Relocating from CA to NY (New York, Buffalo: apartment, rent, mortgage)

[I'minformed2]

Yes, I suppose you make a point there. lol

[Phish Head]

between NickL28 and i'm informed, I'll listen to i'm informed

[carol in ulster]

I'm from Ulster County, on the border of Orange & Sullivan counties. It's lovely up here. Travel to the city via rail is from Middletown (20 minutes away) and from there it's about an hour and 30 minutes. The taxes on my house w/2acres, which I am selling, is $5,700. The school system is very good. I'd recommend it over Rockland simply because there's space and a lower price for it. You can live quite comfortably here on a New York City salary.

[winnie]

Wallkill NY, Pine bush, Montgomery, Maybrook

Anywhere away from Beacon and Poughkeepsiee. Newburgh, Kingston and Middletown are on my @#$% lists too.

They are the exact opposite from what you are looking for in an area!

Goshen is nice, Walden..Minisink Valley area (west of Middletown), Gardner, Rosendale, Northern Marlborough is quite nice too.

I can speak for the Walden area as my mother is a teacher at East Coldenham Ele. It is a very nice school, nice area with lots of homes with acerage - you will pay 3-500K for a nice newer home here but boy you really get a HOME when you look at the size, and what's included.

I would stay away from Dutchess County and recommend Northern Orange, Southern Ulster counties. Stay away from Sullivan County - high home owner's insurance - WICKED high property taxes and the schools are not as desireable.

Any more questions? I would be happy to help!

[valjen]

Yeah, L.A. is definitely expensive to live, I'm from there so I know. An average 2 bedroom house is easily 500k. I'm definitely looking forward to moving to New York.

[_John_]

I know that housing on the left coast is high priced but it is here too. If you're trying to escape the high cost of living there, please don't make the mistake of moving here. I won't debate the merits of either location but would suggest that by jumping from the frying pan into another frying pan you're not accomplishing anything. As another contributor suggested you may want to rethink the Poughkeepsie school district, ........... NOT the place I'd want to send my kid's but then again neither is the Beacon school system. Unless you have some other reason for considering a relocation to this area (family, employment, etc.) you could do MUCH better elsewhere. I'm here only because it's where I was born and raised and quite frankly I'm too damned old to do anything about it now but if I were younger I'd be outta here in a New York minute. As it is both of my kids have relocated, one to Las Vegas (an area that I'd STRONGLY suggest you look into as a new home) and the other in the military. New York in general and the Mid Hudson Valley area has seen better days and it will be a LONG time before it's on the way back to what it could/should be.

[beljag]

john,
thanks for the warning, I'll keep them in mind; but my husband and I both being California natives, would like to experience living in the east coast. As for Las Vegas, (been there, done that) it wasn't our cup of tea and didn't like raising our family there for a number of reasons too long and too personal to list.
We are aware of what were up against as far as the cost of living goes, but so far, the areas were looking at seem to price out better than where we are now. Thanks again for the input.

[shadys210]

Whats so bad about Dutchess County and Poughkeepsie? other then the City of Poughkeepsie, the Town of Poughkeepsie is a very nice place to live and plus the school district, Spackinkill Union Free School District was rated 2nd best in New York and 1st best in Dutchess County and its right on the coast of the Hudson River with places like the Galleria Mall,IBM head quarters,Dutchess,Vassar and Marist college in a considerable reach and not that far of a commute to NYC, heres some information on Spackenkill New York: http://www.city-data.com/city/Spackenkill-New-York.html
and heres the school districts site: http://www.spackenkillschools.org/

[Wisteria]

Got to get my two cents in. I'm from Buffalo, originally, lived in Syracuse, spent lots of time in NYC, and now live in a rural town (Felton) above Santa Cruz, California. I am nearing retirement age, and I have lived in California for the past 11 years. I also lived in Arizona, Colorado and Seattle, Washington. I have done extensive research on moving.

As much as I have family in NYS, and I love the autumn and even some snow, I have found that it will be MORE expensive for me to relocate back there in retirement. One of the primary reasons? Housing (and as was mentioned in an earlier post -- food, etc.) have risen greatly back there. In fact, it is comparable to or even higher than in California!! Plus, and this is a biggie, the property taxes in NYS are THREE times higher than they are in California!!! So, for a $200,000 home in California, you'll pay about $2,000 in taxes, in NYS, you'll pay about $6,000. The reason: California put into place something called Prop 13 years ago that keeps property taxes at about 1% per thousand. Just do the math.

With housing prices going up back east, and heating costs, food the same cost, and taxes being 3 times as high -- well, NYS is not the proverbial cheap place to live. The illusion is that if you check things like Realtor.com and see the housing prices you think, "Oh, that's really cheap for what you get." But the TAXES are killers! Many times I have mused about returning to the eastcoast, but each time I try to figure out how in the world I would live paying $300 or $600 a month just for property taxes, I stop.

And, wages are, generally, MUCH higher on the westcoast. Unless you're a high-powered CEO or professional (attorney/doctor), then your pay back east will undoubtedly be lower than here. I have a degee in social work, and although I'm not currently working in the field, I can tell you that my "menial" job I have now, pays about 3 times what it would pay back there -- three times more! Living in California has also raised my Social Security amounts tremendously. For the same job here that I have, in NYS it would be about $18.000 a year -- here, I get paid $50,000/year!! That's absolutely true.

Thus, for me, I am staying NEITHER in California or in NYS when I retire. I am looking to the western states with low property taxes (for a fixed income). And some states don't even have state taxes, like Nev. or Washington State.

NYS has those pretty little towns, beautiful farm lands, the lakes, and charm, but the economy dropped out so badly long ago that it never recovered. Why in the world most cities outside of NYC, didn't bring in high-tech or things of that sort decades ago, is beyond me. Backwards thinking, I guess.

Most of my generation has moved from the area -- we are responsible for a lot of that population decline -- and rightly so. Most of us have found it better elsewhere, even in "expensive" California.

Weigh out all factors. Food is just as expensive back east (I was just back there) as it is here in California. Houses are getting high-priced enough that the property taxes outweigh the "lower" cost of housing compared to the west. Heating bills are much less in the southwest, in particular. And the lifestyle IS slower here, and varied.

I read on another thread that one should just go to where their heart is (or, I suppose your good job), and that's good advice. Living costs have gone up everywhere -- I suppose you could find it cheap in Kansas or Nebraska, but really, who wants to relocate to there unless they had to? There is such a thing as quality of life!

Do extensive research and weigh all the different factors first. It's not a toss-up as to which state is better -- they both have great but different features. Good luck to those moving!!

[cherianne]

My husband and I looking forward to moving to Orleans county from the Kansas City area. We've been reading the threads with interest. This response is twofold. One; what do you think of Lyndonville and that area and 2; I need to disagree a bit with Wisteria. We are orginally from CA and also lived in Washington state. There is a state tax in Washington and if they don't access you in RE taxes they get you somewhere else. It was a high overall tax area. The purchase price is not nearly in the CA range but its climbing fast. Last April, we went to the LA area hoping to checkout the prices of this cute quaint old neighborhood in Fullerton (near Disneyland). A 1930's home with 2 bedrooms, 1 ba with a dinky backyard was selling for 750K. You'll faint when you see the home prices in Nevada. But Wisteria and I agree on one thing, the midwest isn't so great. Looking forward to leaving...way too buggy!