TiedinHistory
TiedinHistory t1_ivz2ub0 wrote
Reply to Moving to NH by Loose-Connection-935
Prep for the downvotes - I do recommend searching the forum history, especially in the last two years and change NH has become a very popular place to move to. The housing market, much as it is everywhere but maybe even more here, is very difficult. Lots of demand with money from South (like Mass, CT, etc.) combined with a lot of attractive factors within the state (the fabled close to everything element). I saw with other posts you're looking at VT too so I am guessing it's more of a location thing as opposed to political thing, so I'll try and angle it that way. This is all my opinion
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Best Things
- The "close to everything" element is quite real. Just taking from South-Central NH (where most folks live), you're within probably 1.5-2 hours of the beach, mountains, hiking, and a major U.S. city. I'd argue this also extends to amenities - for the most part you'll have reasonable "by car" access to most things and commodities you may want.
- Similarly, depending on what you want - provided you have money - you can get the living experience you want. Like, in NH there's absolutely places with real acreage in a woodsy area that is within 10-20 minutes of retail and restaurants - many at that.
- The seasons - it's a cliche but a real one that you do get some elements of all four seasons here. I can't say I love the extremes at all (more on this later) but if you are a person who likes the outdoors you get a ton of variability here.
- The people are generally aight. Like, the most combative NH residents I've met are here and you can block them easy enough. People aren't gonna drown you in niceness and it'll vary by area but it's pretty nice if you generally want to be left alone. Obviously big YMMV there.
Challenges
- Costs. It's expensive and there's not exactly many shortcuts. I mentioned the housing market before and it's very tough to find a good property or rental in a good area as is, but even when it's not living frugally here is very tough. I'd argue state wages generally haven't kept up with cost of living and there's a reason a lot of people do an absolute trash commute to make it work. If your range is 850-900k this may not be nearly as much of an issue for you. The market is softening a bit too.
- The seasons - the issue with four seasons is that we're not really built for heat IMO as an overall area. It can be downright unpleasant for weeks on end and the infrastructure/relief will likely fall on you to account for. Likewise, winter can be a massive pain. We prep well for it up here but if you don't like cold/snow it sucks and even if you do, you have to spend to mitigate it or work to mitigate it.
- You need a car...maybe two for two people. Even in a city. Just not much in terms of public transport
- Generally, I think culture is lacking. Like, NH has some good live performance venues and minor league sports but most of the time the best musicians, performers, etc. will skip over NH for Mass/VT/ME - especially if it's not the summer. This bothers some more than others but it's a grind if that's part of what makes life worth it.
- Utilities - eh. Electric is expensive, heat's expensive, raw materials are expensive, choices suck, cable sucks, etc.
- Big lack of diversity. Not just racial but also experience based, education based, etc. That's a subjective con but I think we're worse off for it.
In terms of places to live, if you're honestly looking 800k-900k the state is your oyster and probably depends, in my view, on what you want to do in the state. Like at that price I think you can live anywhere in the state, but it you're gonna get a lot more house/land for your money the farther north and farther west you go - but if the importance is access to something, it may be worth taking less to get closer. If I were doing this I'd be looking in adjacent towns to the big population centers and going out from there, but if you don't care about being close to a Portsmouth or Manchester, you'll get a ton more landwise not doing that and relying on the shops/stores in smaller localities - except the Lakes/Resort areas, that's a different monster.
TiedinHistory t1_iv2xpdi wrote
Reply to comment by Apprehensive-Ad6466 in Honest car dealerships in NH? by deadpeasant2
I’ll echo Grappone. The other dealers I went to ranged from pretty good to disasters but the only iffy parts of Grappone were the trade in value for me and add on run through and neither were that bad. I’d go back.
TiedinHistory t1_iy8w2qx wrote
Reply to getting to Boston by FarStudy3278
To sort of just recap what others have said
Really, all of this is very dependent on the nature of your meeting, flexibility requirement for time, and overall tolerance. There's no perfect answer - my personal preference for going into Boston is #2 but any of those are defensible depending on the situation. Plan it out for sure.