vanuel said:
I have always liked living in NC, but the quality of life here is not what it once was, IMO. If I was single and didn't have work attachments here, I would probably move out west to somewhere a lot more rural and more in line with my political leanings. I am not fond of the idea of having to live in a blue state and I think that is where we are headed. My wife and I have briefly talked about the possibility of not being here at some point which seemed unthinkable 10 years ago. At one point I was thinking of moving to the coast, but that's getting to be as crowded as it is here.
I remember one of the first houses I built was for a guy from CA who was poor but he owned 1/2-1 acre land in the right place and he got something like $2M dollars for it. He built a really nice house back then of cedar siding and over 2400 sq. ft. for $189,000 and he plenty of cash left over. The same happens with many people who have moved here from elsewhere. They sell and double the size of the house they sold and have many thousands leftover to spend.
I've mostly lived in rural NC for 64 years and in the late 70's I knew everyone that lived within 3-4-5 miles. I'm still fairly rural but not so much. We've been drowned. I own some land that my 6th Great-granddad owned in the mid-1700's...King George's former land; you know, 500 acres, a mule, a cow, a goat, 5 chickens and a dog. I own some land my 6th G-grandma owned when her husband died...she had 2 kids after he died. I own some my granddad purchased in the early 1900's and some he inherited and some a GGG and GG granddad owned in the mid and late 1800's. When I was young it was worth around $1000/acre, in the late 1980's some was worth $3000-4000/acre and now some are trying to throw $75,000/acre at some and even more at some other.
Politics it was more even keel back in the day....not so much nutty left or nutty right. That's how I saw it anyway, maybe I was blind? Of the last 32 terms of the NC governors office, 28 terms were Democrats; I remember Terry Sanford but I don't remember Luther Hodges.
The weather has changed! If you've grown a garden since the 50's or 60's or watched pond and ocean waters....you KNOW it has changed!!! I joke with friends that I'm going to Vermont or Maine and buy me some rural land and relax.....to get away from the great number of Yanks. I expect the rural mountains to be like us soon and I know many who have moved there. Screw the beach from May thru Sept.; the other months I can take. I know a lot of people who have bought land in Montana and South Dakota too. They invite me to go hunting or fishing but I have not gone yet.