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Pensions are all but gone in the private sector these days. The amount of people working on Wall Street who couldn't find jobs elsewhere is going to be very small compared to the numbers of average people working average jobs that could be found elsewhere.
The Northeast is heavily unionized. There are plenty of pensions still here especially for those who've been at their company for years. New hires won't have as an easy time finding a pension.
There aren't many places where one can be a stock broker in Idaho. Working in the commodities market? Again most of the financial aspect of it is in NYC. Many folks who work in NYC and other giant cities who earn a good living aren't going to settle for a drop in their income. A lawyer and an accountant in NYC or Boston or San Francisco aren't making $60k a year. They're making well over $100k. Depending on their field they could be making hundreds of thousans especially something like a patent attorney.
There's a certain lifestyle they have and want. Also they could be saving for any number of things including early retirement to a Cain in the TN mountains. Good for them! I don't begrudge others for what they have. They worked for it!
Who is anyone to give someone a hard time about where others retire to? Frankly, you sound like a grump who doesn't want anyone who's not native to move to your area. Worry about yourself and not others. You'll be happier in life.
My car insurance doubled when I moved to Nashville from San Francisco. My gas and electric bills are higher in Tennessee. My rent was way higher when I first moved here, so high in fact, that after one year it was cheaper to buy a house. Of course there is no way I could afford to buy that house now because it has more than doubled in value (yea for me when I sell). Alcohol is much more expensive in Tennessee. But hey, at least gas is cheaper and that’s a good thing because you have to drive your car since there’s no public transportation.
That was my experience when I moved to rural New England. Since I owned both the San Francisco and NE homes outright, literally everything except gas was higher in NE, and I sure used more of it there ...... property taxes 50% higher on a home valued less than half the SF home. Car insurance higher. Home insurance higher. Homes and cars crumble faster due to snow/ice/salt. Electric bill was higher, and that didn’t include heating. Heating oil cost me 2k a year. Food higher. Lawn service guys higher. On and on and on.
Don’t ever assume the big city is expensive if you’ve got the mortgage paid off, because it isn’t. I live on about 35k a year here in SF Bay Area. I’m looking at moving to a condo in Boston. I’d shave 10k a year off by reducing property taxes and ditching the car. It isn’t my primary motivation for wanting to move, but it sure is a nice benefit.
My car insurance doubled when I moved to Nashville from San Francisco. My gas and electric bills are higher in Tennessee. My rent was way higher when I first moved here, so high in fact, that after one year it was cheaper to buy a house. Of course there is no way I could afford to buy that house now because it has more than doubled in value (yea for me when I sell). Alcohol is much more expensive in Tennessee. But hey, at least gas is cheaper and that’s a good thing because you have to drive your car since there’s no public transportation.
Utility costs are largely determined by your usage. You are obviously using a lot more energy now, for whatever reason, than you were before, because PG&E rates for both electric and gas are far higher than Nashville utilities. San Francisco's climate allowed you to use very little heat or A/C because there is little temperature variation.
PG&E electric rates in San Francisco START at 19.9 cents per kWH, and go as high as 40 cents per kWH. Nashville electric rates are 9.9 to 10.5 cents per kWH. For your electric bill to be way higher in Nashville than in SF, you would have to have more than doubled (likely tripled) your usage. Natural gas rates per thousand cubic feet are 30% higher in CA than TN.
After 24 year with the electric utility as a energy specialist, I know a bit about utility rates and usage. Our usage here in Loudon TN is the same as it was in Placerville CA, and our bill is far less than it ever was in CA.
Pensions are all but gone in the private sector these days. The amount of people working on Wall Street who couldn't find jobs elsewhere is going to be very small compared to the numbers of average people working average jobs that could be found elsewhere.
There are professions that are place based. Not available in flyover country. Professions that are lucrative and fulfilling. Yes and many with pensions and perks that make it reasonable to “stick it out” in high cost of living areas— while affording great vacations to possible retirement spots. Also homes appreciate faster-giving more money for your retirement castle. So what if it is a small percentage as compared to the average joe— if it works for brokers- nuclear physicists-(if the shoe fits)- why should they take a pay cut to move before retirement?
Your musings on this subject are relevant to many but not all-and probably most relevant to your age group and not 60 somethings.
