Relocation from Austin Texas to the Broadway VA area (Harrisonburg: for sale, real estate)

[HomesickforWV]

We located in Austin 22 years ago and now are looking at retirement. We are from WV and due to the poor status of the state we will not be going back. The Harrisonburg/Broadway area seem to offer the same beauty without the dire poverty and mismanagement of WV. I have been researching the cost of vehicle registration and personal property tax, not only is the heat unbearable in TX but the property tax is absolute robbery. It appears VA offers the beauty and low property tax. I do not like the personal property tax but it is all give and take. Can anyone give me info on new housing, can you buy a nice lot and build your own home, used to be a custom home builder? It seems not to many homes for sale and very limited new homes and it would save us a lot of money if we could build our own. Is Broadway as beautiful as it looks online? How is the shopping in Harrisonburg/Broadway? What about utilities? Do you have competition in tv/internet packages. These are issues that greatly affect your daily life and I do not want to be surprised by not being able to afford the cable package I love because of no competition. My family in WV is being raped by the providers because their is no competition. We pay $170.00 a month through ATT and get high speed internet/wi fi and all paid stations. Any help is greatly appreciated. Retirement is a big deal and decisions have to be made carefully. Thanks for all help!!

[HeartWantsWhatItWants]

We lived in Wimberley, TX for 5 years prior to moving to Virginia. It took us 6 months to find the right property but we have horses. Part of the search problem was also internet - outside of city proper, this part of Virginia is horrible on Internet coverage, somewhere in the vicinity of a poor African country. For the 6 months we have been renting and looking for our forever country place, we have been on 4G LTE == roadside robbery. Major providers are Centurylink (garbage), XFinity (spotty), Shentel and local line of sight people. AT&T is not really big - Verizon has better coverage in rural area in my experience. Check out Broadband Now or similar sites for an idea of who offers Internet in a zip code. Real estate agents are mostly useless in this sort of thing as listings usually don't include such info and hence they can't search for your needs. What I did was use Google Earth extensively, Broadband now and then go to individual provider websites to punch in the address. Don't worry, my real estate agent did none of this and still got paid...

Personal property tax... don't get me started. In most rural counties you get zilch for it.

Now, if you are looking to buy/build in the city, I have no clue what is involved.

[Bigfoot424]

I live very close but not in Broadway. It is located in a beautiful area. Broadway is nice but really not a whole lot there. I would consider it a (big) small town for this area. But you're close to Harrisonburg and you'll find pretty much everything you'll need there. You're right on not a lot of homes coming up for sale but you'll find some real nice ones that come open weekly. Plenty of open land out here so I can't imagine you'll have an issue finding some land. As far as internet we have Shentel and only Shentel. We're way out so DSL is it and I'm not sure what Broadway might have. We use Direct TV instead of Shentel TV. No idea which is better.

The scenery out here can be beautiful so go outside of town.

[HomesickforWV]

Thanks everyone, sounds like a challenge to find good tv/internet/wi fi. If I stayed in Harrisonburg I wonder what cost is for these services. I am also concerned about the personal property tax. If you owned a few newer vehicles it could add up. I love the beauty of WV but cannot live where it is so poor no companies will come in. WV does not have shopping period, I was hoping the Harrisonburg area would give me the beauty with some amenities. I am going to continue to seek out information. Thanks

[cbl1]

There are areas in Broadway/Timberville with reasonable cable TV services.


There is relief on the taxes up to a certain amount on personal property taxes.
A 100 percent tax relief on the first $3,000 of the vehicle’s value
A 28 percent tax relief on the next $17,000 of the vehicle’s value, from $3,001-$20,000
No tax exemption for the portion of a vehicle’s assessed value over $20,000

[Bigfoot424]

You're best bet is to call Shentel and see about their services. I know some of the Valley has cable while still has DSL. I left FIOS when we lived in NOVA which was blazing fast and now have DSL. Since I don't play games and such I rarely miss the higher speed of FIOS. To us the beauty of our area beats some of the things we had in NOVA such as high speed internet.

[Bigfoot424]

Homesick. I can't make this any larger but here is the view from our front porch. This view, and even better, can be found all along the RT. 42 area N and S of Broadway.

[LM117]

Originally Posted by Bigfoot424

Homesick. I can't make this any larger but here is the view from our front porch. This view, and even better, can be found all along the RT. 42 area N and S of Broadway.



Attachment 192982

Nice!

So, you ready to go back to NOVA?

[ersatz]

Originally Posted by Bigfoot424

Homesick. I can't make this any larger but here is the view from our front porch. This view, and even better, can be found all along the RT. 42 area N and S of Broadway.

Attachment 192982

Homesick? Why are you homesick? Isn't Shenandoah home and you are there?

But yes, I know what you mean. The Blue Ridge just does it for me. I love how the rolling hills shade from green to blue and purple and how the late afternoon sunshine coats them like butter. The hills still smell like grass and trees and in the fall the evening air has a nibble to it from the biting chill to come.

[HeartWantsWhatItWants]

Originally Posted by cbl1

There are areas in Broadway/Timberville with reasonable cable TV services.


There is relief on the taxes up to a certain amount on personal property taxes.
A 100 percent tax relief on the first $3,000 of the vehicle’s value
A 28 percent tax relief on the next $17,000 of the vehicle’s value, from $3,001-$20,000
No tax exemption for the portion of a vehicle’s assessed value over $20,000

In other words "don't tread on me" (after you have taken state income taxes, personal property taxes, RE taxes etc. etc.)