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Saturday, June 03, 2006
Where to Enjoy My Retirement Years
Many people move to a different town or state to live after they retire. I plan to be one of those people. I'm really tired of living in "Tornado Alley", spending entire evenings glued to the TV set monitoring the progress of severe thunderstorms.
I want to live where I don't have to worry about severe storms, tornados, hurricanes, earthquakes, or deep snow. Albuquerque, New Mexico fits that description and I lived there, way back in my pre-college years and summers during college. My best friend warns me about the high cost of living and the spring windy season, complete with dust. Well, Kansas City also has a spring windy season, complete with tornados. I'll take the dust. Based on cost of living numbers I've been able to find, that doesn't seem to be that different than KC metro.
Are there other places to live as good or better than Albuquerque? Probably. But I haven't lived there before and my good friends are in Albuquerque (and in Tornado Alley).
Although, I know where I want to move to, I still like to read about the choices. The June 2006 issue of Kiplinger's Personal Finance has the article "50 Smart Places to Live". The ranking is based on good value in home prices, reasonable cost of living, and great quality of life. #1 on the list is Nashville, TN. #2 is Minneapolis/St. Paul and #3 is Albuquerque. Kansas City came in at #6.
The June 2006 issue of Money magazine has several articles on real estate. "Can you still get rich in real estate?" lists Albuquerque as one of the last hot spots in real estate. "Home forecast: Where the growth is...and isn't" classifies Albuquerque as a hot real estate market, meaning that prices are increasing by more than 5% Kansas City is a cold real estate market. More specifically, Albuquerque real estate went up 16.6% last year and is predicted to increase 8.3% in the next year. The numbers for Kansas City are 4.9% and 1.9%. However, the medium home value in Albuquerque is lower than Kansas City which is lower than the suburb I live in.
I won't be moving for a while. I need to do some painting and minor repairs and finish getting the landscaping in shape. And clear out some accumlated stuff. So it is good to know what the real estate markets are doing, but I don't think it's going to cause me to get this house ready to sell any faster.
