This was published several months ago inside the Millionaire Money Mentors forums (so it uses language like “are moving,” but by now, it’s actually “have moved”). I’m running it now as a mini-retirement update as well as to get ESI Money readers up to speed.
This post is probably going to surprise a lot of people, though for me, it’s been a long time coming.
Let me give you the summary right now in case you don’t want to read a very, very long post:
Our kids are moving to the Raleigh, North Carolina area and we are moving to live close to them. We both want to be near each other and have decided that this is the area, climate, and sort of place where we all want to live and can be there for a long time.
Of course, there’s much more to the story and this post will get everyone up to speed.
With that said, let’s begin our journey by going back a couple of years.
THE VILLAGES
Two years ago we lived in Colorado Springs near our daughter and son-in-law. Our son lived in Denver.
Our daughter told us that they had a couple of years left in Colorado Springs, but after that point they were going to move somewhere else to experience a new area of the country, see some new things and states, and be able to take part in new activities/experiences.
This was roughly the same time we were spending our first vacation trip in The Villages renting from a friend. Yep, this was all happening simultaneously. Who says retirement is boring? LOL!
After our first visit to The Villages in January-March 2022, we loved it and decided that we would come back the next year. My dad loved it so much that he bought a place in May 2022!
We got back to Colorado Springs and continued having conversations about what our future living arrangements might be.
We decided that we would rent in The Villages unless something opened up that was near a town square. And at that point, it looked like the soonest a new house near a square would be available was going to be two or three years out.
They were just starting to build the fourth town square (called Eastport) in the southern part of The Villages. So homes would become available after that and that’s when we would probably consider buying a house.
Little did we know that they were opening up a new piece of ground called the Village of Richmond — and it was just south of the Brownwood town square. And when I say it was just south, I mean it is literally 1,200 steps if you’re walking from Richmond to the Brownwood town square. So very, very close.
This area had not previously been developed even though everything around it had. No one even knew it was going to be developed until one day they decided to start building it out!
And as you might imagine, it was very popular. There was a LOT of interest in Richmond. There were many people trying to get in.
In fact, once we got down here, we found out that some of the homes had 30 or 40 people on waiting lists when the homes went up for sale!
With this new turn of events, we talked about the possibility of buying a house in Richmond for several reasons:
- We wouldn’t have to pay $20,000 a year for rentals.
- We wouldn’t have to stay in somebody else’s place — we could stay in our own!
- We could come down more often if we wanted to to see my dad or experience The Villages.
- We could live part-time in The Villages and part-time in Colorado.
The last point sounds like a dream because if you add those two climates together, and you spend certain times of the year in one place and certain times in the other place, you have pretty much good weather all year round!
BUYING IN THE VILLAGES
So that’s what we decided to do. We didn’t know if we would get a place because it was so competitive, but we were willing to leave that up to chance. We decided that if a place came up that we were interested in, we would try to get it.
Our plan was to buy it, have two homes, and live in both of them. We worked with our realtor on the lots as well as house designs we liked.
Once we compared the various combinations of land and homes we liked, there were about 15 places that we felt were acceptable out of roughly a few 100 spots coming up for sale. From there we waited until something we liked became available.
It wasn’t long before two homes on our list came up the same day. We found out they were to be released the next day. The night before release our realtor went to both homes and showed them to us via Face Time.
It also just so happened that both of the homes were facing the recreation center and had a park behind each lanai. In other words, these were premium lots with great views/locations.
The homes were two homes away from each other and very similar in design. However, there was one that my wife preferred and we decided that we would try for that one.
We were completely open to whatever happened. If we got the house, we got it. If we didn’t, we would just go down and rent. No problem either way!
As you may have read in my post about buying in The Villages, we actually ended up getting the home on the first try, which is highly unusual in The Villages, especially in a village that’s in high in demand.
We’ve talked to many people who have tried multiple times to get homes within Richmond and they failed. So they ended up buying somewhere else.
And we got the first place the first time we tried — so we felt it was kind of meant to be. We agreed to go ahead with the purchase.
The house was around $450,000, which we had in cash since we had sold our rental properties and hadn’t deployed all the capital.
