Choices!!!

They are good to have. At the same time, they can make decision making a challenge.

The decision to sell and buy another house was an easy decision for us to make because as our life circumstances changed, so did our housing needs. Our new house has more space than we were looking for, but it has the space we need. Hubby having his own office space for work has been a life changer and that alone was worth the move. However, while we were selling and buying, we realized that in the not too distant future we could once again find ourselves selling and buying. After all, retirement is peeking from around the corner, we have had to ask ourselves should we stay or should we go?

I’m quite certain those are choices many retirees have had to make, so we don’t feel like we’re in the minority.

We have spent hours, days and weeks researching our choices of places to live in retirement. Things that Make You Go WHAT?! – worldofweeks

We looked carefully at all our options and were seriously wondering if an international move would make sense for us. We found some very good reasons for living outside the U.S. in retirement. #1 on that list was just how far we could stretch our retirement dollars. As we looked at where we could live, we realized that our circumstances added another layer that might make a move out of the country less feasible and decided to stay state-side instead. I will admit, that if we had looked at this as an option a few years ago, we may have gone for it. It’s not a bad choice at all and I would recommend that anyone looking at retirement consider an international move as a possibility.

Now that an international move has been taken off the table, we have directed our attention to what makes the most sense for hubby and me in the short-term and in the long-term. Which states are most retirement friendly? Which states have what we would enjoy most in retirement? What states would work well for us still having kids at home in retirement?

We have a lot of choices. Fifty to be exact!

Some states were ruled out simply because we have no desire to live there. This allowed us to narrow the choices.

Different states comes up as retirement friendly depending on what criteria you are researching.

For example, if I was looking for the top 10 most tax friendly states for retirees, the list might include Wyoming, South Dakota, Alaska, Mississippi, Florida, Pennsylvania, Nevada, New Hampshire, Kentucky and Georgia.

If I were looking for the top 10 states with the lowest cost of living, the list could include Mississippi, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Kansas, Missouri, Georgia, Alabama, New Mexico, Tennessee, and Indiana.

If I want to find the top 10 states that is ranked best for retirees that list might include Florida, Colorado, South Dakota, Iowa, Virginia, Wyoming, New Hampshire, Idaho, Utah, and Arizona.

The challenge is that each report creates their list based on different variables, so the lists change a bit depending on what that criteria happens to be. However, by combining all the information into one master list, we discovered that very few states consistently showed up

Now the fun begins!

We have our first visit planned to the state on the top of our list because spending time there seems like the best way to determine, should we stay or should we go?