[Rumblebelly]

After visiting Upstate a few times because my wife's family lives there, I fell in love with the area and we plan to move there from Colorado. The traffic is less, everything is greener, less sprawly, and the wild areas seem more accessible. People think I'm crazy but I think the forests and hills in Upstate are just as beautiful, if not more beautiful than the ones in Colorado.

[Wanda-ng]

I hear what ya'll are saying about NY state. It is beautiful and friendly, and cheap homes but doesn't the property tax make you feel like you could actually afford a nicer house somewhere else cause yer never gonna get that back in equity.

[honeychrome]

Originally Posted by Wanda-ng

I hear what ya'll are saying about NY state. It is beautiful and friendly, and cheap homes but doesn't the property tax make you feel like you could actually afford a nicer house somewhere else cause yer never gonna get that back in equity.

I actually think that there are a lot of people in upstate NY (at least the farther you get from NYC 'weekend' range) who don't give too much thought to the notion of building equity to later sell and 'trade up.' They become attached to their locale and their house and land (or maybe were even born there) and hope/expect they'll live there until they die and maybe a child or someone else in the family will take over from there. None of which is to say that the high taxes aren't burdensome- many just grin and bear it (grimace and bear it might be more accurate!) because this is where they want to stay.

[Tioga]

...Ran into a-soon-to-be-ex neighbor the other day. He's taking his retirement earlier than planned. Moving to....where else...NC. Of course he couldn't end our last conversation w/o mentioning: a. how great the place is he bought down there; b. how much better everything is down there; c.how he felt bad for those still stuck(?) here in upstate NY. I thought..why start an arguement at this point...wished him well on his relocation to "the promised land."..........yeah..right...I'm packin' as we speak..NOT.

[Rumblebelly]

Originally Posted by Wanda-ng

I hear what ya'll are saying about NY state. It is beautiful and friendly, and cheap homes but doesn't the property tax make you feel like you could actually afford a nicer house somewhere else cause yer never gonna get that back in equity.

Being from Colorado, property taxes are dirt cheap. But there are drawbacks. Roadwork gets neglected and maintenance takes a backseat to growth. Also, that "big" snow (24") we had in Denver, shut the area down. Our street never got plowed all winter. It was a one laner with nowhere to park on the street until Febuary. Some busy streets went from 2 lanes to one lane for several weeks because they couldn't remove the snow. It was a mess for a long time. My wife, who is from Upstate, was pretty upset about the whole thing.

I'm not sure if property taxes are tied in with street maintenance but I'm just saying that I noticed a big difference between the two states. Your snowplows seem like busy little bees if it so much as flurries in Upstate.

[JustSayNo]

Property taxes are tied DIRECTLY into street maintenance! Property taxes make the annual budget, which in turn determines how many employees there are, how many trucks, plows, pavers, dump trucks etc. So while I can not Imagine Denver being so behind the snow-ball, we do all know the bigger the area, the more to maintain and the more expense. Denver is certainly larger than many Upstate areas, so a Catch-22 perhaps?

No one removes snow better and faster than Central, Upstae, and Western NY! Here is the Southern Tier they do a pretty good job too, but with the 3ft/25 hrs. V-Day snow, it did take them 24 hours after the snow fell to get to us-no complaints-people here are always prepared to be snowed in for a while

[Rumblebelly]

Originally Posted by JustSayNo

Property taxes are tied DIRECTLY into street maintenance! Property taxes make the annual budget, which in turn determines how many employees there are, how many trucks, plows, pavers, dump trucks etc. So while I can not Imagine Denver being so behind the snow-ball, we do all know the bigger the area, the more to maintain and the more expense. Denver is certainly larger than many Upstate areas, so a Catch-22 perhaps?

No one removes snow better and faster than Central, Upstae, and Western NY! Here is the Southern Tier they do a pretty good job too, but with the 3ft/25 hrs. V-Day snow, it did take them 24 hours after the snow fell to get to us-no complaints-people here are always prepared to be snowed in for a while

Not to turn this into a Colorado thread but I think the Denver/Fort Collins area can't keep up with it's growth. I think in the future, taxes will have to go up in the area so that the cities can provide more adequate infrastructure. Denver's metro area is over 2 millions souls, almost 3 times the size of Syracuse or Albany's. Fort Collin's downtown district is about the size of Saratoga Springs' downtown but Fort Collins' is completely surrounded by approx 250,000 (metro area number) people, most of them living in the burbs. Because these downtowns are so encircled by burbs and can't grow, they are building new downtowns that resemble old downtown architecture in the burbs. Very strange.

That's one of the things that attracts me to Upstate, less sprawl and a more hometown feel...even with the cities.

[I'minformed2]

That's THE thing that attracts me back to Upstate NY the most.