Teach me *smaller* town living.

In reply to z31maniac :

I live in Cibolo, TX. About 20min NW of San Antonio and 50min SE of Austin. less than 30k people and has very good schools and low crime, which = a nice place to live. I live very comfortable with my income, i currently rent but looking to buy soon. I think it's in a sweet spot, though it isn't very country it's in a nice spot between SA and Austin. You can live south of me in and have truly country living with the same access. I moved from Southern California to here and only took a $200 pay cut so my money goes longer. Though, I admit I miss Cali lol! LMK if you have any questions, feel free to pm me. 

I'd move back to Springfield in a heartbeat if it wasn't for the lack of a good airport. I fly enough that it would be a royal pain. There are a bunch of close by smaller "towns" too. It's pretty spread out overall so you don't feel on top of each other. 

Lots of outdoors stuff. Taxes overall are cheap too. The state income tax isn't too high and the property tax will be under 2K for what you are looking for. 

Mike

^Are there still pr0n and firework stores at every exit up and down I-44? lololol

Its funny what some people consider a small town to be. 

racerdave600 said:

You seriously need to look at Huntsville, AL.  We are consistently ranked among the best cities to live in the country and have a pretty low cost of living.  It's like all of the best of big cities in a smaller package.  

Careful or you will mess-up your town.    

In reply to z31maniac :

Right next to the church and the name the current "collectible" item. 

In reply to z31maniac : I prefer outer ring suburbs of major cities rather than smaller cities.  The reason is because I enjoy big city diversity and choices without the traffic issues.  And should the unexpected ever happen you don’t need to lose all the equity in your home moving to another city to find employment.  

Second, if you are young you should be house poor.  The reason is two fold. First it will lower your taxes. Let you keep more of your income.  

And  America fought two wars and just enacted a giant tax cut for the upper class( to the time of 1 & 1/2 Trillion dollars.  Without a way to pay for any of it except what America has always done. Which is inflate our way out of a crushing. debt.  

What that means is the house you pay $300,000 for today in a decade or so could be worth 3 million.  

Yes you could buy a more expensive house with each pay raise that you earn and as the effects of inflation kick your earnings up.  However every time you move you lose 10% or more of the equity of your home.  ( realtors fees, closing costs, cost of moving, and new stuff to fit into the new house carpets drapes furniture etc  ) 

If you buy the worst house in the best neighborhood  you can afford then you can use those pay raises to fix it to your liking ( or have it fixed to your liking) 

Finally real-estate appreciates at the rate of inflation.  Unless it’s highly desirable. Like waterfront or great school district or high income neighborhood with high paying jobs nearby.  Then it can easily more than double at the rate of inflation.  

The later is what I did. And my $107,000 purchase is worth well north of a million now. 

Inflation is coming,  do you want to be a victim or benefit from it?   

spitfirebill said:

Its funny what some people consider a small town to be. 

When you grow up in a metro area of ~1 million people, and now I live in a metro area of ~1.5 million people..............even 150k is small. 

Even where I went to college was right around 50k population (not including students) and it felt REALLY small.

spitfirebill said:

racerdave600 said:

You seriously need to look at Huntsville, AL.  We are consistently ranked among the best cities to live in the country and have a pretty low cost of living.  It's like all of the best of big cities in a smaller package.  

Careful or you will mess-up your town.    

HAHA! I can't wreak that much destruction!

I like my town ( Columbia, MO population 110k) but it isn't likely the nicest place to live if you don't have any reason to be here and while it winters are getting less every year, it can still be real cold for a month. 

On the internet, my friend had gigabit and lives just outside town. I was over there and downloaded a game on my laptop and the drive write speed was definitely the bottleneck. It was pretty funny to watch. 

My sister is in Springfield for college and it seems like a nice place. The have a Grizzly tool outlet which is enough reason for me to consider living there and last time I checked a decent little autox club. That isn't very common in smaller towns, Columbia doesn't have one.

singleslammer said:

I like my town ( Columbia, MO population 110k) but it isn't likely the nicest place to live if you don't have any reason to be here and while it winters are getting less every year, it can still be real cold for a month. 

On the internet, my friend had gigabit and lives just outside town. I was over there and downloaded a game on my laptop and the drive write speed was definitely the bottleneck. It was pretty funny to watch. 

My sister is in Springfield for college and it seems like a nice place. The have a Grizzly tool outlet which is enough reason for me to consider living there and last time I checked a decent little autox club. That isn't very common in smaller towns, Columbia doesn't have one.

I almost ended up in Columbia years ago (never visited), my first job out of college was for State Farm as a claim rep. In the first or second interview, they told me if hired, I'd likely end up in the Columbia office and not the Tulsa office........I ended up in the Tulsa office. 

Good or bad, I wonder what life would have been like if I had been shipped off to another state/town my first gig out of college.

It would have been bad. Place went downhill as an employer, starting probably around 2013. I was real unhappy when I left. My friend just left, he said it only got worse. Maybe it was different outside of HQ though.

In reply to mtn :

Yeah, I have applied for many jobs there over the years and luckily none paned out. I haven't heard good things in the last several years.

What career is your GF going to be seeking? That is a good question to ask, I think. 

singleslammer said:

In reply to mtn :

Yeah, I have applied for many jobs there over the years and luckily none paned out. I haven't heard good things in the last several years.

