Retired in Florida or in the Planning Stages? Please share Here.

TDirgins said:
My wife and I are eyeing St Augustine as a retirement spot. How do you like it there? Pros? Cons?
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We do like it here, it does depend where about you live. We live with walking distance of the best beach here. It does get chilly sometimes in winter is probably my main issue. Property in nice areas can get pricey.

What sort of info do you want?
 
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We live in Sarasota and love it here. It is pricey, but we like townhouse living, so we were able to find something that worked with our budget.

We are 5 miles (driving) from the beach. It takes about 15 minutes to get to the beach in season (traffic is definitely an issue in Sarasota, especially in season).

I would not live east of 75. Much warmer, from what I hear (less breeze from the gulf), and as noted earlier the drive to the beach is long.

Do note, Sarasota is getting more and more crowded. The difference between season and not season is not as great as it used to be, according to those I have talked to who have lived here for years.

There are SO many beautiful beaches in SW Florida. I would take some time to do a traveling vacation and check them all out.
 
Not sure if South FL is on your radar. We lived in Sunrise (S. FL) for many years. There are decent 55+ condo communities with golf courses and HOA that keeps area very nice. Weston is another town that's worth considering.
 
Looking to or are Retired in Florida, or in the Planning Stages? Please share Here.

I have a condo just south of Boca Raton in Hillsboro Beach. It’s an older building and maintained well. Fees are near $1800/qtr, but includes high speed Internet. We are right on the beach on the eighth floor. Beautiful ocean view worth every penny. More wave action than the boring gulf coast. Lots of good restaurants and traffic not nearly as bad as the Sarasota area. I shopped there and traffic turned me off in just a few minutes. We’re 20 minutes from Ft Lauderdale airport and cruise port. We’re happy with our decision.
 
simple girl said:
We live in Sarasota and love it here. It is pricey, but we like townhouse living, so we were able to find something that worked with our budget.

We are 5 miles (driving) from the beach. It takes about 15 minutes to get to the beach in season (traffic is definitely an issue in Sarasota, especially in season).

I would not live east of 75. Much warmer, from what I hear (less breeze from the gulf), and as noted earlier the drive to the beach is long.

Do note, Sarasota is getting more and more crowded. The difference between season and not season is not as great as it used to be, according to those I have talked to who have lived here for years.

There are SO many beautiful beaches in SW Florida. I would take some time to do a traveling vacation and check them all out.
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Is "the beach" for you Longboat Key?
 
We moved to Punta Gorda 4 years ago. We don’t meet your distance to a beach criteria, or flood zone . It’s more of a boating community, and golf. It takes about 45 min to get to your choice of several beaches. And it’s getting to crowded. But no frost.

Venice And Nokomis are nice, we have friends there. Fort Myers was just a little to big of a city for us and Naples was just a little to far south and expensive.

There are plans for a new resort type community being built in Port Charlotte this year. It’s on the water, but again no beach. The guy that owns Allegiant airlines is building it.

Good luck.
 
Forgot to add, Sanibel is also nice. Wife did not like the living on a island with only one bridge. Probably in a flood zone also.
 
simple girl said:
That's one of the beaches, although we are closer to Siesta.
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We have a place on Longboat Key. We are planning to move there full time when I'm completely retired in a few years. We love SW Florida and the Sarasota area in particular. For a retirement lifestyle, I think the west coast is much better than the east coast, but I have retired friends who live on the east coast and love it. To each his own. On Longboat Key, there are many days in the off season when I can walk out to the beach and not see a single person as far as I can see in either direction. Its incredible.
 
RAchip said:
We have a place on Longboat Key. We are planning to move there full time when I'm completely retired in a few years. We love SW Florida and the Sarasota area in particular. For a retirement lifestyle, I think the west coast is much better than the east coast, but I have retired friends who live on the east coast and love it. To each his own. On Longboat Key, there are many days in the off season when I can walk out to the beach and not see a single person as far as I can see in either direction. Its incredible.
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I sooooooo agree!!!! How awesome that you will be able to retire right on the island. Jealous! :D

We have enjoyed kayaking the mangroves on Lido Key and also of course the powerboat races on the 4th of July - such a crazy, fun experience! I love driving up Longboat on a Sunday morning to Cortez Beach for the beach market, then head up to the Beach House Restaurant at Bradenton Beach for lunch right on the gulf. So many great places in this area to explore!
 
Babcock Ranch is marketing itself as the first solar-powered city in America. I might drive down there just to have a look around when it gets more built out. I don't expect it to be much different than other large Florida PUDs despite the eco-friendly marketing slant.

Babcock Ranch website

Babcock Ranch article
 
We just came back from house & community hunting in South West Florida. I know it is in season, but the traffic was terrible in comparison to where we live in NE Florida. We actually drove around from Marco Island up to Estero, many times in 3 days at all hours of the day. Other than that most of the communities that we liked were at least 5 miles to 10 miles from the beach. That is 15 to 25 minutes as I drove. We mainly were looking at the Naples area.

