I live in Temple, three hours south of DFW and one hour north of Austin. It’s still hot here, but hurricanes don’t cause any damage this far from the coast. It is hot from June thru September...and it gets into the triple digits.

Sounds like you want central Texas, my advise is to find a city and move one county over...property taxes make up for the lack of income tax....the cost of living here is the same as to where we lived in eastern NC.

We could live in the next county over and pay less taxes, but we wanted the good school district for our kid. If he was not in the equation Gatesville would fit our needs.

New Braunfels or Fredericksburg in the Hill country would be good choices. McAllen if you’re looking for a city type atmosphere.

quote:

Originally posted by CQB60:
New Braunfels or Fredericksburg in the Hill country would be good choices.

Along these lines would be good, Kerrville area, etc.

Yes, it's going to get hot but it normally isn't as humid as it will be along the coast. Will get cold at points during the winter with occasional ice and snow but shouldn't be anything overly major or for an extended time.

Their property taxes are pretty large also, as they use them to make up for having no income tax.

https://arizonarealestatenoteb...20are%20in%20Arizona.

TEXAS property taxes are huge, roughly 3 times what they are in Arizona. Texas doesn’t have an income tax so it hits property taxes real hard.

The conclusion is to be sure and include property taxes when comparing home ownership costs in different states.

Not a fan of winter at all either, but we had another of our occasional widespread power outages recently. We were VERY lucky with the temperatures outside and the speed of the crews getting the power back on.

So, if the power goes out, how many ways can you heat your home?
On the other hand, I only know of air conditioning for significant cooling - and you need juice for that.

Now I have heard Texas has its own power grid so maybe outages aren't a big deal.

If you can stand the shock of wild open spaces after living in the "Bay area", I'd recommend the Lubbock, Tx area.

It does snow from time to time (and when it does the people do not how to drive in it) but doesn't last but few days and then is gone.

The weather is not bad year around compared to other areas of the country. The humidity is usually on the low side. It does get cold in the winter but usually doesn't last. It will get hot in the summer. Last summer we had several days of 100+ but that is unusual. The average temperature this time year is in the mid-50's.

We do have tornadoes in the area but so does the rest of the State.

The crime rate in the area is low compared to the rest of the state.

The cost of living low compared to CA and low compared to other parts of TX.

Lubbock is blessed when it comes to healthcare. There are 3 major hospitals. It has the only major trauma between center Dallas and Phoenix. Lubbock is the medical center for the area with any medical specialist that your would need.

There 3 large grocery chains with stores in Lubbock plus Walmart so you can find what you almost on every corner.

There are also 2 indoor shooting ranges and a couple of outdoor ranges. We shoot IDPA a couple times a month a one of the indoor ranges.

I don't in Lubbock but i live a couple of counties over in smaller rural town. Living in the area in great and the people here are truly hard to beat. You could not find a better to live.

As already pointed out, you're not going to get every thing on your list, so you should prioritize the list. If number on is no heat, you're SOL. In the middle of summer, everywhere in Texas will be hot, and humidity is not relegated to the coast areas. I honestly think this heat deal is overblown. Everything is AC'd so for two months you just don't plan outdoor activities from about 12 noon to 6 pm.

I didn't see it mentioned, but East Texas might be an option. Say Tyler. About 100,000 people and COL is reasonable. Pretty good access to medical care and other amenities a mid sized city will offer. A bit different terrain then most other parts of the state, with some hills and a lot of pine forests. No hurricane worries, but sometimes a big hurricane in the Gulf will bring a lot of rain and sometimes spin of tornados. That's a rarity though.

Good luck.

The Hill Country north of San Antonio.

quote:

I don't in Lubbock but i live a couple of counties over in smaller rural town. Living in the area in great and the people here are truly hard to beat. You could not find a better to live

^^^^^^^^^^
Buddy Holly said he liked Lubbock Texas in his rear view mirror. Does have Texas Tech.

I've lived in TX all of my 35 years.
Majority in the Houston area, a couple years in Austin & 5-12 grade in the ETX Beaumont area.

We currently live in N Houston, Spring, just outside Harris County. Close enough to be able to get down into Houston, but far enough to not deal with it daily. We're close enough to the coast to get hurricanes, but we're about 75 miles inland, so even Harvey & Ike weren't terrible (we were lucky with Harvey that our neighborhood is situated on higher ground).

I've lived further north of Houston in Conroe (next larger city north of Spring) and just south of Huntsville.
Conroe is a lot like where we are now, but a bit less 'city', though it is growing pretty rapidly. My wife's brother just bought a house a bit north of there, Willis, and it's a bit further rural.
In college, I lived just south of Huntsville, in a very tiny town (no grocery store even), but was close enough to Huntsville & Willis to get to grocery & other necessities.

Lived in Austin for 2 years right after high school. Love the town, but it's probably the worst traffic I've ever experienced. Constant stoppage, daily, during rush hour; at least in Houston traffic still manages to flow, even if slowly.

