35, curious about ER

[escape_nyc]

I've been to Denver before as well, its great. The weather there is not too bad, but its nothing like San Diego. I've been to San Diego a few times myself, and its been a dream of mine to live there for the longest time. You are lucky to be able to retire in San Diego! We are very adventurous when it comes to places, but with a little kid in tow, schooling is a whole new can of worms, and the USA seems to be the safest bet.

Welcome Manny!

I think if you could make a short list of a few areas you're interested in, and start collecting typical costs for those areas, the rest would fall into place pretty easy.
I live in San Diego, and while it's not cheap, it's not as expensive as NY. DH and I are aiming for $2.5m to retire, figuring that'll get us around 80k per year. That's plenty for the two of us, and if your kid is in public school, could probably cover that as well. But it really depends on your lifestyle.
I visited Denver a few years back, and it also seems like it would fit a lot of your qualifications, except for the weather part - but good weather to me might mean something quite different than good weather to you. There's also places out of the country if you're that adventurous, spending a few years in another country is one huge way for kids to get some culture and diversity.

 

[rodi]

I'm in San Diego and plan to retire here in a few years - I'm done as soon as the mortgage is paid off (next year.)

If you do end up picking this part of the woods - pick your school district carefully, or learn the system of choicing into the school you want. (San Diego Unified program that is lottery driven, but you can work some factors in your favor.) I've done the choice thing successfully for my elementary age kids - and my oldest moves to middle school next year - and I just learned I got the "choice" school I want to send him to.

House values in San Diego are very much tied to school districts. So similar houses, just a mile or two apart - can be hundreds of thousands of dollars apart in price - all because of school boundaries and district maps.