If you were in me...Greenville or Aiken? (North: jobs, hospitals)

[LeavingNJ]

Hi everyone...long time reader, first time poster. Maybe you all can help me out.

Here's my situation:
My wife and I are 52 and 50, respectively, and are planning a move to SC by spring '09. We are retired, and will be taking my 83-year-old mother-in-law with us from NJ. She is in very good physical condition, but we do want to have access to good health care resources. We have one daughter currently in college in PA.

We have visited Aiken and liked it very much. I have also done a fair amount of internet research on Greenville, and we plan to visit within the next two months. It also seems like a great choice.

We prefer to be inland, so we're not considering coastal communities.

We would prefer to spend about $500k on a house and would like an approximately 0.5 acre lot.

Aiken seems very attractive, but the general demographic does seem to skew older. Also, as charming as the town may be, it does seem to be fairly limited in terms of restaurants, activities, etc. Greenville on the other hand, appears to offer a lot more, given it's size. Home values also seem a lot higher in Greenville in regard to bang for the buck.

Does anyone have any thoughts, given my situation? Any insights would be appreciated, and I'd be happy to provide any additional information that might help make a choice. Thanks so much in advance.

[gvillesc]

You should be able to get a lot of bang for your buck in either Aiken or Greenville for 500k.

Here are some things in Greenville you might want to look into:
Within the City of Greenville, is a huge masterplanned development called Verdae. A traditional neighborhood development (Hollingsworth Park) is currently under construction with homes ranging from 400k to over 1 million (all sitting on small lots with alley ways and garages). It is 10 minutes from award-winning downtown Greenville, and about 3 minutes to Interstate 85. Check it out here: Hollingsworth Park

Also within Verdae is The Cascades at Verdae. This development is down the road from Hollingsworth Park and is a retirement community. This might be aimed at an age of people older than yourselves, but perhaps your mother-in-law would be interested. You can check it out here: The Cascades Verdae

And you can find out more information about the Verdae mixed use community here: Verdae

[motonenterprises]

Greenville is a lot bigger than Aiken, so its going to have lots more to offer and the cost of living may be slightly higher.

[LeavingNJ]

Thank you for the responses.

Gvillesc, thanks for the Hollingsworth Park info, it seems very interesting. There is precious little info on their sites, however, especially regarding homes and lot sizes. At this point, we prefer not to build, and it seems that that development may not be ready for prime time when I plan to move.

I've looked extensively at different subdivisions online, but there are so many, it's really hard to get a feel for which are more desirable. What you get for the money in almost all of them is pretty impressive, though, certainly from a New Jersey perspective. And in the price range I mentioned, it appears that you get a lot more in Greenville than you do in Aiken, especially regarding new homes. I am assuming that a major reason for this is the increased competition among builders in Greenville, since there is so much more new construction. Which leads me to wonder if that's a bad thing. Any thoughts on out-of-control development?

And one other thing if anyone cares to answer...are there any flooding issues in Greenville? I currently live on a river and the potential for flooding continually makes me nervous, so I want to be free of that aspect.

Thanks again.

[g-man430]

I have pics I took recently of Verdae. Do you want to see them? Some homes are under construction and almost completed. The park is already completed. There are some places where flooding can easily occur. We're in a drought right now so I don't expect much flooding anytime soon unless a tropical system decides to make its name known.

[gvillesc]

In some newer areas where clear cutting for developments has occurred, you can find some occasional flooding, of course, but, unlike what you see in the Midwest, that sort of flooding doesn't happen in the Upstate of SC. The geography and size of our rivers and creeks play into this factor.

And yes, you can get a whole lot (in comparison) for your money. If you're looking for well-established neighborhoods, the North Main area, Alta Vista, Augusta Road area, and Parkins Mill area in Greenville are all beautiful established neighborhoods that are all between 5 and 15 minutes of downtown.

[OconeeMountains]

Greenville will provide you easy access to the mountains and great mountain communities such as Hendersonville and Asheville if that is important to you.

[janrey]

I would pick Greenville based on your family info. Greenville has more hospitals to choose from and many great areas from close to downtown to the Eastside area as well as probably a lot more people who have moved down from NJ, NY, MA. Being retired you aren't restrained by jobs as to where you want to live and $500K will buy something nice.