Considering moving to Santa Fe: Advice? (Albuquerque, Rio Rancho: sales, mortgage, home)

[Devin Bent]

Originally Posted by Vinegaroon

There is an article in today's Santa Fe New Mexican regarding the price of homes and living in Santa Fe. Many people that work in Santa Fe cannot afford to live there, and have chosen to buy homes in places like Rio Rancho. The current price of gas has been hurting those who have to commute, which is eating up the money saved in living out of Santa Fe.

Who knows, maybe the Roadrunner train will help a bit when it is finished for some of these people.

I have problems with this article. A woman and her husband are offered as an example of someone who can't afford Santa Fe. She gets divorced and then buys a home in Santa Fe? Two incomes they can't afford Santa Fe -- but one income she can???

ABQ has several things Santa Fe doesn't. For instance, a zoo and a newspaper. We have the New Mexican. It is the closest we have to either.

[Lovehound]

Originally Posted by Devin Bent

IAnd you can get everything you want and more for $600 K or less if you are willing to settle for a great view -- but not looking over the city -- and maybe 20 minutes from Trader Joes's -- not ten minutes. I see a row of 12+K mountains from inside most of the rooms in my house looking directly out front (east) and if I turn my head to the left about 45 degrees (northeast) then I see two of NM's 13ers. Look to the south and see the plateau where the city sits. Look to the west at the face of 100 foot cliffs. The Milky Way spreads above at night and the moon shines like a spotlight -- first night I was here I walked all over looking for the light I had left on. It was the moon. Realistically, I would say it is about a 270 degree view.

It is on a dead end road -- little traffic and all five acre lots. I sure didn't spend 650K and prices are soft now in Santa Fe.

Oh, the stars are bright. On a moonless night, you let your eyes adjust and you can walk around outside by starlight.

And if that still doesn't let you realize your dream -- you can certainly do it somewhere in New Mexico.

Thanks Devin, you've really cheered me up. Maybe my plight is not hopeless!!!

[Lovehound]

Originally Posted by santafescribe

Well the good news is you're way off on property taxes! On a $650,000 home your taxes are somewhere around $3,500 a year.

Well I've calibrated on Los Angeles, the place where YOU serve the government. I could be mistaken, but I believe we pay 2 percent of assessed value, with limitations for increase. Your $3.5K is like half a percent, not 2 percent. Very reasonable.

[Lovehound]

Originally Posted by Devin Bent

I have problems with this article. A woman and her husband are offered as an example of someone who can't afford Santa Fe. She gets divorced and then buys a home in Santa Fe? Two incomes they can't afford Santa Fe -- but one income she can???

ABQ has several things Santa Fe doesn't. For instance, a zoo and a newspaper. We have the New Mexican.

I hate to be part of the problem and I don't think I am. We are not Californians, we are not New Mexicans. We are Americans. We all have the right to move wherever we want to live. I know that you didn't address that in your post, but I'm a bit sensitized about the issue.

All I'll say for myself is that I'll be a credit to Santa Fe if I move there, I'll be a law abiding citizen, and I'll contribute to the common good if I move to SF. I know you don't like Californians and if I move to SF the first thing I'll do is trade in my license plate for a NM license plate, and I'll even promise to practice up on my high school Spanish.

Please don't hate relocating retirees. We've all us old guys and gals lived in hell, and we just want some peace and quiet in our retirement years. We promise we'll turn off the lights at 9 p.m. and you'll never hear our stereo!

[Xavious Orgus]

Originally Posted by Devin Bent

I have problems with this article. A woman and her husband are offered as an example of someone who can't afford Santa Fe. She gets divorced and then buys a home in Santa Fe? Two incomes they can't afford Santa Fe -- but one income she can???

ABQ has several things Santa Fe doesn't. For instance, a zoo and a newspaper. We have the New Mexican. It is the closest we have to either.

Statistically speaking, exactly how many people do they find doing this?

How can you not afford a home in Santa Fe? When as a group, they have enough income to purchase over $301 million worth of goods, etc.? Just for arguments sake, let's say that 15,000 people are doing this. That would total a bit over $20,000. spent per person, just in goods, etc. purchased outside of Santa Fe.

If in fact there are/were 15,000 people doing this. Would there be enough homes for sale in Santa Fe to house these 15,000 people? From the little research I have been doing, It appears that there is nowhere near that type of inventory in Santa Fe. Perhaps I am wrong?