My dad lives just south of Bryan/College Station. Very quiet little town, again with nothing but a post office. So, they drive up to Bryan, or south to Navasota for everything; both are only about a 10-15min drive, no worse that I have to do for anything beyond groceries or WalMart.

If I were retiring & moving, it would be to the hill country west of Austin. We had a customer in Horseshoe Bay, which IIRC is about 30 minutes from S Austin & we liked that area. Until then, we'll stick it out in Houston.

quote:

Originally posted by CQB60:
McAllen if you’re looking for a city type atmosphere.

NO!!! I know from McAllen, it varies from boring to gang-ridden crap hole. I strongly recommend you stay off of the border.

If medical is an issue (and it makes sense that it would be), then your best bet may be to look in the Hill Country (Wimberly to San Angelo up to Brownwood and back again). There's been a lot of developments in terms of hospital availability as the place has gotten a steady influx of retirees.

As for property taxes, just about every county has theirs listed on their website. Failing that, some of the real estate websites should have them. Do the math; you may find they really aren't that high once you're outside of the larger metropolitan areas (to include Austin, which traffic does indeed suck dead dog weenie).

You might consider Tyler and surrounding area. It has several Level 1 trauma centers, a couple of lakes with relatively cheap land prices, and good variety in the retail landscape. I don't live there (but may reconsider after retiring) but discovered it when my son went to UT - Tyler there.

quote:

Originally posted by TXJIM:
#2 and #3 do not exist in Texas, sorry. It gets stupid hot for several months in any part of Texas. We have floods, hail, tornados and hurricanes....and Tuesday ain’t much better

this is one of the best lines of the decade

North Mississippi it's better than ppl want to say.
I'd love to be near Hernando, Batesville.
These areas sound like what the OP is looking for.

I don't know much about Texas, but we looked at the hill country and the huge property taxes turned us off to it. I do have a friend who lives in Texas and says that Alpine is the place to go for weather. Don't know anything other than that about the city. Good luck.

FYI--Lots and lots of people are moving to no income tax states (with the exception of South Dakota and Wyoming). If you are soon to retire, you might want to look for a state with an income tax (after all, you won't be making "income") with lower property taxes.

You currently live near a world-class city. A criterion to consider is, how often do you go into San Francisco? How important is it to you to be within reasonable proximity of big city stuff, such as:

a major airport

concerts & professional sporting events

museums, conventions, & festivals

international foods - grocers & restaurants

craft breweries & distilleries, wine venues

a variety of gun stores & ranges

potential for a SF meet-up

Lubbock and Tyler-Longview are good suggestions if you're willing to deal w/ harsher winters, but both rank low on accessibility to big-city stuff. E.g., you won't find a decent Chinatown at either.

I concur w/ a lot of other suggestions thus far. First place I'd look is somewhere outside of San Antonio, such as: New Braunfels, Boerne, Spring Branch, & Seguin.

Next I'd consider Temple-Belton. I agree w/ P250UA5; Bryan-College Station is a worth a look or somewhere between BCS and Houston or between Conroe and Huntsville. You can get 10+ acres for a reasonable price in a semi-rural town off a major highway, yet still be within an hour drive to Houston for big-city stuff. The closer you are to the Gulf Coast though, the more humid it'll be.

Horseshoe Bay would be a nice place to retire. It's practically a resort town. A lot of rich people have vacation homes there. It's a little far from a big city (Austin & San Antonio) if that's important to you.

quote:

Originally posted by henkelphoto:
I don't know much about Texas, but we looked at the hill country and the huge property taxes turned us off to it. I do have a friend who lives in Texas and says that Alpine is the place to go for weather. Don't know anything other than that about the city. Good luck.

Alpine is spitting distance from the border and Big Bend NP, there's nothing 'Alpine' about Alpine; dry, rocky, desert plateau region it avg high-80s for half the year. Its the 'big town' for that region; Marfa is to the West, the burgenoning artist enclave similar to Carmel, Bolinas and Laguna Beach.

quote:

Originally posted by Tejas421:
5th generation Texan here. I’m in Nashville now ...

Is this because of your ex's?

Lived in Amarillo for 10+ years, cold/snow in the winter, hot in summer but with low humidity. Winds blows constantly (hate the wind), tornado prone, and you had better have a roofer on speed dial (hail). Moved to the DFW area, Mid-Cities, between Ft. Worth (where the west begins) and Dallas (where the east peters out). Great area, as we very seldom went to Dallas, but frequented Ft. Worth a lot. Recently moved to Weatherford, right off Interstate 20 about 35 miles west of downtown Ft Worth, and really love it. Everything you could want in a smaller town, lot less traffic and great shopping, etc. and close to Ft. Worth. Just my 2 cents worth. Have travelled around TX and about the only other place I would consider for retirement would be the Fredericksburg-Kerville area. Nice and just a short distance to San Antonio.

I lived in Denton and Waxahachie.

Waxahachie is pretty nice and has never been hit by a tornado

You may want to look into Fredericksburg.