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Post by Clipper on May 18, 2011 21:48:47 GMT -5
I don't blame you BZ, with the camp at Delta and now your dream house, you would have to be crazy to want to move out of state, unless the taxes go so high you couldn't buy groceries.
We actually like it here, but like it there too, and would like to have the best of both worlds with a summer place up there possibly. As much as I love the area up there, we were bitching about the taxes and cost of living around there long before me moved. It just wasn't as big of an issue when I was making a grand a week or better.
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Post by Disgusted-Daily on May 19, 2011 0:43:19 GMT -5
Most guys that I work with will be leaving New York when they retire. Kind of ironic that they will be collecting a New York State pension and no interest in New York. We do pay higher taxes than other states but we get to enjoy all four seasons, great food and for me to not have to worry about a natural disaster taking my house when I arrive home or during the night is a great piece of mind. But like the others I to will most likely leave New York State when I retire.
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Post by JGRobinson on May 19, 2011 6:03:57 GMT -5
"We do pay higher taxes than other states but we get to enjoy all four seasons, great food and for me to not have to worry about a natural disaster taking my house"
We dont have to worry about a Natural Disaster taking our homes but we have to fear Bankruptcy, Foreclose, Tax collectors and NY just plain taking your property for the good of The Public!
NY citizens pay heavily for all the areas of the country and world with Natural Disasters over and over again via our insurance and tax payments. How many times has the Ohio flooded its banks? California Burns, slides and shakes, who pays for them to live in nirvana after acts of God occur, us! With little or zero return on our FEMA, Homeowners and Flood Insurance, we are literally subsidizing the nations assets and getting nothing to speak of in return.
It should be cheaper to live here, few acts of god, tons of natural resources and the financial Mecca of the world. Its not God who is punishing New Yorkers, its Acts of Albany and Organized greed that have caused this unnatural financial disaster. Few are moving into NY other than other Nations and States Tired, Poor, Sick, Lame or Lazy!
Last but not least, Todds right, the state and Federal workers know that even though this state provided them a great living, they can't maintain the same standard after retirement unless they move elsewhere.
Its not like we can stop them and we have nothing more to offer them after retirement than what they have already bankrolled. The future of New York State is not their big concern as they see it shrinking in their rear view mirror. That is a sad statement, they leave and take with them our tax submissions and futures.
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Post by Clipper on May 19, 2011 7:03:57 GMT -5
Todd, Tennessee and a few other states don't have any state income tax, so it protects a little more of your pension for YOU to spend instead of state government thieves. It makes a difference come April 15th, believe me. I would hate to be paying NY state's ridiculously high taxes on MY pension, but that is just a personal thought.
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Post by dave on Feb 15, 2013 1:04:27 GMT -5
I was searching for another topic this evening when I came across this thread and our discussion about leaving New York. We have been Carolinians (however it's said) almost a year and a half now and it's probably time for me to give a report on whether we feel we made the right move. To sum it up, our only regret is that we didn't move here five years ago. Maybe ten years ago.
Down here on the shore ... in this part of the state, at least ... quite a few people are immigrants from the north. It makes for an interesting mix of people with different backgrounds and experiences and for me that's a lot of fun. I have noticed a high concentration of refugees from New York and a surprising number from Ohio. The Ohioans speak of being near the ocean. So do the New Yorkers, and then immediately tell you how much taxes they were paying up north before they moved here. I have never lived in an area where so many people are happy to be here, and will often spontaneously come right out and tell you that while you're standing in line at the grocery store. That includes most of the natives.
For us the move has significantly lengthened our financial runway in our retirement years. South Carolina enacted a tax structure which works well here on the coast. The system directly takes the sales tax, as well as hotel and resort room taxes, and applies them to property taxes, effectively reducing them to a great degree. No B.S. like New York's Lottery revenue promised for education going astray and winding up in New York City subways. From what I can tell in my reading of the newspapers, politicians are swiftly put out on the curb if they displease their voters. There are a lot of retirees here and they are particularly sensitive to tax issues.
Housing is much more reasonable here and the home we bought was much cheaper than what we sold up north. This year, because we're over 65 and we'll have been here over a year, we qualify for the Homestead reduction. Our total property taxes will total only 4% of what i was paying in New York. That's almost laughable. Our only utility is electricity and the per kilowatt cost is about 2/3 of what it was in New York. My total electric bill last year, which covered lights, cooking, heat and air conditioning was less than a third of what I paid just for oil in New York the last year I lived there. In fact, a rough calculation in my head says that all of my house expenses ... utilities (heat, a/c,) taxes, insurance and even maintenance (I now have all the yard work done) totals less than just what I was paying for property taxes in New York.