Some other things we noticed is that a lot of the homes still had damage from Irma and had tarps on the roof and missing tiles etc.

In addition to get an evening meal at Carabbas, Bonefish Grill, and other similar places was a 45 - 1 hour wait at the times we wanted to have supper.

On the home front, the houses are well built.

Saying all that, the homes in the price range we were looking are very nice and the developments are also very nice. The communities are well kept and looked after.

Next time we will look in the Venice area, although we drove back through Venice and it was certainly not as nice as Naples.

We never got bitten while we were there either (That did surprise me) and we were not molested by any roaming Alligators.....
 
We live in the Space Coast. It's awful here. Probably best just to pass it by as you head south on 95.
 
jimnjana said:
We live in the Space Coast. It's awful here. Probably best just to pass it by as you head south on 95.
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You are so funny. We tell people driving US 101 from LA to Santa Barbara the same thing about Ventura County:LOL:
 
Daytona can be a little busy and rough (though it does have a beautiful beach), but the towns just north and south -- Ormond Beach and New Smyrna Beach -- are quite nice. My DW and I recently moved to a spacious condo in Ormond just off the beach and have great bike trails, parks and nearly a dozen (non-chain) restaurants within walking distance. New Smyrna is a bit smaller, but still a charming artists colony. The half-million population Daytona/Deland metro area is big enough for most needs and has a sweet local airport in Daytona (with non-stops to NY, Charlotte and Atlanta). And, Orlando and Jacksonville are each only about an hour away if you need access to a big city airports and amenities.

St. Augustine, about 45 minutes up the coast, is also a wonderful college town, with easy access to Jacksonville. But it may be a bit chillier in winter!
 
ShokWaveRider said:
We just came back from house & community hunting in South West Florida. I know it is in season, but the traffic was terrible in comparison to where we live in NE Florida. We actually drove around from Marco Island up to Estero, many times in 3 days at all hours of the day. Other than that most of the communities that we liked were at least 5 miles to 10 miles from the beach. That is 15 to 25 minutes as I drove. We mainly were looking at the Naples area.

Some other things we noticed is that a lot of the homes still had damage from Irma and had tarps on the roof and missing tiles etc.

In addition to get an evening meal at Carabbas, Bonefish Grill, and other similar places was a 45 - 1 hour wait at the times we wanted to have supper.

On the home front, the houses are well built.

Saying all that, the homes in the price range we were looking are very nice and the developments are also very nice. The communities are well kept and looked after.

Next time we will look in the Venice area, although we drove back through Venice and it was certainly not as nice as Naples.

We never got bitten while we were there either (That did surprise me) and we were not molested by any roaming Alligators.....
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Thanks for your update.

We are looking at FL when we retire in a few years and are considering the same areas you are.

I'll be watching this thread for updates!
 
jerryo said:
Daytona can be a little busy and rough (though it does have a beautiful beach), but the towns just north and south -- Ormond Beach and New Smyrna Beach -- are quite nice. My DW and I recently moved to a spacious condo in Ormond just off the beach and have great bike trails, parks and nearly a dozen (non-chain) restaurants within walking distance. New Smyrna is a bit smaller, but still a charming artists colony. The half-million population Daytona/Deland metro area is big enough for most needs and has a sweet local airport in Daytona (with non-stops to NY, Charlotte and Atlanta). And, Orlando and Jacksonville are each only about an hour away if you need access to a big city airports and amenities.

St. Augustine, about 45 minutes up the coast, is also a wonderful college town, with easy access to Jacksonville. But it may be a bit chillier in winter!
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We were just in Ormond beach last month, saw the big rocket and heard it even though it was many miles away.

I was thinking of moving there, but on A1A , going south to Daytona beach its pretty sad looking, going North to Flager it's nice.

What is your thought on a condo, on the Halifax river, either land or ocean side, vs between A1A and the Ocean. ?
 
I believe that Palm Beach County is one of the best places in Florida. We certainly have the nicest looking mermaids. I managed to capture a short video of one under the bridge that connects to Singer Island where a lot of people like to dive. Warning! Don't expect those grainy UFO type videos. This is the real deal.
 
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In-laws have owned in Nokomis since the mid 1980's. At least 5 homes are owned by family members in Venice, Nokomis, Osprey areas. It's great but you may not get out of the flood zones. I've been going down since the early 1990's--been there every month of the year. Played at Calusa Lakes twice last month in fact. Waterford is another nice place.


The area is very nice, you can get a freeze but only overnight usually. if you go further south it is warmer but also much more vulnerable to big hurricane damage. The last big hurricane flood in Nokomis was in the 1920's and the water went all the way to Rt 41. In-laws have never had storm damage but Hurrican Charlie was a close call as well as the hurricane this year (evacuated but only 90 MPH winds since it went over the everglades.).


It is getting crowded there year round, Ft Myers may have more room for you but that is building up too.
 
We did visit and all the way up the west coast is way too crowded for our tastes, I think we sill stay put in NE Florida for a while. It was a breath of fresh air getting back here after a week in the SW.
 
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