As of November 2022 we owned two homes. We were also able to get out of our rental unit as we rented from a company that works well with The Villages. They were able to find another renter to take our place (which was pretty easy because January through April down here is peak rental season.)
MOVING TO FLORIDA
Since we were able to get out of our rental agreement, and just come down to our own house, that’s what we did! We drove down to Florida in December 2022.
We didn’t bring much with us for a couple reasons.
First of all, they tell you when you move to The Villages not to bring your furniture because it won’t fit. Plus it will look like it’s furniture from up north — so it won’t be “Florida furniture.”
If you do bring your furniture, it’s likely you’ll end up paying to move it down only to then send it to a secondhand store for sale — because you’ll eventually hate it and get something else. The secondhand stores down here are filled with “up north furniture.”
And of course the second reason we didn’t bring our furniture was because we were going to keep the house in Colorado.
SELLING IN COLORADO
As we continued talking with our kids about what their future might be, a plan started to develop. It looked like they would be willing and able to move to Florida to live within about an hour from us. This would necessitate some career changes for my daughter and son-in-law but they were willing to accept that for a few years.
So it looked like we would have them close by (in Florida) when they decided they were done with Colorado. The puzzle pieces started fitting into place.
Couple this with the fact that once we got to Florida, we realized having two homes is a real pain in the rear: there are management issues, there are extra costs (you’re basically paying for one home you’re not in all year, not to mention the lost opportunity costs), there’s a lot of worry, there’s a lot of coordination — there’s a lot of everything.
These were made worse by the fact that the two homes were so far apart — it amplified all the negatives. It’s a three-day journey from Colorado to Florida by car (since we have a cat, air travel is not a great option).
So in early 2023, with the prospect of our kids coming down to Florida and living for a while as well as not wanting to manage two homes so far apart, we decided to make Florida our permanent residence and sell our Colorado home. Besides, our kids were done with Colorado anyway, so why hang on there?
In April of 2023 my wife went back to Colorado. She and the kids got the house ready for sale. It sold within a few days and closed a couple of weeks after that.
We were out of Colorado and in Florida full time. All was going according to plan. Well, you know what they say about the best laid plans, right? Hahaha.
A CHANGE OF PLANS
At that point, we were living in Florida.
And our kids were going to come down here. They had put out some feelers for jobs and it looked promising. But over the course of the next few months, those opportunities dried up one by one.
We kept trying to help them and it just seemed like nothing was coming to fruition. After exhausting every possibility, they decided that they were not going to come to Florida. That was disappointing for everyone because we had lived close and had spent significant time together when we lived in Colorado Springs. It was a very nice family environment.
We wanted to live near them and they wanted to live near us but it looked like that was not going to happen since their opportunities in Florida had dried up.
But instead of giving up, we started having some family conversations — beginning with where we all wanted to live.
This is also a good spot to talk about our thoughts on Florida and The Villages.
By the late summer/early fall of 2023, my wife and I had two different views of our move.
To her, it was a home run. She loved everything — the weather, the house, The Villages, the friends, the EVERYTHING!
I had a different opinion.
While I liked The Villages enough, I preferred Colorado (and would have moved back if the kids were staying.) The main things I didn’t like as much about the new place were:
- The weather — I knew it was going to be hot, but I didn’t know it would be so hot for so long. As someone here told us, there are three seasons in Florida: summer, hot summer, and face of the sun summer! Plus I missed the seasons. Christmas just isn’t the same when it’s 80 degrees out.
- The activities and services — Obviously The Villages is the king of recreational activities, but it lacks in other activities/offerings. The churches, gyms, restaurants, and more are “fine” but are sub-par IMO. And don’t get me started on the doctors down here. We had great ancillary doctors (dentist, eye doctor, dermatologist) but the primary care and specialists were way below standard in my experience.
- The house — It was fine when it was just us two, but quickly got crowded whenever we had guests. And truth be told, I don’t want to live in a place that’s just “fine” anyway. I could use a bit more space than we had.
Given these as well as 1) we had agreed that if we didn’t like it here we could always move and 2) our kids were not coming to live near us, even my wife agreed that we should begin looking for a new area.
