Moving West – Part 2

Want To Reach FI Sooner? Join more than 18,000 others and get new tips and strategies from Can I Retire Yet? every week. Subscription is free. Unsubscribe anytime:

We’ve arrived. We’ve left our empty nest, downsized, and relocated from the southeast to the southwest. For the first time in five months, we, our vehicles, and our possessions, are all in one place. It’s been a dramatic change in venue, and we’re excited to begin the next chapter of our lives in amazing new surroundings!

We moved into our new home about two weeks ago, before most of our things arrived from the east. We had brought the bare minimum of linens, dishes, kitchen utensils, appliances, and some folding furniture in our car, so we could make the place livable and “camp out” for the short-term.

We were glad to have a week or two to assess our new rental. There was some cleaning, and some critical repairs for the property management company to make. And we benefited from a few days and nights in our new abode to get a sense for how we would lay out the rooms and configure our life here, before everything arrived.

The POD

Then, last week, the POD I described in Part 1 arrived. The week before, it had been trucked out from Tennessee to the nearest PODS storage facility — in the big city about an hour away from here.

The company called to confirm our local delivery, and the POD showed up like clockwork the next morning. The friendly driver backed the truck in place, and expertly positioned the container exactly where we needed it. With some trepidation I snipped the zip ties, unlocked the door, and threw it open.

We had not seen our things for almost six weeks. Would they be OK? Was our decision to rely on our renter’s insurance and self-insuring the right one? How did our possessions survive the trip?

I sighed inwardly in relief. The contents looked almost precisely as we had left them in early October. I noted a few of the lighter boxes on top had shifted. And one of our restraining cords had broken, but there were others in place to back it up. On the surface, at least, there was no apparent damage.

Later that day our local movers, selected through the excellent HireAHelper web site again, arrived to help us unload. This crew was much like the one in Chattanooga. They showed up punctually, were prepared, worked hard, were careful with our things, and finished on time. The cost, at about $260 including tips, was well worth the savings to our joints and back muscles!

As we began opening boxes, removing the wrapping paper, and organizing things, we realized this had indeed been a successful move. There was no significant damage of any kind. Our things had arrived safely in their new location.

About the only bump in the entire process was locating the POD in our new, more urban neighborhood. You typically have less freedom to leave a large container in place when land is at a premium. If you are ever in a similar situation, be sure to investigate parking restrictions, fire lane easements, and such. And talk with neighbors beforehand, if possible, to head off any conflicts.

New Home

Our new home is a rare find. After evaluating nearly 40 properties, we can say with some confidence it was the best available place in the city for our needs. Given all the factors involved, we couldn’t be happier.

I’ll talk about the location — possibly the most important factor — in a minute, but first a little about the house itself….

We’re in the larger portion of a duplex (there is a small efficiency apartment rented separately on the other side). It’s two bedrooms and two full baths. In retrospect, those two full baths were a critical comfort factor for us and guests: We turned down some other potential properties that had only a single bath.

There is a kitchen, dining room, living room, and garage. Closets and storage space are adequate. The bedrooms are roomy enough to serve several functions. All told, this feels like the minimum space we need to allow for comfortable living, offices for the two of us, and occasional guests.

The house is nicely appointed with tile floors, Pella windows, and mostly new appliances. We have a small fenced yard with some lovely stonework and landscaping. There is room for a small garden, one of Caroline’s passions. Being in the southwest, the ongoing demands for yard work should be minor.

As mentioned, some cleaning and maintenance were required at the start, but nothing out of the ordinary. We aren’t perfectionists when it comes to housing, but we’ve yet to move into a rental property that was as clean or functional as we would like. Some elbow grease seems always to be required.

About the only compromise we had to make was parking for our beloved camper van. We’ve had to store it a few miles away for another $70/month. But it’s secure and reasonably convenient.

The cost for our new place? $1400/month, utilities included.

New Location

What makes our new home truly special for us is the location. For the first time in our lives, we are urban dwellers, and loving it.

Our house is located in a group of similarly-styled condos and standalone homes, so there is some immediate privacy and sense of community. It is remarkably quiet, both day and night. We visited the property a half-dozen times at all hours before signing the lease, to make sure of that. Our neighbors, most of whom we’ve met at this point, have been friendly and helpful.

Despite the privacy and quiet, we are a short stroll from the commercial district of the city, with access to dozens of excellent restaurants, theaters, performing arts, museums, coffee shops, banks, and shopping including housewares, clothing, outdoor gear, and groceries and fresh foods.

Inspired in part by my visionary and non-conformist blogging colleague Mr. Money Mustache, I’ve been very interested in reducing our dependence on the auto at this stage of our life. We have achieved that. Once we are settled into our routine, it will be quite feasible for us to do without the car for days or weeks at a time, if we choose. In addition to the environmental benefits, this gives us yet another “lever” over our expenses, should future economic scenarios require belt-tightening in our retirement.

And, thanks to the size and layout of our new town, despite our relatively urban location, we have easy access to the natural world that is our chief form of recreation — hiking, biking, climbing, and maybe even a little skiing.

