Can you recommend a new hometown for a single mom??

[CindySue]

Hello from Alaska~ My daughters and I are planning to find a new home outside of Alaska. I have been here all of my life, and am ready for a change.

We are looking for a small town, clean-living type community and we plan to make an exploration trip next month. I am leaning towards MN, IA, and MO, but am definately not limited to that. I love to travel, and I would be content traveling around for a long time to find my next hometown, but I do have 2 daughters (13 & 14) who need more stability than that.

I am hoping for some input on area(s) that you might like, so we can go check them out. We need affordable living costs, and not too much heat or humidity. I have a home based business, so need to be near to a post office. Other than that, we would like a yard big enough for a few animals a garden and fruit trees.

Thanks in advance for your help! I look forward to hearing from you!
Cindy

[Jan Doling]

Make sure the daughters help with the research and get input on the choice or they will make you wish you had!

[Blu3duk]

We live near the cultural hub of the universe...... everyting spins faster as you get away from here..... Cultural hub
There are less spendy places to buy into, more or less populated as well, but a person has to start looking some place i suppose, and my wife is on the chamber of commerce and seen the website hadnt been updated for this years event in July but it will be sometime this week showing the local celebration being the last weekend in July as always. ok so this is a cheap way to promote the area.... have fun searching for a new place to call home.

William

[Laura]

I thought maybe I had some good ideas until I saw where Blu3duk lives. His area is the most beautiful best place in the world, especially if you have a home based business.

[fordy]

Originally Posted by Blu3duk

We live near the cultural hub of the universe...... everyting spins faster as you get away from here..... Cultural hub
There are less spendy places to buy into, more or less populated as well, but a person has to start looking some place i suppose, and my wife is on the chamber of commerce and seen the website hadnt been updated for this years event in July but it will be sometime this week showing the local celebration being the last weekend in July as always. ok so this is a cheap way to promote the area.... have fun searching for a new place to call home.

William

.........................William , that is one of the Best places to live that I've seen lately . I looked at some realestate on the Realtor.com site and there was alot of Very expensive houses available . I would love to live in a small town such as Kooskia but I'm wondering what in the Sam Hill I'd Do to get by . I guess i'd figure that out after I got there , fordy...

[jerzeygurl]

lots of nice small towns in missouri what are your criteria?????

[Northman]

Two Harbors/Northshore Minnesota is a great place I enjoy quiet country living. Duluth is less than 1/2 hr away and has decent shopping convenience as well as decent variety of entertainment. Like hiking? the Northshore trail runs from Duluth to Grand Marais about 200+ miles of trail. like remote wilderness? BWCAW is not too far away. No hurricanes, No tornados, no real natural disasters happening around here, unless an occaisional dump of snow is a problem. Lake Superior if located near it controls the temperture cooler in summer warmer in winter.
Gas is cheaper than National average.
People are friendly, plenty of wildlife deer, bear, wolves, fox, eagles, owls, and moose.

I know this is a place I'll never leave other than to VISIT somewhere else.

[Ohiosteve]

CindySue,
Just curious- where in Alaska do you live? I always thought that Alaska would be a pretty nice place to live! The wife, two kids and I are planning an extensive trip that may take us that far this summer. We were there in 2000
(pre kid era) and really liked it. >>>>>>>>>>Steve

[cwgrl23]

Don't forget South Dakota! We have a wide varietly of landscape to suit your needs. There is the Black Hills on the West side of the state and the rolling praire hills on the East side of the state. There are many small towns around the state and the majority have a PO.


Check out http://www.findyourspot.com/ I don't have anything to do with them but have found them very informational. Just answer the questions and it will give places to look at.


MN is very beautiful up in the Duluth area, but they aren't kiding about the size of the mosquiotes.

[Blu3duk]

Originally Posted by bare

Bah! He'd rather live where I do, in fact he used to. Truth is, he's just such a reprobate, we had to send him way down to Southern Idaho.

Sent me away??? hmmmm i was gone 3 years before anyone really understood i werent there NEmore. And as for SOUTHERN idaho... i aint that far south....we prefoer to be called central idaho here..... one fella said we have a realy nice climate here..... NEwhere you go you have to climb it!