We love the weather, although it does get pretty hot in the summer. But the spring lasts twice as long as spring up north and the same with fall. Winters can get down to freezing at night, but they're short and the amount of sunshine in this part of the country gets the days warmed up to at least the 50's. I know people who don't own a coat and don't feel they need one. Most of the time it's very pleasant here, and this far south the sunsets are actually longer.
I've traveled around the state a little bit and have been pleasantly surprised. Off the coast I thought I might find most of the state to be dogpatch-like. But the majority of the towns are not at all like that. Nearby cities such as Conway and Florence and Columbia have some of the nicest residential architecture and the streets are clean and well maintained. The roads, even the back roads, were a great surprise. They are well maintained and smooth surfaced and you can safely do 60 on them. They're banked well and built well. There's a Trappist Monastery about two hours from here that I visit and most of the drive is over roads where you'd swear you were in the Adirondacks .... piney, sandy and with few homes. But it's all flat with no mountains. The roads are done really well and I can keep the speed between 60 and 70 flying through the Carolina forests on a sunny afternoon.
Some of the larger cities are lovely. We get down to Charleston fairly often and it is an absolute jewel of a city. In my mind, what a city should be, even with the heavy industry about the edges. In some ways it's like a cleaner Syracuse, although much of it is of course much older, historically.
In the small towns many of the commercial buildings do look 1950-ish and I think that's because building changes are needed far less often than what would be the norm in northern winters. And speaking of the cold weather taking it's toll on buildings, I've found that it also takes its toll on the body. I've never felt physically better than since I've moved here.
And there's lots to do. I don't know if it's because there are many retirees here or if it's something in the water, but there are a great many activities and clubs and whatnot, plus a huge amount of opportunity for volunteering or just meeting other people. the arts flourish and folks just like to really have a good time. It feels more celebratory down here, whatever the reason.
So we're quite well settled here and glad we made the move. I do miss stream fishing for trout sometimes, but I do plan to get in some marsh fishing this year. To tell you truth, when Mrs. Dave speaks about going up to see the kids this spring, I sigh and wish I could stay here.
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Post by clarencebunsen on Feb 15, 2013 6:25:24 GMT -5
It was interesting to go back & review this thread to jog my memory. I've been going through much of the same calculations lately, my wife will be 61 next week & a post retirement budget is getting closer. Prepping for taxes, I have to look at the huge nut that is real estate tax. In a few weeks I'll run Turbo Tax (started using that 2 years ago instead of making my own spread sheets, either I'm getting dumber or taxes are getting more complicated) and I'll be forced to acknowledge how much I pay NYS.
I look out the window and the street in front of my house has not been repaved in the 28 years I've lived here. I did the math during the 2012 budget season, the town paved 2% of it's roads last year. Utica scheduled 1% for repaving.
None of it makes me feel very optimistic and I'm an up beat person.
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Post by dave on Feb 15, 2013 9:46:30 GMT -5
While becoming onerous, it wasn't so much the amount of NY property taxes I was paying ... I could swallow hard and try to work that into the budget. It was the percent of increase I'd experienced in previous years and the likelihood it would continue, or probably get worse. And all the elements of a disaster are there: local revenue plans that set assessors to squeaking every dime out of property valuations, aided by state guidelines; missed opportunities by the state to alleviate local property taxes, probably due to a heavy influence by NY business; an unusually (even for New York) perverse liar for a governor (sorry, I really feel that way), and the fact that property taxes are the only resource left to provide revenue after fees have tripled and quadrupled over the years. (C'mon, $29 for a fishing license? Down here its $9 and my driver's license was $13. $27 for commercial class.)
In such an environment I found it difficult to concoct a plan that I could trust. So I stewed over that for a while and came down here in the winter for a month, with a plan to make it 2 or 3 winter months when Mrs. Dave finally retired. Our thought was to eventually live up north and spend the winter down here. It occurred to me that if I turned that equation around and lived down here and spent the summer up north I'd be miles ahead financially. And now that I'm down here I'd just as soon stay. We came close to buying a trailer in an RV park in a nice part of the Catskills a few months ago. But we looked at each other and said, Nah, who needs the complication?
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Post by Clipper on Feb 15, 2013 12:51:47 GMT -5
Those that have been on the forum for a long time remember when I used to say that my heart was still in the Mohawk Valley and the Adirondacks of NY State. I missed NY when we first moved here to care for my parents when I retired. Especially in summer. As time went on and I watched the area decliine each year when we visited. It makes me very sad to see my beloved upstate NY going downhill.