A very small percentage of retirees relocate. CD is skewed to those looking for information to move. I think a major mistake that some retirees make is moving to be close their children. My son has moved three times for his career. I was a Marine Corps -we moved every 2 to 2 and a half years. My grandparents wouldn’t have even considered following us.
Retirees who move are like anyone else-some people plan, research and move wisely, and are happy. Some people are impulsive, some people are stupid, some people are wish washy. Some people are glass half full types and will not be happy or content anywhere. Priorities change-interests change. If you plan well and are flexible it will work out.
Utility costs are largely determined by your usage. You are obviously using a lot more energy now, for whatever reason, than you were before, because PG&E rates for both electric and gas are far higher than Nashville utilities. San Francisco's climate allowed you to use very little heat or A/C because there is little temperature variation.
When the bill starts coming charging me by the rate and not the total use/amount, you just let me know. As a budget line item number, it is nearly double in Tennessee than what it was in San Francisco. That’s all I care about.
Now would you like to opine on car insurance rates???
Tennessee is great considering I am still working, making California money, and not paying state income tax. If I were retired, I would not care about income tax.
Like others have mentioned, I would not ever live in a small town, the suburbs or rural area. Grew up that way and knew from when I was about 10 years old that I wanted to get the *^!! out.
This board, and many retiree oriented area local boards, often receive post after post from people considering retiring to such and such area.
Being in Tennessee, one thing I've never understood is why people from big, rich, prosperous areas often become fixated on rural retirement living, oftentimes in areas they've never been to or know anything about. We often get posters on our local boards from California, New York, etc., who have never been to Tennessee (if they have - it's almost always to the tourist attractions only), nor lived in a small town, and seem downright set on moving, come hell or high water, with no one being able to change their minds.
Let's face it - we're mostly a suburban and urban nation now. Most of the population lives in fairly significant metro areas and their suburbs/exurbs, not isolated small towns and rural areas. We get used to certain lifestyles and amenities over the years. When I moved back to my small town in Tennessee from an affluent area of Indiana, it was a major shock to me, and often still is. I feel like the rug was yanked out from under me in many ways.
When people look at areas for retirement, it seems like people get overly obsessed with certain things. Taxes always come up. While taxes are important, I'd rather pay several thousand more in taxes annually in a place I'd rather be, rather than simply chasing areas with the lowest possible tax burden. When areas have very low tax burdens, they also usually have very little in the way of services or amenities, which may be important as people age.
People often seem to assume similar medical care is similar everywhere, but it isn't. I know a professor who is going through brain cancer. He cannot get all of the treatment he needs locally, so he goes to Duke periodically. Truly rural areas and very small towns may not even have a family doctor or small community hospital around for quite some distance. There are plenty of beautiful areas over in southwest Virginia that may not have a family doctor within hour in any direction.
Do we often place outsize importance on weather? In this area, we often get people who want a mild four season climate. We generally have that, but I wouldn't consider this a weather paradise. A lot of people want to move out of say, Ohio, for its cloudy winters. In my neck of the woods, we've been cloudy and cool all week, with seven of the next ten days either being mostly cloudy or raining. We're five to ten degrees warmer than Columbus, OH, which is also scheduled for about the same cloud cover and rain. November to March in most of the country is a slog weather-wise.
It seems to me that, in planning for retirement, many people are looking for significant life change, often having never experienced the lifestyle that they're "looking" for at all. It almost seems like people are wanting to buy into the brochures and vacation guides they see.
If someone desires to leave the rat race of NYC, DC, whatever, why did they wait forty years or whatever to do so? Yes, those areas are where the jobs are, but there are interior cities that also have good job markets. If the kids didn't want to relocate, well, they're probably gone by the time people reach traditional retirement age. If they are young, they go with you.
Thoughts?
Some people do so because of the lower housing costs....sell their house in Seattle or LA and buy a nicer house at half the price.
For me, if I leave where I live now, it will mostly be because of weather as I hate the winters in the PNW. From there, wife and I differ, I prefer a larger city and she prefers rural so we have to balance each others wants out or stay where we are which is a metro of about 300K so not big and not small. We may just winter in Arizona and spend the res of the year in the Evergreen.
I think there's a fair number of people that make a retirement move and get bored or miss family and move back. Then there are those that love their retirement move....not sure which I would be.
