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You may want to be pretty selective on the "halfback" thing.
Yes, NC/TN will eliminate most of the snow, but it still has snow, and especially in middle and west TN, there is a big severe weather risk. In NC, you are trading cold/grey/snowy MI winters for brutally hot summers and, along the coast, hurricane potential.
Appalachia is the sweet spot weatherwise. I live in east TN at about 1600'. 90F is fairly rare in the summer. Below 20F is rare in the winter. Severe weather risk is minimal. We get more snow in the winter than middle TN or middle NC, but it usually melts in a few days at the most.
I used to live in Indianapolis. The weather here is actually not that much warmer than IN in the winter - it's probably hotter in Indy in the summer. The big difference is this time of year when we could have glorious 60 degree sunny days that you didn't get up north for another month or two.
This is secondhand info but I live on a road with several snowbirds, and I think it depends on your age, health, and how well-off you are.
My snowbird neighbors are all middle-class, middle income retirees who they have fairly modest homes both places. That worked for them very well in the past, but now that they are in their very early 80's, they are all considering selling possibly both homes very soon and moving to one place, though not necessarily south. (A couple are considering moving closer to relatives here in Wisconsin.)
The point is that if one wants to do it and is able to do it, that might be just fine now -- but I think you should consider how much you want to deal with selling and moving when you are 80, if you live that long.
Great advice already but really — to Snowbird or relocate is a very serious decision that only the two of you can make.
I retired south of the Mason-Dixon from the OH/PA border because I am a big outdoor person with horses and I knew my arthritis would never tolerate the “cold to the bone winters in Ohio & PA.
You have to figure out where your health issues will survive the best, long term and can you mentally handle pulling up roots and planting yourself somewhere where you don’t know a soul. That’s just for starters
My wife and I are retiring in a month
We live in northern Michigan. Please, anyone with an opinion. Should we snowbird or relocate? Thanks. Family is spreadout.
How about friends? Do you have any connections to your community? Do you like the weather or any activities in the area you currently live (general or seasonal)? If you totally dislike your current location and have few reasons to stay a permanent move may make sense otherwise snowboarding offers the best of both worlds.
I like Florida but also enjoy New England. I down sized in my home state and purchased a small condo in Florida. Flights are cheap so it allows me to regularly fly back and forth.
As far as how long to “vacation” in winter, we rented several times in Las Vegas for two months (January and February). That was just right for us. One year we drove to Galveston for a cruise, then got in the car afterwards and drove to Destin, FL and rented a condo for two weeks. That was nice, too, as it was two totally different experiences.
My father was a snowbird for 30 years. He said the most economical method is to buy a fifth-wheel trailer. As a trailer they are cheap. Put your money into a pickup truck to pull it. Pickups have much better warranties. And after you have put 100,000 miles on a pickup you can trade it in and get a new one.
Motorhomes / RVs rattle apart and become nightmares. No warranty, and each part is unique / handyman specials. We have a motorhome parked in our driveway, up on blocks. At one time we had five children living at home, we bought this motorhome and did a few road trips. It is extremely difficult to locate anyone willing to do work on a motorhome.
In the middle of IA there are a couple places where you will see a 100-acre parking lot filled with old motorhomes [I do not recall the name of these places]. Their entire business model is to re-build those suckers.
The best deal on a motorhome is to find an old Greyhound bus that has been customized. Because the undercarriage is all truck. You can pull into any truck stop in the nation, and every diesel mechanic can instantly work on it. The tires are the same as 18-wheel trucks use. The powertrain, shocks, linkages are the same, every thing is compatible with 18-wheel trucks.
Greyhounds can do 500,000 miles and it is like just a thin layer of dust. Hard miles like that do not destroy them. They are built like 18-wheel trucks.
I have never had the luxury to snowbird, but I can definitely see the appeal of being able to migrate south in the winter and north in the summer.
I think it all comes down to, how bothered would you be living in two locations. If you make both "homey", I don't see why snowbirding would be a problem. It must have a lot going for it.
I do wonder all of the complexities involved from maintaining two dwellings to tax implications.
If you love your current location and just want winter relief, then I would say "snowbird". If you are not crazy about your current location, that would indicate you might be better off moving fully.
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