We thought often of buying a summer place up there or of putting our fifth wheel in an RV park up there, but then there would be the cost of pulling it up there in spring and back home in fall, or the cost of paying someone to keep the snow off the roof, and check on it periodically. The last time we pulled the trailer up there for two weeks we spent almost $600 on gas counting the gas we burned in the two weeks we were there. Gas prices are ridiculous once we leave Tennessee and Virginia, and pulling the trailer I only get about 10-12 mpg.
We find ourselves thinking along the same lines as you and Mrs. Dave. We can stay in a hotel for the time we are up there, and don't have to worry about maintenance of a property of any kind, nor the ridiculously high taxation. I hate paying the gas tax up there, but I can stand it for a couple of weeks a year.
Taxes and utilities here are comparable to what you pay in your area, and taxes are minimal. I pay less for my driver's license for five years than I did in NY for a year or two.
The point you made about retirees being very focused on tax rates is also true here. It is not only retirees. Tax increases here meet with great opposition and when property taxes DO go up, it is my a minimal amount and only as a last resort. I am 100% behind the tax structure here that is based more on sales tax and hotel restaurant taxes than on income tax or property taxes. EVERYONE pays. The race fans, the tourist dropping off the interstate for gas or a meal, those that rent rather than own property, and even those that don't work or contribute to the tax pool in any other manner.
It is simply sad to watch the NY State area slowly crumble and decline while other areas of the country thrive simply by offering a more economically friendly environment for industry as well as residents.
NY has one of the best education systems in the nation, and while those NY children grow up with that system and attend the finest state colleges in the Northeast, they have to leave the area in order to find jobs and to find a cost of living that allows them to live comfortably.
The NY that you and I have loved all of our lives no longer exists Dave. I oft wonder what the eventual fate of the state will be over the long haul.
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Post by Ralph on Feb 15, 2013 14:21:05 GMT -5
I wish we could escape. I see nothing good coming down the road for the two of us in the future.
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Post by JGRobinson on Feb 24, 2013 8:19:36 GMT -5
I love NY, always have, always will! They have tried to chase everyone out that doesnt fit their kinda idea of a New Yorker and even laughed when some big names took their millions and left. I dont blame the fixed incomers or the <30 crowd leaving but its time to turn that around. Its our state, our country, our futures and just the same way NY led the nation into the desert of Socialistic entrepreneurial doom, we will come out of the sandstorm into the light of our free state even stronger than before.
Just like the 29 counties (out of 62) so far that have said "screw Andy's Safe act", many of us are prepared to stand our ground to the end and Im pretty sure, the end is the only thing that will elevate me from here, hope that doesnt come anytime soon.
The Safe Act may ultimately be the straw that propels us forward into breaking the backs of Republicrats in Albany that are out of control. Bloomie may get away with limiting the rights of his city dwellers to a big gulp of soda but messing with the 2nd Amendment FOOG will haunt them all like the Ghost of Politicians past (1994 to be exact).
Just like my guns, my feet stay where they feel most comfortable on and in NY.
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Post by Clipper on Feb 24, 2013 8:25:47 GMT -5
I have always missed NY, and in the beginning, when we first moved south to care for my mom and dad, I always planned on moving back some day.
Now that my parents are gone, and we could come "home" if we wanted to, Kathy and I have realized that to do so would be just plain stupid financially. We will be contented to simply visit annually.
The politics there have always been somewhat sketchy, but with Cuomo in office, I don't see anything good coming down the pike.
