Anyone want to move to VT?

[cdskier]

How many Vt plates do you see ANYWHERE???

Either VT is heaven on eart and residents move in and never leave. Or its residents are too poor to go anywhere?

Considering that my county in NJ has more people than the entire state of VT combined, I actually feel like I see quite a few VT plates outside of VT relatively speaking. I just saw one today on the NJ Turnpike about 20 minutes ago in fact.

 

[Zand]

Re: VT Plates

Take a look at the Hinsdale, NH Super Walmart on a weekend. There are a lot of green plates in that lot! Is subtle irony because VT towns often fight tooth and nail to keep big box stores out. Heck, people practically did cartwheels in the street when Home Depot left Bratt. I never understood cheer leading job loss.

Is VT the worse place to live or retire?

I suppose that depends. It's often easy to look at these situations from a purely financial point of view. But certainly, that's not 100% of the story. We spend a lot of weekends there and enjoy it quite a bit. We are physically close to NH, so when the time comes, retiring there would be plausible without much disruption to our routine.

I will say, the "close proximity to Boston and NY" is a bit of a stretch. It's quite a haul no matter how you slice it. Doable for a meeting here or there, but certainly not if you have to be in either city somewhat frequently.

This. Same thing 120 miles up the river. Go to Littleton Walmart on the weekend and it's 75% Vermont plates. St J fought tooth and nail to keep Walmart out 20 years ago because it would hurt local businesses. Spend a day in downtown Littleton and a day in downtown St J and tell me how that's working for them.

 

[56fish]

Considering that my county in NJ has more people than the entire state of VT combined, I actually feel like I see quite a few VT plates outside of VT relatively speaking. I just saw one today on the NJ Turnpike about 20 minutes ago in fact.

c jersey plates everyday, and, i’m 8 miles from can border

 

[cdskier]

c jersey plates everyday, and, i’m 8 miles from can border

I'm not surprised...no one wants to stay in NJ for too long :grin:

 

[VTKilarney]

Considering that my county in NJ has more people than the entire state of VT combined, I actually feel like I see quite a few VT plates outside of VT relatively speaking. I just saw one today on the NJ Turnpike about 20 minutes ago in fact.

Almost all of those people are transplanted flatlanders who are returning home for a couple of days.

I definitely agree that Vermonters aren’t travelers - unless you count Old Orchard Beach. We’ve had many people think that we are stupid for traveling to Europe and Asia. Florida is exotic to these people.

 

[deadheadskier]

When I lived on Cape Cod, I found a lot of the residents there didn't like to travel. I met more than a couple of older people who had never even crossed the bridge, which completely blew my mind

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[bdfreetuna]

When I lived on Cape Cod, I found a lot of the residents there didn't like to travel. I met more than a couple of older people who had never even crossed the bridge, which completely blew my mind

I would never move to the Cape just based on inconvenience factor of going anywhere else. Know some folks out there and it's kind of a low miles E46 M3 scene. Snow is horrible anyway.

 

[deadheadskier]

Yeah, I did two six month swings at 20&21. Summer seasons on the Cape, Winters in Stowe. It was fun at the time, but I agree on the inconvenience part. Not a place I could live full time.

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[Edd]

Yeah, I did two six month swings at 20&21. Summer seasons on the Cape, Winters in Stowe. It was fun at the time, but I agree on the inconvenience part. Not a place I could live full time.

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Nicely done on choosing seasonal towns. Wish I’d done something like that.

 

[abc]

I would never move to the Cape just based on inconvenience factor of going anywhere else. Know some folks out there and it's kind of a low miles E46 M3 scene. Snow is horrible anyway.

Surfing in VT is pretty horrible too.

 

[deadheadskier]

Nicely done on choosing seasonal towns. Wish I’d done something like that.

Only regret was one of the winters wasn't spent out west. Never had that out West ski bum season. Realistically it would have had to have been the first one of the two. The second season I was taking classes part time at UVM to get back into school.

My "band" strongly considered going out West the first season. I was way into playing the guitar at the time and the other five guys in the ski house were all musicians and we had a bit of a garage band. Come August of 95 with the Cape season about to wind down, we started talking about where to go for the winter. We were thinking out West, but realized it would be difficult to figure out how to get a house in Colorado. None of us had ever been to Stowe, but I had always read how great the skiing was. So, I suggested we all take a trip up there for a couple of days to see what it was all about. It was a beautiful couple of days in August. We ate some shrooms, hiked to the peak of Mansfield and fell in love.

Next day we met with a realtor and signed a six month lease on this 4 bedroom 70s A-frame. We paid in full for six months, $1200 each. Because we paid in full for the season, we all were a bunch of degenerates and only worked enough to pay to eat and party. We took jobs at the mountain to start the season for season passes. Quit after the holidays and worked various other jobs in town throughout the winter. Back then, there was no ski pass tracking technology, so once you got a pass you were good for the year. Counterfeit passes were big business in the local college dorms at that time for this very reason. Computer nerds would sell them for $100.

The house had a HUGE living room, 3 tiny bedrooms and 1 large bedroom/family room in the basement. That became our jam room.

Very shortly after arriving in town we started making connections. Word got out quickly that the A frame on Weeks Hill Road was the place to party. The drummer started dating this server at the Shed Brewery. She'd bring us employee rate kegs almost every night. It was $30 for a five gallon or $65 for a half keg. Literally every night of that winter there was a keg of some sort at the house. I drank so much Mountain Ale I couldn't stomach the stuff for over a decade after that season.

