Are you thinking of downsizing but only interested in buying a brand-new home in a larger metro area with modern conveniences and medical help – and where you can see the Lakers play on occasion?
How about San Antonio, where hundreds of new homes are for sale!
On Saturdays, we feature other areas – click on the Where To Move category (above) for the whole collection!
“I suddenly realised I was in California. Warm, balmy air – air you can kiss – and palms.”
I thought about these words Jack Kerouac wrote in 1951 as I turned off the state’s famous Highway 1 and followed the road around, the gleaming Pacific Ocean in sight. Everything around me was tinted pastel pink in the early evening light. A liquor store’s neon flickered, sun-faded motel signs promised vacancies, a couple walking arm-in-arm crossed the wide street framed by the rolling Irish Hills. If the perfect sleepy beach town still exists in California, I wondered if I’d found it.
“The secret is out and there’s a bit of gentrification, but it’s still the same as it’s been for 30-odd years,” said Ryan Fortini, born and raised in the area and owner of the boutique Pacific Motel, my base for two nights.
I was in Cayucos, a hidden surf town in San Luis Obispo County on California’s crowd-free central coast – or SLO-CAL as it’s known. Exactly halfway between San Francisco and LA, this peaceful paradise is home to world-class surf, glorious wine country, seal colonies, Michelin-starred restaurants, the kitschiest hotel in the world, and even an opulent castle.
Link to Full Article
As consumers continue to grapple with elevated inflation, especially in housing, the Wall Street Journal/Realtor.com Emerging Housing Markets Index highlights housing markets that offer shoppers a lower cost of living, including for homes, and thriving local economies that are attractive, but not too crowded. The index identifies markets that those considering a home purchase should add to their shortlist–whether the goal is to live in it or rent it as a home to others:
https://www.realtor.com/research/april-2023-wsj-rdc-emerging-housing-markets-index/
3 emerging migration "hot spots" to watch over the next few years:
Northern New England
NW Arkansas
Upper Great LakesWhere are the new households coming from (and why)?
Quick?… pic.twitter.com/RQXCWDBDGW
— Eric Finnigan (@EricFinnigan) June 24, 2023
From realtor.com:
To find the most affordable beach towns for homebuyers in 2023, we started by using a federal listing of beaches and their locations. We aggregated Realtor.com listing data for every home put on the market in the past year located within a one-mile radius of each beach. We then selected the most affordable beach towns by price per square foot. Only locations with at least 50 properties within a mile of the water in the past year were included.
We limited our list to just one beach town per state to ensure geographical diversity. And although we did favor places on the ocean, we also included a few bayside locales.
Despite what you may have assumed, in some places, a home by the beach can cost about the same as an average U.S. home—or less. So let’s dive in.
The United States is full of beautiful small towns. Though large metropolises like New York City, Chicago, Los Angeles, or Washington, DC, are often thought of as culture and beauty capitals, this doesn’t mean other locales can’t be beacons of these qualities too. All across the county, locals and tourists alike are drawn to these charming enclaves where beauty takes shape in the form of lakes, mountains, historic main streets, forests, architectural splendor, and beaches, among other picturesque qualities.
As the saying goes, beauty is in the eye of the beholder, so when developing this list, we looked at easy access to nature, the presence of historic or design districts, and topography that’s appealing in its own right—whether it’s beaches or mountains, or maybe a riverside perch. From a California community known for its celebrity residents to an indie-shopping hotbed in New York; from Washington’s San Juan Islands to plush inland communities along lakes and within forests—here are the 55 most beautiful small towns in America.
https://www.architecturaldigest.com/gallery/most-beautiful-small-towns-in-america
What will it take for you to leave California for Indiana?
Start with $5,000 to $7,500 in relocation cash. If that’s not enough, how about free health insurance for a year, unlimited golf club membership, a seat on the community’s nonprofit board?
How’s a Himalayan massage strike you? Or bourbon and burgers with the mayor?
Across the Hoosier state, dozens of counties and cities are practically stepping over each other in what has become the new competition across the land: attracting the pandemic-enlarged horde of people with remote jobs who no longer feel the need to live in more expensive urban centers like Los Angeles or New York.
Some 30 states have gotten into the action.
Cities and states are accustomed to fighting for manufacturers and other businesses by offering tax abatement and sweet land deals.
The game today is recruiting higher-income and younger households — made possible by the rise of remote working and the geographic flexibility it has afforded many American workers.
Link to LAT article
You have to wonder about a list that that has no California metro areas in their Top 100, but includes New York City at #14 and Flint, Michigan at #64.
To identify the best places to retire, U.S. News analyzed data for the 150 largest metropolitan areas in the U.S. to assess how well they meet Americans’ retirement needs and expectations. Top criteria include the happiness of local residents, housing affordability, tax rates and health care quality.
https://realestate.usnews.com/places/rankings/best-places-to-retire
San Diego finally did make this list at #93, just ahead of Cleveland and Tulsa:
https://realestate.usnews.com/places/rankings/best-places-to-live
Are you looking for an experienced agent to help you buy or sell a home?
Contact Jim the Realtor!
CA DRE #01527365, CA DRE #00873197