[Devin Bent]

I am not sure what people are objecting to in my ealier message.

I am NOT saying anything against retirees -- I am one myself and I assume that the people in the article are mostly young and working. Some of them working at jobs that would not exist if it weren't for the retirees who pour money into New Mexico.

Could they all move to Santa Fe? I have no idea, but anyone of them could and they chose not to. They chose, for instance, three bedrooms in Rio Rancho over two bedrooms in Santa Fe.

(They also chose something typically brand new in Rio Rancho (All New Appliances!!!) over something typically older in the Pojoaque Valley in Santa Fe County.)

But it was their free choice. They were not driven out of Santa Fe by overwhelming market forces. Instead -- the market gave them choices.

When you think about it -- millions of people in the US make this choice all the time -- do you live closer to work in less house or further away in more house??? I have had to make this choice myself. Maybe we haven't seen it much in New Mexico -- yet. So it is harder for us to accept. But we will see more and more of it as the population grows.

Come on -- life is full of trade offs and choices. We make them all the time. Go out to dinner or save for a new refrigerator? Big, comfortable car versus small and more economical? Get a job or go to college or do both at the same time? Two weeks in Cancuun at a resort or visit family and sleep on the couch? This is life in the US.

I feel very bad for people who didn't have choices. Had to work to support parents -- couldn't go to college, for instance. But we have been talking about people who made a choice.

[Vinegaroon]

I disagree. Many people who grew up in Santa Fe are being forced out because of the cost. I do have to say Santa Fe would be one of the last places I would retire to unless I had a good amount of disposable income. I would rather retire somewhere where my dollar went farther.

[Lovehound]

Originally Posted by Vinegaroon

I disagree. Many people who grew up in Santa Fe are being forced out because of the cost. I do have to say Santa Fe would be one of the last places I would retire to unless I had a good amount of disposable income. I would rather retire somewhere where my dollar went farther.

No, you're wrong there. You're being forced out because the cost is going up everywhere. And even worse, there are more people everywhere competing for what is desirable.

Let's also remember that it isn't "them" versus "us." We're all Americans and we all want to live in a nice place. We're all fortunate that we live in a free society and can live where we choose. Rather than polarizing the issue as "we who were here first" vs. "those who are taking over and ruining our nice place" you should remember that we are all the same people, and we all have a right to be here.

Maybe you'd prefer to retire to a place that's inexpensive, but many people want to spend their final days in some place nice, not some place cheap.

[Towanda]

Nice post, Lovehound.

Frankly, I would rather not anyone even consider moving to Santa Fe if they are already looking for negative things to say about it. They have a lot of other choices for retirement.

I am moving to hot, dusty, expensive Eldorado "quite a ways from Santa Fe" (LOL) in TWO WEEKS .... and I could not be happier.

[Lovehound]

Thanks Towanda.

I don't know if I adequately explained the price situation particularly with regard to "you out of towners are moving in and paying your big city dollars and increasing the prices so much we natives can't afford to live here anymore." Let me try again, with an analogy.

Let's say you have a really big swamp and you own a parcel of land there. All the other land owners like the swamp the way it is but you want a lake, so you hook up a hose and start filling your part of the swamp until it gets deeper and deeper and deeper until finally you have your lake. Unfortunately now the entire swamp is a lake, not a swamp. The other swamp land owners complain that "we don't like you lake lovers coming here with your water and making our swamp so deep that we can't live like we used to."

The analogy behind this is that water is free to flow wherever it wants and it seeks its own level, so you can't fill just one part of a swamp. With housing values, people are free to move and buy houses wherever they want, so due to supply and demand forces the housing prices of your lovely town are going to increase just like that water filled the entire swamp.

America has a free market economy and people can live and buy houses wherever they like. Your housing prices are going up in Santa Fe because my prices and those other guy's prices and everybody's prices all over the land are going up. Housing is a commodity and there are no safe harbors from being subjected to increased prices, not in Santa Fe and not anywhere else.

It's a shame to see your home town change in ways that you don't like, but you can't blame "people who aren't from here" for ruining it. It's not the fault of the people moving in. It's the fault of having a free market. That is where the blame lies, and there's nothing you can do about having a free market. So you might as well start making friends with those people who are moving into your home town. They're your new neighbors.