For starters, we have incredible mountain views from our very own balcony. (The sunset above was captured on my cell phone just a few nights after we moved in.) There is also a paved bike and rail trail network that we can access just a few blocks away. A couple of miles in either direction, also within easy biking distance, are world-class trail systems for hiking and mountain biking.

For longer excursions, within a couple of hours by car, are hundreds of trails, summits, parks, monuments, ruins, and historic towns of interest. And within a day’s drive are all the wonders of the entire American southwest.

New Town

You might be wondering at this point, where we settled, after our long journey. What was our ideal retirement location?

Well, our new home town is one of the most unique and storied in the country. In fact, the history here long predates the transient political arrangements of the last 200+ years. It’s a fascinating area, and it will be some time before we fully grasp all the traditions and culture here.

But that history is really just icing on the cake for us. We chose our new town based on more personal factors. (Your criteria could well be different, so consider this a possible checklist, not a sales pitch.) When you get right down to it, the really key ingredients in our relocation decision were:

  • relative proximity to family and friends
  • four-season climate without extremes of heat or cold
  • mountain recreation and sports
  • sheer beauty: astounding scenery in all directions
  • new region of country for us to explore
  • resources for spiritual and personal development
  • diversity of quality dining and good food
  • proximity (1-hour) to major metropolitan area for healthcare and air travel

For all that, and despite this being the state capital, it is still a “small” town. We can ride bikes to all the essential services. If a car is required, it’s a 15-20 minute drive to cross town, max. This place seems to be big enough to have most everything you could want, but no bigger.

So, perhaps you’ve already guessed. We are enjoying our new life in Santa Fe.

Is this really the “perfect” city? Well, there are issues here, like anywhere else.

The area has a reputation for being expensive, a playground for the wealthy. If you need a trophy house in the foothills, better bring a big bank account. But I’ve already shown that you can rent a nice place in the city for a budget that many retirees can handle. You don’t have to be wealthy to live here.

My philosophy has always been that you are largely in control of your own financial destiny, through the lifestyle decisions you make. Nobody will force you to dine at 5-star restaurants, shop the galleries for fine art, or drop by the spa three times a week. However, by living alongside those who have the means for such luxuries, you can take advantage of the public services that kind of wealth can invite: awesome food, events, parks, and trails, for starters.

There is some bureaucracy and red tape here, no doubt. I’m told there are cultural tensions under the surface. And there are some obvious disparities in wealth. But I’m not sure it’s worse than any other urban area in the country.

In the end, Santa Fe, the “city different,” has an element that seems to have all but disappeared from cities this size. There is a raw, untrammeled, unpolished quality to this place that is just right for a guy, and a girl, who have spent much of their lives doing things differently than the mainstream.

There seem to be plenty of over-50 and active people here who feel the same way. Yet, believe it or not, Santa Fe still feels somewhat “undiscovered.” Perhaps it’s the zoning against tall buildings, or the crazy-quilt of narrow city streets — some still dirt, or the largely undeveloped hills rising above town, but this is a place that remains not fully tamed by modern civilization.

The mountains are beautiful, the air is clear, the trails are not crowded. Finally, we are home.

* * *

Retirement calculators: if you’re interested in the state of the art, check out the detailed discussion I had with Todd Tresidder in our second podcast at FinancialMentor: How to Engineer Your Wealth Using Retirement Calculators with Darrow Kirkpatrick. In addition to some broader musings about modeling the future, we discuss the creative possibilities, and the potential potholes, when using these powerful but sometimes deceptive calculation tools.

* * *

Valuable Resources

  • The Best Retirement Calculators can help you perform detailed retirement simulations including modeling withdrawal strategies, federal and state income taxes, healthcare expenses, and more. Can I Retire Yet? partners with two of the best.
  • Free Travel or Cash Back with credit card rewards and sign up bonuses.
  • Monitor Your Investment Portfolio
    • Sign up for a free Empower account to gain access to track your asset allocation, investment performance, individual account balances, net worth, cash flow, and investment expenses.
  • Our Books

* * *

[The founder of CanIRetireYet.com, Darrow Kirkpatrick relied on a modest lifestyle, high savings rate, and simple passive index investing to retire at age 50 from a career as a civil and software engineer. He has been quoted or published in The Wall Street Journal, MarketWatch, Kiplinger, The Huffington Post, Consumer Reports, and Money Magazine among others. His books include Retiring Sooner: How to Accelerate Your Financial Independence and Can I Retire Yet? How to Make the Biggest Financial Decision of the Rest of Your Life.]

* * *

Disclosure: Can I Retire Yet? has partnered with CardRatings for our coverage of credit card products. Can I Retire Yet? and CardRatings may receive a commission from card issuers. Other links on this site, like the Amazon, NewRetirement, Pralana, and Personal Capital links are also affiliate links. As an affiliate we earn from qualifying purchases. If you click on one of these links and buy from the affiliated company, then we receive some compensation. The income helps to keep this blog going. Affiliate links do not increase your cost, and we only use them for products or services that we're familiar with and that we feel may deliver value to you. By contrast, we have limited control over most of the display ads on this site. Though we do attempt to block objectionable content. Buyer beware.