To the OP: Thanks for starting this interesting thread. Can you tell us how long you lived in the Santa Fe/ABQ area and you impressions of it?
We were in the Santa Fe/ABQ area for only one month. We realized pretty quickly (within the first week) that it wasn't going to work for us and decided not to stay any longer. In fact, Boulder pretty much dominated Santa Fe on all the criteria that were important to us.
Some things we didn't like about santa fe:
The crime rate is noticeably higher. The first week we were there the city went on lock down due to an escaped felon from a work detail. What's crazy is that the person had previously attempt an escape before. My wife was also threatened with a beating right in old town square. Mail theft is apparently an every day issue as we saw a few households with signs telling the postman to not leave mail in the box at the curb/walls. Broken windows theory and everything.
The vibe was unappealing to us. Santa Fe felt like a tourist town where rich old people go to [-]die[/-] retire and there's no real industry or jobs outside of tourism and the government. In contrast, Boulder felt younger and more energetic with people coming to live there specifically for outdoor activities. Boulder has a pretty healthy economy and even a small tech scene (in terms of the people we met, it actually felt pretty similar to bay area. In fact, Google is expanding their footprint and expected to have 1500 employees in a city of 100k). CU Boulder is a top tier research university (I interviewed there a long time ago) whereas there's nothing comparable in Santa Fe. Median age in Santa Fe is 45 compared to 28 in Boulder, 36 in San Jose, and 33 in San Diego.
Santa Fe also felt very bimodal. Lots of very rich and very poor people. On paper, Santa Fe is more diverse with nearly a 50-50 split between whites and hispanics, but it was quite easy to go into a restaurant and see only white patrons. Boulder is basically all white but is diverse in a different way -- we ran into quite a few people who immigrated from foreign countries (also many US transplants from HCOL areas).
There were some factors personal to us. Specifically, Boulder is within a day's drive to IA (wife's family) whereas it would take 2 days from santa fe. You can get direct flights from denver to des moines but not from the santa fe airport (or abq)
Sorry if this seems so negative on santa fe. I don't think it's a bad place but rather just that Boulder so was much better for us personally. Santa Fe has a great arts scene with a ton of festivals, museums, and galleries. You might also run into GRRM.
Albuquerque was eliminated because it was just too hot.