[masraum]

Originally Posted by Wil Ferch

Yeah, I guess Texas can work too.....once visited Tyler area that was surprisingly "green".... nice area.

For all these areas, we need to consider this other point that maybe I didn't stress. I'm selling a home in Buffalo ( on a nationwide basis, at a low price)...so I cannot "cash out" and go to a considerably higher home price area...even if other cost of living aspects are good. People coming *to* Buffalo often make out like bandits on this point....where they sell (say) a California home for $3MM and can get a comparable home here for maybe 1/10 the cost. Going in the other direction like I am, on the home-to-home comparison..... is a killer. Going further, I pay $10,000 / yr in property taxes here in NYS...and the smaller place I have in mind in SC has property taxes of maybe $600-$900/yr. Yet the home prices are fairly comparable between these SC areas and suburbs of Buffalo...odd. Also newer construction in SC.

I'm just using this as a data point. I was in a home in an old neighborhood (built late 60s early 70s) with homes that were appraising for $120-135k, 1500-2000 sqft, decent front and back yards, and property taxes were, I think about $2300/yr.

I think most newer neighborhoods in the 'burbs around Houston are $200-300k, but there is stuff lower and, of course, higher. If you're retiring, I don't know if you'd want a neighborhood or not.

Houston has cheap housing and the taxes are reasonable. Not the cheapest, but, I think, compared to NY or NJ, they will have to be an improvement.