FINDING A NEW PLACE
We began the process by looking at the various “best places to live” lists. Interestingly, Colorado Springs was on many of the lists, but that was still a no-go for the kids and my wife.
We discussed the various elements that go into picking a place to live: what part of the country it’s in, what it has to offer, what it’s like on a day-to-day basis, what opportunities it has so and so forth. Then we had to determine what factors were the most important to us.
We did a ton of online research, learning as much as possible about various “best places.” We also talked to friends and relatives as well as people in The Villages who had lived in some of our contenders.
Ultimately, a front runner emerged: Raleigh, North Carolina (more specifically, the entire Triangle area of NC.)
For those of you who don’t know, the short version is that in the Raleigh area, there are three major cities: Raleigh, Durham and Chapel Hill. If you draw a line from one to the next to the next and back again to the beginning, you get a triangle and that area is called the Triangle region of North Carolina.
And if you look up best places to live in America, you’ll see that area scores very highly for a number of reasons: the economy, health care, things to do, cost of living, weather, and so forth. As such, this area looked pretty promising.
CHECKING OUT RALEIGH
Once we decided Raleigh was a potential fit, my wife and I made an exploratory drive up there in September of 2023, just to see if we even liked it.
We looked around the entire place for three days. We LOVED it and came back with a feeling that this could be a place we could live.
We liked it for different reasons:
- It had a great climate (still a warmer climate that my wife liked and a more moderate climate than Florida that I liked.)
- It had a lot of activities/events/stores/etc. that The Villages doesn’t have simply because of size.
- It had very good health care.
Obviously it was an older community than the Villages — it wasn’t as nice and new.
It didn’t have all the recreational amenities, but it had enough activities — especially the things we wanted to do — that would keep us more than busy.
And it had some improvements versus The Villages! For example, the gym in Raleigh is a Lifetime Fitness versus the Genesis gym that I have in Florida. Night and day difference.
After that visit, Raleigh became a possibility and we started investigating it more deeply. We did even more research on the area, talked to people, and watched YouTube videos — getting all the information that we could.
You wouldn’t believe the number of people that we ran into that had either lived in the area, had a relative that lived in the area, had their son or daughter or someone that knew the area, or went to school at Duke or North Carolina. We got a ton of information about it.
In November 2023 when our kids were down here visiting for the Christmas season, I took them up there and they got to see it for the first time. They loved it immediately. Now the die was cast — we were moving there.
DIVING DEEPER
This is when we really got serious and started focusing on three towns west of Raleigh in the heart of the Triangle: Cary, Apex, and Morrisville.
That said, Cary was our favorite. It’s a quaint little town. I say little but it’s about the size of The Villages — about 180,000 people. And it still has a lot of southern charm. (FWIW, many locals say Cary stands for Containment Area for Relocated Yankees.) Hahaha.
Cary has had some growing pains because it’s a very popular area, but it offers a lot of things that we were looking for — and the kids absolutely loved it.
By the way, this was during the time where interest rates had skyrocketed. And because of that, housing inventory dried up. So the choices we had were limited.
We started looking for homes on the web, then made a couple of visits up there — one in February 2024 and my wife went up a little bit later after that (I was not able to go due to my back issues.)
Between all the trips we went into over 50 homes to get a good feel for the market. Plus we reviewed hundreds (probably thousands) of homes online — so we knew what things cost and what the home choices were. We knew the areas well.
FINDING A HOME
We kept doing our research and we narrowed down where we wanted to live within the Triangle, and in particular within Cary. That was our number one criteria in a new home — a good location.
After location we had some criteria that my wife and I went back and forth on. She wanted a smaller house while I was willing to accept almost any size as long as it was in a good location.
I certainly wanted a bigger house than what we had in Florida. She was willing to go up but didn’t want to go too far up in size. But we also had to consider the market and what size of homes were for sale in the locations we preferred.
We ended up agreeing to a broad range on house size — the new house would be bigger than our house in Florida (1,900 square feet) but smaller than our house in Colorado (3,700 square feet.) I know, that’s a big difference.