There are professions that are place based. Not available in flyover country. Professions that are lucrative and fulfilling. Yes and many with pensions and perks that make it reasonable to “stick it out” in high cost of living areas— while affording great vacations to possible retirement spots. Also homes appreciate faster-giving more money for your retirement castle. So what if it is a small percentage as compared to the average joe— if it works for brokers- nuclear physicists-(if the shoe fits)- why should they take a pay cut to move before retirement?
Your musings on this subject are relevant to many but not all-and probably most relevant to your age group and not 60 somethings.
A very small percentage of retirees relocate. CD is skewed to those looking for information to move. I think a major mistake that some retirees make is moving to be close their children. My son has moved three times for his career. I was a Marine Corps -we moved every 2 to 2 and a half years. My grandparents wouldn’t have even considered following us.
Retirees who move are like anyone else-some people plan, research and move wisely, and are happy. Some people are impulsive, some people are stupid, some people are wish washy. Some people are glass half full types and will not be happy or content anywhere. Priorities change-interests change. If you plan well and are flexible it will work out.
By no means am I saying people should completely bail out of major cities and move to somewhere in the sticks. Yes, there are some professions that are "place based" and pay well enough to keep up with the cost of living in those cities, but again, that's probably a relatively small percentage of the population. I'd consider the most prestigious cities great for the top 20% or so of their income earners and the subsidized poor, with the majority in the middle not making enough to outright afford it and live well, and making too much to be subsidized.
Living out here in the sticks is the opposite problem. You may not find a professional job at all. If the job is eliminated, you get fired, whatever, you're moving again. You may make less than you would in a mid-major market, even after adjusting for cost of living.
There are plenty of sweet spots in the middle of NYC/DC/Boston/SF and the sticks that still retain a significant level of amenities that would satisfy most folks and have good job markets.
Let's say you have a couple living the rat race in the posh DC suburbs for thirty years. They're used to a certain level of comfort and amenities. The world has been at their fingertips for decades. Everything they could ever want is a relatively short drive away.
They get a wild hair up their butt and think it would be awesome to move to some mountain town here in Tennessee, some podunk town on the beach in the middle of nowhere, pick your poison. They end up getting there and it's not what they are used to at all. In many of the areas I personally know people have wanted to relocate to, cell service may be unreliable. Many areas around here only have dial-up internet. Rural areas often lack municipal water. There's no Costco for two hours in any direction from me. They move to some place like this in a poorly thought through fashion and want to run home as fast as they can.
It's really not much different than rich NYers going to FL and going back.
Some people do so because of the lower housing costs....sell their house in Seattle or LA and buy a nicer house at half the price.
For me, if I leave where I live now, it will mostly be because of weather as I hate the winters in the PNW. From there, wife and I differ, I prefer a larger city and she prefers rural so we have to balance each others wants out or stay where we are which is a metro of about 300K so not big and not small. We may just winter in Arizona and spend the res of the year in the Evergreen.
I think there's a fair number of people that make a retirement move and get bored or miss family and move back. Then there are those that love their retirement move....not sure which I would be.
I doubt I could ever live in the PNW just due to the lack of sun. The lack of sun here is bad enough for me.
I was losing my job in Indiana, and had the offer back here before I left Indiana. I want to get a little more stability on my resume, more money in the bank, and I like my job here. I'll be 32 in April. The odds of me being here in the Tri-Cities at 35 are slim to none.
I also want to move to somewhere I actually want to move to. When I moved to Iowa and Indiana, it was out of financial desperation because I was making <$15/hr here at the time. I'm not financially desperate like I was, so I can be more selective. I would much rather be in central FL (Orlando/Tampa areas) than Kingsport.
What you want at 35 is often not small town living. Most people at your age need alot of stimulation. Small towns aren't usually it. Great thread!
I doubt I could ever live in the PNW just due to the lack of sun. The lack of sun here is bad enough for me.
Yeah that is a tough pill to swallow every winter....Medford in southern Oregon might get enough to be more tolerable, I've thought about retiring there but that's only marginally better than Washington state so not sure it's worth it...I will say the summers are truly fantastic so I always want to move in the winter and then when summer comes I start to think "what was I thinking to want to leave."
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