Fordy....As for making a living.... one of the local sawmills just upgraded its machinery for about 8 million or so, to lay off 15 jobs in 2 shifts..... so some folks are wondering the same thing, quite a few folks have brought in their own business that they run from the internet or phone and fax..... some make it and some dont... A person could maybe open a clothing store in the area as the last one here closed several years ago before the population grew.... ok they retired and wanted to many dollars for anyone to pick up the business..... farms are large here.... once in awhile a farm hires year round help.. welders and fabricators seem to kep steady work going...... truck drivers dont make it here.... farms have their own semi's, and log truck driving is a whole nother ball game and takes a special person to drive the log roads, although if you cant do any other job logging usually we can make a truck driver outta you..... I personally own a portable sawmill, and have run it since before moving to central idaho in 1988 [havent made enough money to leave maybe] its seasonal, carpentry has been another way ive added coin to my poke, also building log houses, and this area is one of the of the good places to prospect for gold in Idaho, also sapphires are around the area along with opal.... there are a few people who an gold and make jewlry from it and sell it at flea markets and online as well..... then there is the "ELK STONE" jewlery which was once grass that went thru an elk....women actually wear that on their ears...mostly tourists though..... a couple old bikers have gotten into selling real estate kinda funny to know that scooter trash who once were not allegedly fit to talk to are now the foks setting the price for the very people who wouldnt talk to them a few years ago....

Mostly if a person figures on making money here they either have to bring a well paying job with them, or they end up moving on to somewhere else..... there are a few government type jobs that pay mediocre.... and the occasional construction job if you can work your way into it..... but its sparce pickins here for the most part for those high paying jobs.

there goes the property values i spose.

William

[nodak3]

You might consider Killdeer, ND. Killdeer Mtn. Manufacturing offers decent jobs. Good school, small town with all the amenities, and really nice people. No crime rate, cheap housing, low cost of living. Really nice teenagers in town and on the farms. The city has a web site. (City of around 800.)

[Cornhusker]

The Nebraska Panhandle is nothing but small towns with reasonable real estate prices and good people.
You can pick any size town from less than 50 people to 10,000.
Wide open spaces, good hunting and fishing, no pollution, low crime, less government, etc.
Good place to raise kids.

[jgbndaudio]

[QUOTE=CindySue]Hello from Alaska~ My daughters and I are planning to find a new home outside of Alaska. I have been here all of my life, and am ready for a change.

We are looking for a small town, clean-living type community and we plan to make an exploration trip next month. I am leaning towards MN, IA, and MO, but am definately not limited to that. I love to travel, and I would be content traveling around for a long time to find my next hometown, but I do have 2 daughters (13 & 14) who need more stability than that.


Hello,

First let me congratulate you on deciding to 'move somewhere else' - I'm a strong believer that everyone should move someplace else at least once in their lifetime. It makes you a more open mided person when you learn a different perspective.

Anyway, Having been a roadie for the better part of the last two decades, I have been nearly everywhere. All fifty states many times over. I would say that if those are the only three states that you have narrowed it down to that you're going to miss a lot of very cool places. Also if you can tell me where you're living now I can gauge what kind of city would best match what you have now (If that's what you want?)

Although I have many friends from MO, I cannot suggest actually moving there. I think most of my MO friends would agree. I can happily put you in touch with them if you need. If you do have to move there, Springfield would be the top of the list. Understand - in general this is a very HUMID state.

Iowa has some very cool, places. Des Moines and Iowa city both come to mind.
Iowa has extreme weather differences from summer to winter. The weather will be alaska like in the winter but much more uncomfortable in the summer.

MN, would seem to me to be most like the climate you're coming from in general. Both St. Paul and Minneapolis are great cities with a lot of surrounding "country."

Feel free to email if you have further questions.
Scotty

[sisterpine]

Check out Anaconda Montana, a lovely place , good for home business, good school and the yuppies have not moved into town yet (they are all out at the lake in their million dollar homes!)

