Will you move when you retire???

Vermont sounds nice.
I was in for 20 years to the day. Last couple of years the worst cause i had injuries and medical conditions by then.

Not much fall color here. It doesnt stay cool long enough.I have to drive upstate NY to get my fall fix.

I had 2 brothers in the Navy Jada, one was on a sub and the other a destroyer, neither made it a career. One of my other brothers joined the Marines and made a career out of it, retired a few years ago as a Colonel.

What was your favorite part of the world, Joyce?

Thank the colonel for me, Celeste.

I will Victor, thank you! We have a joke when he comes to my house....he may be the Colonel but at my house im the General!! LOL

Good question Victor, i will be curious to see what she says....for one brother it was Hawaii, for the Colonel it was and still is Japan. He goes at least once every 5 years to visit his friends.

This message was edited Feb 23, 2010 7:07 PM

Funny!

My friend who was in the marines for four years loved Japan. He really loved the women!

I would love to visit Japan. That would be my number one Asian destination.

My middle DD used to say as a teen ager that when she was rich we could visit Japan. she's not rich & I have too many aches & pains to enjoy the trip.

Funny Celeste! Colonel is impressive!

I liked Japan a lot too. The courteousness of the people and culture is not to be believed. I went into a department store and bought several inexpensive small items. They wrapped each one in gift paper and then placed them in a lovely shopping bag like I had bought gold bars. Everything they do is in a thoughtful manner.

Its where i learned to love sushi. I was invited to a couples home for dinner once and they served me a seven course meal, and I was the only guest.Thats how they roll.

i liked Thailand too. Also spent three years in Bermuda.The people there (thats what I remember about places, the people) were also very giving and laid back and welcoming.

Heard that about Bermuda too. Maybe Bloomberg will let me use his place??

The Japanese were our favorite customers. They would take us out to the top Japanese restaurants in NYC! Wonderfully polite and gracious. And guess where Japanese maples come from?!!! ^_^

Oregon??

Hee hee!

I forgot to say - thank you too, Joyce!! I have always appreciated people who have served. As soon as I started making money my first charities of choice were ones that cared for disabled vets.

LOL! I wasnt into gardening too much when I was there but they had wonderful landscaping, especially around the temples...very creative

Driving there is taking your life in your hands....treacherous! But they have a clean and organized subway system.

Thanks Victor!

They are hyper-organized! Germans too.

Jada were you in japan when the Cherry Tree's bloomed? My Brother said it is a sight that imprints it's self in your heart and memory forever.

I would love to see that! We will be in DC this year at cherry blossom time!

I'll stay as long as I can, but property taxes may push me out . . . :-(

Out there too?!!!

I am getting my tax stuff in order. 11K in property tax this year!!! I want to curse!!!!

Not to put a damper on DC, but the Colonel said he always liked DC but they have nothing on Japan when it comes to cherry blossom time. ^_^

And to boot, there was some serious damage to them from the snowstorms.

On a related note, I will be starting a thread about money matters. Will be a nice segway from this thread.

11,000 $ Victor? are you kidding???? You could buy a couple of acres of land here for that kind of mooney!

Tell me about it! It was $5K just twelve years ago.

Ouch Victor!
A money thread is in order for these times.

Yes, the cherry blossoms were GORGEOUS!!!!! I have two of them in my yard but they dont do so well here. Yes, DC is a sight too,but no comparison.They really coddle the trees in Japan, they climb them and hand tend to them. Like they are people.

Property taxes in Pelham Manor near where I used to live were ~ 36k /yr! lol!

I don't want to tell you what i pay for 18 acres then.......

That's just beyond sick, WC.
I now pay more in escrow (taxes and insurance) than I do for my mortgage.

9 room House on 2.97 acres $900
Undeveloped 15 acre field $400

Not that bad here, but not that far off, either. Microsoft and Nintendo and all the "little" spinoffs are just down the road. The poor little backward towns that got invaded by the wealthy are now losing all their charm to 50-house tracts of the "new craftsman" look.

At least the estates have some property around them . . .

I'll be contesting my taxes this year - guess I should get on that. Wouldn't be so hard to move if I could take my garden with me . . .

WoW! i'm google mapping south china now....

I'm googling 'gardener for Celeste and Brian'.

LOL!!!!

See, that's the bad thing about moving to a popular place for retirement...
The population increases, roads have to be widened, more schools have to be built, more commercial areas develop, more cops have to be hired... and who pays for it??
- The property taxes go up... Meanwhile the natives move to more quieter secluded haunts and the 'newbies' get clustered together! lol!

I can build on the far corner! ^_^ I'll be Sophie's full-time butler.

Funny! My brother is already trying to get 5 acres out of me in the back cornor. His reasoning is I will get to see his smiling face every morning when I wake up. lol

I can smile more/better.

Just found this thread and it's very interesting to hear how you all are thinking. We spent about 18 years putting our current game plan in place. We loved our NH farm in the summer, and spent every weekend there year-around, so we decided that would be our summer place once we left Connecticut. I grew up in this neighborhood in Florida, but thought I was leaving forever when I went away to college, because the heat and humidity and bugs were just not for me. Not quite! We had made a grid with all of our objectives on it (near medical facilities, near cultural/art/music/theater, near good sports events, small yard for gardening, near water, small house for easy maintenance, etc.), and we realized through visits here to see my elderly Mom that this little house fit all of those criteria for the winter months. We bought it for a song 12 years before we retired, and now we are here in the winter and in New England in the summer and fall. I was a transplant to New England, but would live there if I had to pick only one place. I have also lived in North Carolina and liked it a lot. I also like the Shenandoah Valley in Virginia a lot, but would have to live in view of water! I think the hunt is as much fun as anything else, so I hope you are all having fun with your hunts!! I would strongly suggest writing down your wish list (what you must have and what you'd like to have) and then testing each option by putting it through your grid of objectives. I kept our grid in my wallet for years and every time we'd visit a place as a possibility, we'd take out the grid and check to see if it fit our objectives well. Strangely, this was the only place that had them all! But we were only looking for a winter locale.

Wow - very organized, Louise! Are you Japanese or German?? ^_^

LOL, Victor!! Just organized....and married to a guy who loves spread sheets!

Which state is your 'home' as the taxman sees? FL?

Yes. We are here more of the year than in NH. This is our permanent home and NH is our summer home. It's nice to have neighbors I've known all my life, and my niece is here as well.