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Add in Flagstaff AZ as well as being cooler. There are cooler places in both of those states. Just have to do a little search on Sperling's Best Places.
We visited Flagstaff, and wrote that area off our retirement location list, including the desert SW. Flagstaff is a small college town close to the south rim of the Grand Canyon. Flagstaff does have cold winters and snow. It might be OK for someone who's main interest in retirement is to live in a small town near nature areas. Arizona has a state income tax, a negative. The desert SW is OK if you like seeing the color brown everywhere, instead of green. Summers are miserable in the desert SW, it's like sticking you head in an oven!
I had a map of the country on my garage wall. I threw three darts and started from there.
Actually, I had a list of requirements and started from there. Warm, Second Amendment friendly, no motorcycle helmet law, relatively homogenous population and nearby military base. Arizona won out. But we still wound up moving back home due to family and summer heat. Kept the Arizona house as a winter getaway.
should we assume that is some kind of racist code for "white people"...? I am not uptodate on "dog whistle" phrasing...
1. clean air - Husband in CPAP machine for breathing at night.
2. recreational opportunities- mainly mtn biking
3. Within a few hours of our 26 year old son
4. Touristy town. Summer employment easily attainable if wanted or needed
5. Clean water
6. Less expensive area though that was not attainable. So we are renting out part of the house for the summer to people who work in the town seasonally to assist with the house payment
7. Bible based church. For me this was #1 though not for my husband who doesn't go to church
BIGGEST DOWNFALL
- Driving is twice as far- 3 hrs round trip to work and back. BUT, I only need to do it once round trip since my 18.5 hr shifts are almost back to back. 6 hrs in between which I can kill by grocery shopping, thrift store shopping for my ebay store, seeing my doctor/dentist, etc..
- A little more snow than we preferred over the winter but should be fine.
-sharing our home over the summertime though we both work more during the summer so those 12 weeks we may not notice so much.
should we assume that is some kind of racist code for "white people"...? I am not uptodate on "dog whistle" phrasing...
Nothing racist about it. It's not limited to "white people". Ever heard of Chinatown? Ever heard of the huge Vietnamese enclaves in LA and Orange County? Are they racist? Or are whites the only ones that are racist if they want to live in an area with a relatively homogenous population?
I think the high desert is almost ideal for a mild four-season climate...if climate is your determining factor. I live between Santa Fe and Albuquerque at 5300 ft. and enjoy the dry and sunny weather. We get a dusting of snow but if you want to ski there are ski slopes not far away. Summer heat tops out at a few days near 100 but often with single digit humidity so swamp coolers are more common than AC. I'm sure there are other similar places in southern Colorado, Arizona and New Mexico.
I live in the desert southwest, the "high desert" but elevation of 3000 ft. One could argue that there are really only about 4 months of the year that have a nice climate, most of it is in the fall. Spring can have nice temps but the wind everyday gets to be almost intolerable. Winter nights are often enough in the mid to upper 20s. Summer temps here hover from the upper 90s to 100s almost every day from May to halfway through September. Yes it's dry air most of the time, but it still feels like an oven when you walk outside.
I'm so tired of looking at brown. I've been looking at brown for decades and long for green. I long for rain and 4 normal seasons. I'm tired of drought but after all it is the desert. I'm retiring to middle America and can't wait.
nope, just dont want to live in the hood or barrio
Well, hood usually equals black and barrio usually equals Latino. So, yep, Racist.
Sure, you can find lots of affordable white areas, where most of the inhabitants have no front teeth. Ironically, most of them will also be marijuana farmers. Are you okay with that?
I tell you this from first-hand experience, by moving to "affordable" areas in CA, that coincidentally also have very low populations of black (because they are not urban and don't have many jobs) and because they also are not Latino (because they don't have the usual agricultural workers, because most pot farmers and their employees are white).
But, do these white citizens give you more security? Better neighbors?
Hmmmm, life is just so dang complicated.
Oh yeah, and lots of these white, low-income citizens in low-income aka "affordable" areas, are also addicted to opioids.
Yeah, good luck finding your affordable white world, where this doesn't include white trash.
My pension is not high, so obviously I need a low COL area, but I like Winters to be winter-like. I like it when the rivers all freeze over and we can drive across the water.
Just as much as how I like Spring when the maple flows, and Summer and Fall.
This morning when I woke-up I heard a lot of rifles going off, and realized this is moose season! What would life be without moose season?
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