What career is your GF going to be seeking? That is a good question to ask, I think. 

She should have her BA in Marketing in the next 1-1.5 years. She did medical billing for an optometrist for a number of years before we met as she started to get back into school.

She's currently the Marketing Coordinator for a decently large trucking company. She handles their social media accounts, internal newsletters, helps with videos/pics/external marketing material, a little bit of HR type stuff, has a touch of graphic design experience but not much, etc. 

I guess that was a longwinded way of saying, something in the Marketing field hopefully.

I live in a town way below 100k people, but I now have two choices for internet. 100Mbps via cable company or new gigabit fiber from a local company. Wilmington, NC is about 100k I think. Major concerts for big acts would require 3 hr drive to Charlotte or Raleigh though. 

Frenchy might be on to something with the suburbs of a larger city, once we take your significant other's career field into account. Winston-Salem, NC might be an intriguing option with a smaller population, thriving art and food scene, and commute-ability to the RTP if necessary for either of you.  Also close to decent size airports (GSO, RDU, CLT) for if you need to head out to the mother ship every so often.

Wow, those ae not small towns.  I live in a really small town of app. 10K.   It is adjoined by another of app. 18K.    In less than a n hours drive I can visit a number of larger cities which I seldom do.   No need.    We have all the stuff bigger cities give.

Ocean Springs was mentioned on a recent web site as a good place to live

Marquette, MI

/Thread.

Thats just my dream though.  

szeis4cookie said:

Frenchy might be on to something with the suburbs of a larger city, once we take your significant other's career field into account. Winston-Salem, NC might be an intriguing option with a smaller population, thriving art and food scene, and commute-ability to the RTP if necessary for either of you.  Also close to decent size airports (GSO, RDU, CLT) for if you need to head out to the mother ship every so often.

We are "almost" in the suburbs of OKC. I actually drive through a small "suburb" that has been surrounded by OKC. I live out in the NW portion of OKC, go 1-2 miles due west, you are in Yukon, a few miles NW you are in Piedmont, about 5 miles north you're in Edmond.  Edmond is a "suburb" of OKC, but is approaching 100k in population. You'd really have to pull up OKC on google maps and see just how spread out it is.

I think we might also like something like Guthrie, OK. Still 40ish minutes into downtown, but it's also not "really" far enough away for me to go full-remote. Maybe drop to going into the office once per week, would work. Just so many options, hence asking you folks!

yupididit said:

In reply to z31maniac :

I live in Cibolo, TX. About 20min NW of San Antonio and 50min SE of Austin. less than 30k people and has very good schools and low crime, which = a nice place to live. I live very comfortable with my income, i currently rent but looking to buy soon. I think it's in a sweet spot, though it isn't very country it's in a nice spot between SA and Austin. You can live south of me in and have truly country living with the same access. I moved from Southern California to here and only took a $200 pay cut so my money goes longer. Though, I admit I miss Cali lol! LMK if you have any questions, feel free to pm me. 

Looks like a nice area! I did a little comparison because I always knew that property taxes in TX make up for the lack of income tax. My effective OK tax rate is roughly 4.3%. 

But the property tax in Cibolo, for example, is about 2x that of Oklahoma County.

I'm in Lexington KY and feel like it has the right balance of size vs amenities. We're a comfortable drive to visit things in Louisville and Cincinnati but not nearly as "city" as either.  Good draw for concerts and such in the city and in some of the cool little towns around us.

If I was looking for a smaller city but in a convenient spot I'd look real hard at Bowling Green.  Close to Nashville and home of the Corvette, with the super bonus of having a new and very nice racetrack (NCM) that runs events A LOT if you like that sort of thing.

spitfirebill said:

racerdave600 said:

You seriously need to look at Huntsville, AL.  We are consistently ranked among the best cities to live in the country and have a pretty low cost of living.  It's like all of the best of big cities in a smaller package.  

Careful or you will mess-up your town.    

Yeah, don't think it's me that will.  Everywhere you read we make the list, sometimes in the top 10.  Evidently we are now the investment capitol of the world for all the hollywood guys and girls to invest their money.  They are down here buying up all the apartment complexes.

In reply to z31maniac :

Yeah property tax is a decent expense here but like I said I don't think it's out of hand given no state income tax. The last two states I've lived in were California and Virginia, so Texas feels under taxed compared to them lol

yupididit said:

In reply to z31maniac :

Yeah property tax is a decent expense here but like I said I don't think it's out of hand given no state income tax. The last two states I've lived in were California and Virginia, so Texas feels under taxed compared to them lol

Everybody seems to get taxes wrong.  Income is much more important than taxes.  In fact the states with the lowest taxes tend to also have the lowest income. While states with the highest taxes also have the highest income.

 I’ll take $120,000 a year income  in Connecticut and gladly pay their higher tax’s  compared to the $38,000 in Mississippi with no taxes and that’s the sort of difference in incomes.  

When it comes to property taxes it really depends on the location more than the state. Property taxes where I live is really low compared to Minneapolis or St Paul. A house with my value there would probably cost $25-30,000. A year while I pay less than 1/5 th of that.  

When you have multi-million dollar homes right next to each other the city can do a lot at a very low rate compared to $100,000 homes next to each other.