Total debauchery almost every night with people coming over to party and jam music. Drink until 3-4AM, wake up to go skiing around 9 to a half dozen random people passed out on the living room floor. Ski until mid afternoon and then go wash dishes, cook pizza or whatever at night. Rinse, wash, repeat all season long. Saint Patrick's day was kind of the culmination of the season. We hosted a big blowout. An invite poster was put up in the kitchen at the Shed. Someone decided to post it up in the actual bar. Something like 300 people showed up. Went through a dozen + kegs of Mountain Ale. There were all sorts of random dudes in their 40s and 50s who were on vacation and just showed up.

I still regularly see people in town when I visit who used to hang at the A Frame back in the day. Place was legendary and still talked about as the greatest ski bum house in town memory.

Wouldn't want to repeat it, but it was an incredible time. Could write a cheesy ski bum movie based upon that winter.

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[BenedictGomez]

I'm not surprised...no one wants to stay in NJ for too long :grin:

New Jersey is positively beautiful, it's the politicians who have destroyed the place and made it unlivable & intolerable.

 

[56fish]

New Jersey is positively beautiful, it's the politicians who have destroyed the place and made it unlivable & intolerable.

Variety of scenery .... w/o doubt. :beer:

 

[56fish]

Just out of stupidity, why is the overall consensus that Vermont is one of the worst states to live or work in? Based on what I've read, the overall tax burden (gas, sales, income, property, etc.) appear to be high, but not to far outside the range we see in New England. Take it with a grain of salt, but it looks like Maine and New York have a higher burden of overall taxes on its residence. As far as state financials, they are rank pretty low, but Massachusetts and New Jersey look to be even worst. Just wonder, since I am looking to move there for retirement.

Cost of living is what u make it. Bout the same in rural Pa where I was as rural Vt where I am.

 

[Jcb890]

My brother sent this link/info to me as well... $10,000 is a joke.

A better question might be - how much money would it take for you to move to VT?

 

[SkiFanE]

Cost of living is what u make it. Bout the same in rural Pa where I was as rural Vt where I am.

Maybe since I've lived my life in MA - just used to whatever I pay in taxes. Great schools and always easy to find jobs (for us at least). Tax burden is not going to factor into my retirement plans. Just not the most important thing. After a life of working, I want to live where I'm happy. Some people can't be happy knowing they aren't in the cheapest place they can be (lol) but that's not me. Hence - you will NEVER see me live in FL. Looking like ME - but also depends on where kids settle - I'm not stuck in an area if it means being far from kids (and hopefully grandkids).

 

[mister moose]

New Jersey is positively beautiful, it's the politicians who have destroyed the place and made it unlivable & intolerable.

Variety of scenery .... w/o doubt. :beer:

I've seen a little of New Jersey, from Cape May to Sandy Hook, from Atlantic City to Princeton, and from Trenton to Boonton. The hills of Sparta. Morristown, Caldwell, the Throughway and the Turnpike. I have to say though, when someone says New Jersey, I think of 2 things - smokestack Newark and 27 lane highways.

 

[abc]

Some people can't be happy knowing they aren't in the cheapest place they can be (lol) but that's not me. Hence - you will NEVER see me live in FL.

Acccording to that link, cost of living isn’t that low in Florida either. Maybe you’ll rethink Florida?

 

[abc]

Cost of living is what u make it. Bout the same in rural Pa where I was as rural Vt where I am.

Quite.

Live in a smaller house, the property tax will be less. Spend less, you need less income to live on — pay less income taxSo on and so forth...

On a different note, retirees have a distinctly different spending pattern than middle age working population. So I’m not sure the COL rankings are that applicable. (Though for this thread, it does).

While I won’t be moving to VT any time soon (or EVER, I’d move to Montana first), I see more behind that “hair-brain scheme”. Basically VT wants to be a tourist state, only they want you to stay longer. Much longer. Full time! So, no factory, no pollution. No business either. Leave your business out of state too, just LIVE in VT.

For many of the New York & New Jersey people who are considering a second home in VT, can’t you just “move” your primary address to VT for 2 year and pocket that $10k? Is there look back if your “circumstance change” and need to “move out” (your primary residence) after 2 years? In other words, do you have to pay back the $10k, or you get to keep it?

 

[cdskier]

New Jersey is positively beautiful, it's the politicians who have destroyed the place and made it unlivable & intolerable.

Variety of scenery .... w/o doubt. :beer:

I've seen a little of New Jersey, from Cape May to Sandy Hook, from Atlantic City to Princeton, and from Trenton to Boonton. The hills of Sparta. Morristown, Caldwell, the Throughway and the Turnpike. I have to say though, when someone says New Jersey, I think of 2 things - smokestack Newark and 27 lane highways.

I've lived in NJ most of my life and visited most areas of the state and the words "positively beautiful" would never pop into my head as one of the top 10 things to say about NJ. There's no denying there are many beautiful spots (even in the middle of a city like Paterson you have the Great Falls which are pretty stunning). Overall though, there are far too many large sections of the state that are way too congested, crowded, over-developed, etc to call the state as a whole "beautiful". Even just in the northeast I'm not sure if I would put NJ in the top 5 states in terms of beauty (VT, ME, NH, and NY are definitely ahead of it...haven't seen quite enough of MA, CT, or RI to know whether they would be ahead of NJ as well).