Looking for mountains and ocean....

[In-control]

I would suggest New Hampshire as well and for several reasons. It has four seasons and the summer is very comfortable. It has great diversity - snow, ocean, highlands, lake district's and cities. The cost of living is resonable and their is no state income tax(besides interest/dividends). It also borders Mass/Maine/VT and Canada - all great outdoor states.

What we are considering doing is to buy a place in NH as our home base from April thu September(or when the leaves fall off the trees), then renting/traveling the rest of the time. Anyone else in NH - where are some good towns - not too crowded and less the 1hr away from an airport.

 

[CuppaJoe]

A friend just moved from San Francisco to Santa Rosa and said SR is so friendly its scary. Maybe there will be afordable houses to rent there for awhile.

 

[Rustic23]

We use to live in the bay area. We went skiing at Bear Vally, CA. It was a neat place. There is a small development there, and when we were there they did not plow the roads during the winter. You had to have a snow mobile to get around. There was back country skiing and downhill. In about a half a day you could be in the bay area. Don't know what the cost is like. It is California.

 

[Zoocat]

Best advice is to always rent for at least a year before buying property.

Personally, my impression was that if one more person retired in Bend, OR, the earth was going to tip over.

Are there a substantial number of single people retiring in Bend? I'll be surprised if anyone says yes. From my superficial research, there doesn't appear to be a whole lot to do there. I may be wrong. Tell me.

 

[Zoocat]

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If you really want ocean and mountains close enough not to be a chore to get there, LA is your destination.

Ha

Ha, I'd point out that in LA you need to define "chore" very closely. For me, driving in LA traffic is definitely a chore, day or night.

It seems like there's no good solution for this desire. My remedy is to live in Colorado near the Rocky Mountains and fly to the ocean once a year. Denver to LA or Oakland is less than $200 most of the time. Or a flight to Oahu for $397 in off season (although this may have been a fluke last year, I don't know).

 

[lem1955]

I second the NH vote. It's a beautiful state - with great mountains of it's own and a little seashore too. Then....come spend your money in my state - Vermont. Maybe your kids will come to VT, work here, help keep real estate affordable, and pay taxes -- for services they need, like schools. In such a minimally populated state like ours, the influx of (relatively) wealthy retirees looking for low taxes and willing to pay big city prices for property is a bigger strain than it is to our neighbors.

 

[FinanceGeek]

What we are considering doing is to buy a place in NH as our home base from April thu September(or when the leaves fall off the trees), then renting/traveling the rest of the time. Anyone else in NH - where are some good towns - not too crowded and less the 1hr away from an airport.

Check Manchester and points North...Nashua is already overrun by too many M***holes moving there and going on weekend shopping trips to avoid sales taxes. But further North you're out of Boston commuting range and it gets better.

Oh, and it wouldn't hurt to be at least 5-10 miles away from 93 as that's a major leaf-peeper and ski route for the aforementioned M***holes.

If you want a nice town and a bit closer to ocean, check out Durham or Exeter.