[Freeholder]

Not in the area you mentioned, but where we are is pretty nice, I think. My brothers, who both live in Tok (Alaska) are seriously considering moving down here. One visited twice last year (both times because of family funerals -- he doesn't usually make it out that often!), and fell in love with the area. We are near Klamath Falls, Oregon. Land prices are about the same as most other places (too high), but what makes it nice is the climate is comfortable all year round -- at least to those of us who are from Alaska! It never gets really cold in the winter -- we had a few degrees below zero this winter, and that was the coldest it's been in quite a while. In the summer, the days can get pretty warm, but the humidity is low, and the nights almost always cool off enough to sleep comfortably. We have a garden, which did pretty well last year even though it got put in late, as we had just moved in. And fruit trees seem to do well. It is possible, because of the elevation, to get frosts in any month even during the summer, so I want to have a small greenhouse for some things, but even without one lots of stuff will grow here. It's a pretty area, too, in between the mountains and the High Desert, with the largest lake in Oregon, several fishing rivers, and lots of wildlife. It's a few hours drive to the ocean, too, something you can't say about the mid-west! There are a few bugs here at times, but nothing like Alaska. You might see a rattlesnake, but I've only seen one in almost three years and that was out in the desert.

Town, Klamath Falls, I think has about forty thousand people, including a small AF Base and two colleges. There is work here, though it will help (same as anywhere) if you have an in-demand skill like nursing or teaching. People are friendly and helpful. There is some tourism in the area, and of course the military and colleges, but a lot of the local income is still from farming, ranching, and logging, and people are pretty down-to-earth and nice. There are a few streets with signs that say, "No horses on the sidewalks"! We are in a rural subdivision of mostly one-acre lots, and almost everyone has some kind of livestock, mostly horses, but a lot of poultry and a few head of cattle. I have dairy goats and poultry.

Down side is that property taxes, while not the highest in the country, aren't the lowest, either. There is a state income tax, but no state sales tax. If you are currently in the Anchorage area, I think you would find that housing prices would be comparable or lower (probably lower). Weather should be more comfortable, too, without the chill Anchorage gets off the ocean. You could easily drive through this way on your way east, and take a look!

Kathleen in Oregon

[Cabin Fever]

Single mom.....eh? Well, you could check out Herman, Minnesota. It's a small rural town that is so cool that they made a movie out of it!

Check the link: HermanUSA

[Jim in MO]

Originally Posted by jerzeygurl

lots of nice small towns in missouri what are your criteria?????

I'll second that! DeSoto, Park Hills, Farmington, Look south of St, Louis. Along the I55 corridor.

[Hank - Narita]

Cindy, we are in southeast AZ at 4,400 ft. While our summer days are warm, the nights cool off. You can sit on the porch in shorts til 9 p.m. The girls can swim. The winters are pretty mild. Property is very inexpensive. Jobs are scarce but the post office is close by. We don't have much shopping but Tucson is about an hour away. We are near the NM state line. About the only bad negative weatherwise is it gets windy but it never bothered me. My DH doesn't like the flies but they don't bite; are just annoying sometimes.

[Hoop]

Three Lakes, WI



http://www.threelakes.com and http://www.three-lakes.com will give you lots more info


In reality, the area is known for its recreational pursuits. The abundance of clear, fresh water lakes is by far the biggest draw. The vast Nicolet National Forest is another.
Small town. Low crime. Excellent schools. Technical college 25 miles away. 4th of July parade through Main Street.

[milkstoolcowboy]

As others have noted, both Minnesota and Iowa have their temperature extremes, but generally good quality of life.

School quality is probably important, and both MN and IA have excellent public school systems. Obviously there are variations from district to district. Minnesota also has state-wide open enrollment in public schools. Both states have excellent public university systems, although MN has more state colleges and universities. MN has tuition reciprocity for 2-year and 4-year colleges and even graduate programs with SD, ND, WI, and to a limited extent with IA.

I would expect that the southern or central part of MN might be more attractive in that its closer to Twin Cities. MN has higher state income taxes than IA and more regulations. IA has some very nice small college towns throughout the state.

The biggest strike against some parts of MN (like my area, SE MN) is rapidly rising land prices, although you can find some small towns along the MN/IA border with very modest house prices.

Hope you find what you are looking for.