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Post by dave on Feb 24, 2013 12:10:26 GMT -5
I can't say I love New York. Not sure I ever did. I have a soft spot in my heart for my hometown, Utica, but I recognize it might as well be a soft spot on my brain, because the Utica I sometimes miss isn't there anymore. And probably it never was. Seen through a child's eyes Utica was a place where I knew every street, most of its population and felt comfortable in every ward as I rode my bicycle around the town. Of course, that wasn't the case, but at a young age it felt true. I guess I feel more like an American, schooled in its values ... the old ones, of course. Whether they were truly practiced or not by those who taught them matters little to me. I believe in them. Some verse: My life plays out on a small piece of earth's turf, stretching from the foothills of evergreen soaked mountains down the coast of an ocean that I cannot comprehend. The hemlocks, pines, spruce stretch themselves over black mountains and lay restless, out there in the darkness on a twig-snapping autumn night, as I lay listening in an Adirondack lean-to. The ocean is unknowable. I comprehend neither its strength nor breadth. I see only immensity, hear the power , but never her plan. Angry waves crash toward me early this morning, only to arrive exhausted at my feet, their job done, whatever it was. The clouds burn away in front of a chasing sun, which lights up the land that has held me in its arms since my birth, no matter where I traveled. Come, O Holy Sun. Glorious Sun. Warm me with your words and tell me where is my home. Of course, I'm still working on it. Also see, "Lights Out On The Sea," (prose). Click on Number 20 on the following web page: www.windsweptpress.com/essays.htm
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Post by JGRobinson on Feb 25, 2013 6:19:54 GMT -5
I can't say I love New York. Not sure I ever did. I have a soft spot in my heart for my hometown, Utica, but I recognize it might as well be a soft spot on my brain, because the Utica I sometimes miss isn't there anymore. And probably it never was. Seen through a child's eyes Utica was a place where I knew every street, most of its population and felt comfortable in every ward as I rode my bicycle around the town. Of course, that wasn't the case, but at a young age it felt true. I guess I feel more like an American, schooled in its values ... the old ones, of course. Whether they were truly practiced or not by those who taught them matters little to me. I believe in them. Some verse: My life plays out on a small piece of earth's turf, stretching from the foothills of evergreen soaked mountains down the coast of an ocean that I cannot comprehend. The hemlocks, pines, spruce stretch themselves over black mountains and lay restless, out there in the darkness on a twig-snapping autumn night, as I lay listening in an Adirondack lean-to. The ocean is unknowable. I comprehend neither its strength nor breadth. I see only immensity, hear the power , but never her plan. Angry waves crash toward me early this morning, only to arrive exhausted at my feet, their job done, whatever it was. The clouds burn away in front of a chasing sun, which lights up the land that has held me in its arms since my birth, no matter where I traveled. Come, O Holy Sun. Glorious Sun. Warm me with your words and tell me where is my home. Of course, I'm still working on it. Also see, "Lights Out On The Sea," (prose). Click on Number 20 on the following web page: www.windsweptpress.com/essays.htmVery Nice Dave! Truly home is where the heart is. I was lucky enough in my youth to travel the nation and the world a bit. Living outside of CNY was exciting and cool but never felt like home to me ever. While I saw the beauty of what each had to offer, none of them had the complete package of evolving natural eye candy and serenity Ive enjoyed most of my life in CNY. When I say I love NY, I guess really what I love is the physical state not the Political nightmare that has manifested itself over the last few decades. Because I never appreciated Albany's overall effect on the state, I generally blame most things that arent good about NY squarely on that Stalingrad like Crapital. We shouldnt look to the Republicrats to save us but damn, they are killing us now so its time to pick a side, not run and hide. They will not chase me elsewhere, I will make my stand here where all of my Grandchildren live and most of my relatives were born and died for many generations. If we dont fix NY and soon, it will only be a place of past memories for my grandkids to vacation in, look for gravestones of people they never met and try to envision what it was like before progressive Tax Eaters took ownership of it.
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Post by dave on Feb 25, 2013 8:26:17 GMT -5
JG, I shouldn't backtrack too much on the way I've felt about NY State for most of my life. It all depends upon where one is at in life. In the past, I often remarked that NY was ideal when I considered the scenery ... the mountains, the broad valley of central NY and the many other fine features. As well as its location ... which plays both positive and negative, to be honest.
One could easily say South Carolina is pretty but fairly boring in its interior. However, to me the ocean makes up for all of that. And the weather. In any event, SC is perfect for us at the moment and I'm enjoying it.
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Post by bobbbiez on Feb 25, 2013 22:12:47 GMT -5
I moved out of the Mohawk Valley just once in my life time and that was enough for me. I missed everything about my home-town. I learned the grass is not always greener on the other side and all areas has their problems that their citizens have to put up with. All my family members and friends who have moved out of this state moved out to either be nearer to their children and grandchildren or moved to other states because of a warmer climate. Not any of them moved out because of taxes or for any other reasons. One thing they all have in common, they all miss this area terribly and come back to visit quite often. If I owned a motel, instead of opening up my home to them, I'd make plenty of money all year long. ;D I live on a fairly normal retirement and I do live decency on it. Sure like everyone else I don't want to give out another cent for anything extra but I also know I would be losing it in other areas in other states one way or another. Just a one time move away showed me there is no place like home and there will never be another move away from home in my life time.
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