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I would like some input on wonderful, affordable towns in North Carolina. We are a 50 year old married couple and will be semi-retiring soon. We would like to spend about $150,000 and would like a 3 bedroom, 2 bath home with an open floor plan and a fireplace. Also, a small yard and mature trees. We would love to have sidewalks too. We are an active couple and prefer mountains, lakes, and rivers to the ocean. We love to kayak, swim, hike, fish, garden, bird-watch, shop, eat out, attend concerts and town events. We are looking for small town charm but would like to be able to walk to shops and eateries if possible. We are conservative and currently attend an independent Bible church but are accepting of everyone and have friends of varying religions, races, and cultures and beliefs. We would like friendly neighbors that we can get to know since we love entertaining! We love New England and the seasons, but the real estate is so expensive here. The property taxes on our home now are $7000 a year, and we have an old victorian in town. We are also looking in South Carolina and Tennessee. Thanks for the help!
If your intention is to "retire in place" then I have to suggest you choose a location close to one of the actual cities (because of all the practical resources there) and probably an older neighborhood within or very near to one of them.
You could quite literally throw a dart at a few maps of those areas and be just fine with the result.
Come down for an extended vacation trip along I-40 visiting the 3 or 4 choices you have.
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Beyond that it's mostly about how you'll pay the bills for the next 15 years or so.
You didn't say so I'll assume that location doesn't matter.
NC is a large state (unlike NH) and as said above, we need more info that what you provide to make recommendations. Have you ever been to NC? We have moutains and coast; urban and rural, woodsy and farm-sy...any of which fits most of your "criteria". It would do best for you to pay a visit or to read about the individual towns/cities on City-Data's pages of North Carolina cities (you can change the menu to get smaller towns). Read a little about the different places, then maybe narrow it down and come back with a "short list"?
I guess I am really a rookie at this! I have been googling "great towns to retire to" and looking at real estate on the web. There are not too many places left in the country where you can still purchase a home for $150,000. I also think I didn't realize how spoiled we are here in NH. We are 45 minutes (in 3 different directions) from the mountains, the ocean, and Boston. The 2 reasons we are thinking of moving are 1. high real estate and property taxes, 2. long, long winters. Thanks for taking the time to respond.
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