Category: Best Retirement Towns and States
Updated October 11, 2017 -- This article was originally published in April, 2014. Prices have gone up since then in most of these markets, but they are still less expensive than many other coastal towns.
Retiring near the coast is many people's dream. Visions of beautiful sunrises or sunsets over the water, boating, swimming, fishing, walks on the beach - it sounds great. But one practical thing that often gets in the way is the price of real estate. Those great views and proximity to the water usually come with a price tag that reflects marketplace demand. Fortunately, not every town on the water is out of reach. In this, Part 2 of our Affordable Places to Retire on the Water series, we've reviewed 10 coastal towns that are affordable. Some of these places to retire might not be as chichi as Naples, FL, but they are surprisingly nice and reasonable priced. Part 1, "Affordable Places to Retire on the Waterfront", came out in 2010 (it included some towns where the waterfront was on a lake, this one does not).
Prices have gone up
The first thing we noticed when compiling this article is that home prices
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Published on April 15, 2014
Comments 98
Category: Best Retirement Towns and States
Update May 16, 2017 - We have updated this article with a 2 part installment. Here is the link to Part 1: These Crazy Best States to Retire Lists.
April 8, 2014 -- Back by popular demand, here is our 2014 list of the best states for retirement (see links at bottom to our lists from previous years). This year we have taken a different approach - we've assembled "best of" lists by category. At the conclusion of the article we've listed those states that made more than one list, which you can use as an indication that they must be pretty good places for retirement!
See the counterpoint to this article: "Worst States for Retirement - 2014".
The categories we've chosen are basically the opposite of those we used to choose our "2014 List of the Worst States for Retirement", although we decided to also give weight to
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Published on April 8, 2014
Comments 131
Category: Best Retirement Towns and States
Note: The tax bill signed into law in late 2017 will have a great impact on the worst states for retirement. In Feb. 2018 we updated this article: "Worst States for Retirement - 2018".
March 11, 2014 -- Finding the best place to retire in is a little bit like looking for a mate. There are lots of attractive ones out there. But for you - which state has the most appealing features and a minimum of not so desirable attributes. To help weed out the more unattractive ones, we present our 3rd annual (we skipped 2013) list of the worst states for retirement. There is one main point we want to emphasize - everyone's retirement situation is different, so a one size fits all approach won't work. If your grandchildren live in one of these states and you want to be near them - that makes it a great retirement state for you. Our goal for this article is to give you the tools to help you figure out what states aren't a good fit for your retirement. See this article's counterpoint: "Best States for Retirement - 2016".
Factors we considered
In this year's list we have tried to simplify
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Published on March 11, 2014
Comments 180
Category: Best Retirement Towns and States
Note: Our 2015 List has been published. See Most Popular Places to Retire 2015.
February 25, 2014 – When it comes to the best places to retire two things are very clear: the Sunbelt is where people want to go, and there is almost no interest in the Northeast or Midwest. The Sunbelt, with 77 towns on Topretirements.com's 8th annual list of the 100 most popular retirement spots, continues to be prime territory for retirement dreams. Only 3 states in the Northeast (and none in the Midwest) made the cut: Virginia, Delaware (Lewes and Rehoboth Beach), New Jersey (Cape May), and Pennsylvania (Pittsburgh). Most of the remaining cities on the top 100 list were from the Pacific Northwest and Colorado.
Florida Rules
Florida dominates the list of best places to retire, with 23 cities and towns (2 less than in 2013), followed by North Carolina (11), South Carolina (8), Arizona (7), California (6) and Washington (6). Tennessee had 5 cities in the top 100. The highest ranking non-Sun Belt city on our list was Charlottesville (VA) at #15. Note: To make sure you don’t miss new lists like this, sign up for our free weekly “Best Places to Retire” newsletter. See also "The Worst States for Retirement - 2014".
11 New Towns Join as Popular Places to Retire
Eleven new towns moved onto the 2014 list, about the same number as in 2013. Eight of the 11 were from the Sunbelt. Of the remaining,
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Published on February 25, 2014
Comments 304
Category: Best Retirement Towns and States
Downtown Sarasota
Updated March, 2020 (originally published February, 2014) -- All of us have our biases. And, even with the best of intentions, we probably hold our share of stereotypes too. Not just about the rest of humanity, but also food, cars, brands of soda and beer, sports teams, movie stars, and yes - places to retire too. Just as being close-minded about people gets in the way of appreciating them as individuals, dismissing places out of hand could get in the way of finding your retirement town.
Biases and Stereotypes about PlacesLet's first discuss the various types of biases that we have heard people bring up at Topretirements. For each one we will name
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Published on February 17, 2014
Comments 65
Category: Best Retirement Towns and States
February 10, 2014. You’ve probably seen lots of different kinds of lists of the "best places to retire" by now. Those include the likes of: the most affordable places to retire, the most tax-friendly states, and best retirement towns for the arts. Plus there are the best places to retire for.... biking, golf, culture, bookstores etc. So, get ready for yet another sub-category - the best places to retire for livability.
Livability means many things to different people. So although this is our list of 10 great places to retire for livability, your own personal list might be quite different. To help you work on your own list we have tried to identify some of the key factors that make living in a community a pleasure. You might want to add, or subtract your own
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Published on February 10, 2014
Comments 45
Category: Best Retirement Towns and States
January 28, 2014 -- Here in part 2 of this series we profile the winners of 5 more categories of great places to retire year round, along with the
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Published on January 28, 2014
Comments 38
Category: Best Retirement Towns and States
January 14, 2014 -- People who can retire in 2 places have some wonderful choices. They have plenty of great warm wintertime towns in Arizona and Florida to choose from. And for the summertime portion of the year there is almost and endless list of interesting retirement towns. But the situation that most people face - not having enough resources to manage two separate homes, or not wanting to manage the complications of that dual living style - is more difficult. This 2 part series will profile 10 great places to retire year round, along with the
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Published on January 13, 2014
Comments 91
Category: Best Retirement Towns and States
December 16, 2013 -- A while back we wrote an article about retirement in the great American Southwest - "Retirement 101: A Guide to Arizona, New Mexico, and Utah". Recently the comments to this article were rejuvenated when member Mike T volunteered to add comments from his experiences looking for his best place to retire in the region. Ultimately he and his wife settled in Green Valley (AZ), where they have lived for the past 14 years. Mike is a former writer; he not only has a great eye for details but he succeeds in that most difficult of tasks, providing a balanced view. Here we provide a roundup of his recent posts to the original article (we made some minor edits to make it flow into a single article), along with some of the member questions to him from the Comments section of that post. Thanks so much Mike for taking the time to share your thoughts - your insights are incredible!
Mike T: We looked all over Arizona, Utah, and New Mexico in a four year search in most
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Published on December 16, 2013
Comments 11
Category: Best Retirement Towns and States
December 3, 2013 -- We received this question from a member recently and thought it was worth publishing, along with our answer.
Q: Have decided that I want to soon retire to FL but unsure about finding a place to live near one of the coasts or in the interior, such as the Orlando and Ocala areas. Am hearing lots of scary stories about the costs of homeowners and flood insurance if living near the coast, but part
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Published on December 3, 2013
Comments 67