But those are the parameters that we had (plus many other wants of course — like a screened in porch, first floor master, and so on). We sort of targeted the 2,500 square foot range as our sweet spot. But unfortunately, there aren’t many 2,500 square feet homes in the sections of Cary where we wanted to live.
The areas where we wanted to live were more established. They had homes that were built in the 90s or the early 2000s. And they were bigger, family homes that were similar to what we had in Colorado Springs.
We looked and looked and looked some more and it got down to a couple distinct options. We could have the house we wanted at the size we wanted (and probably a newer house), if we wanted to live in a location that wasn’t our preferred choice.
Or we could have more of a house like we had in Colorado, but it would be in the heart of where we wanted to live. It would have easy commutes to almost everything. It would be everything that we wanted from a location standpoint, though the house would be older (20 to 30 years old) and it would be much larger than what my wife wanted.
We got close to making a couple offers, but didn’t do so for a couple months. We finally made an offer on a place that had an ideal location in May. But the seller was not willing to negotiate on price and it was overpriced even by our standards. So we moved on.
A couple weeks later we were able to find a (even better) place that we liked in our ideal location. We put an offer down quickly, it was accepted, and we proceeded forward with the sale.
BUYING THE HOUSE
As we entered the buying process we dealt with a new creature (which we were aware of but had yet to face) — the North Carolina due diligence fee.
You can search and read about it separately — and how terrible it is for buyers and great for sellers — but it’s a non-refundable fee that buyers put down that they cannot get out of. If you walk away from the house after you put an offer down and it’s been accepted, you cannot claim that fee back (yes, it’s way different than earnest money.)
It’s viewed as a fee that’s paid to the seller for taking the house off the market for a given period of time. This is so the buyer can do due diligence to see if anything’s terribly wrong with the property.
And because home sales are so competitive in Raleigh (it’s one of the top places to live in based on several lists and has 80 net people moving there every day), there’s lots of demand for housing and not a lot of supply. Given these conditions, the due diligence fee currently averages about 1% of purchase price. When you’re buying a house that’s several hundred thousand, closing in on a million dollars, that’s in the ballpark of $10,000.
And that is non-refundable for any reason unless there’s some sort of fraud by the seller (which is nearly impossible to prove.) BTW, if you proceed with the purchase the due diligence fee does count towards the price.
The takeaway is you need to be really sure you like a property because if you want to have the seller do something after the offer, they can tell you to pound sand. Then they take the money and just put the home back on the market, if that’s what they choose to do.
It’s great to be a seller in North Carolina!
In the end, we may have paid more than we needed to, but we wanted to secure the property and make sure there was no other competition. Plus, what’s ten thousand here and ten thousand there? Hahaha.
The inspections turned out to suggest relatively minor changes. Thankfully, the seller was open to making some repairs and he either fixed some things himself, had them fixed, or gave us a little bit of a concession on price. He was very generous from that standpoint because he didn’t need to be.
We closed on the house on July 17, 2024. My wife was up there for the closing. I was not as my back issues did not allow me to travel.
She spent the next few days with the kids (who had moved into a rental there a month or two earlier) trying to get things settled. She hired a painter to re-do the interiors and met with flooring people to expand and re-stain the wood floors.
So that’s the story of how we left Colorado, got to Florida, and are now moving to North Carolina, including the whys and how the whole thing transpired.
Retirement sure can be a roller coaster ride! Wish us luck!
BRIEF UPDATES
A few updates since I posted this:
- We ended up with a 3,500 square foot house. The design makes it feel smaller though, so we both “won.”
- We moved in the third week in August after having the entire inside painted, new wood floors extended into the kitchen, and the wood floors sanded and stained to a lighter color.
- We’ve also completed several other upgrades and are working on more. This will be a long project.
- We sold our house in The Villages in September. It sold in a few days at $150k more than we bought it for less than two years ago (after all fees and selling costs.)
- Since moving to NC we have seen our daughter and son-in-law an average of twice a week — so we’ve certainly met that objective.
- The fall here has been amazing. The temperatures have been AWESOME! Tonight we host our first Halloween event and will enjoy handing out candy to kids!
- If you follow me on Instagram, you already know much of this information and have seen the pictures. There are many more to come!
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