Pick me a town!

[HarlansHollowFarms]

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My DH is a software architect. The only place that would even have a position available for him would probably be Pocatello. Pocatello being nearest to where he grew up in MT. My FIL has advanced degrees and sells computer equipment. His wife is a well-respected attorney. They live in a trailer. About half of the homes in that town are trailers. We walked the town's main drag. It took about an hour to walk from the house, down to the end of town, back up, look at the river, get a cup of coffee and walk back to the house. I'd go mad living like that. This was the county seat.

IME tiny places like that are either really good to live in or really awful. And I am not a fan of rural schools. I have had kids in rural schools, and I have worked in rural schools. In general, quality was low. Being as the tax base is small.

And I am really not knocking where you live. I grew up in the Mid-Atlantic region, in the hills and valleys of the Appalachian Mts yet only a three-hour drive to the ocean or to the Great Lakes. I have family in MT, NM, CO. It's just so dry and brown for so much of the year. just seems so foreign.....

I am not sure I understand what living in a trailer has to do with anything but, we own 2 houses in 2 separate towns and we CHOOSE to live in a trailer because it is in the country. We can not build on this land yet as it is part of my FIL estate and not legally ours. We love our Paradise on the Prairie!

I suppose some feel that living in a trailer make you less affluent...not sure!

 

[HarlansHollowFarms]

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You would love it here!

 

[nonseq]

http://mus.edu/mrpip/

There used to be a federal program, I think...But now it looks as if the programs are administered through the states.


Trailers? Where I am from, trailers are low-class and get blown apart by tornadoes. So when I see a town that has a bunch of trailers as homes, I think it is poor.

I think we are talking apples vs. oranges. Here, my county vs your county:

http://www.city-data.com/county/Fairfield_County-OH.html

http://www.city-data.com/county/Richland_County-MT.html

Very interesting.

 

[Duramaxgirl]

I guess I should say something about North Idaho... I've lived here all my life and I love it... But the winters are cold. At least most the winters are last year was very mild. The bad economy seems to be hitting us hard right now and jobs are scarce...sigh... The mountains are amazing! We have lake Pend Oreille and it is one of the deepest lakes in the world! Great for fishing and boating. I don't live in a trailer so I'm must be more 'affluent'. it would take you less then an hour to walk from downtown sandpoint to the lake... But as you enter town from the long bridge which is a mile long with breath taking views of lake pend oreille and the mountains... Any how as you enter sandpoint you'll see a sigh that says 'Sandpoint is a walking town. Slow Down! Please watch for pedestrians' it kinda sums it up we love our life here its slow and not a huge rat race like big citys. If ya don't like it.... Sorry! I love it here because life is relaxing and not rush... Sandpoint is about 12 miles away from me and has a population of 6000+ Coeur d' Alene is 35 miles the other way with population of 35000.
I once had a friend who moved here from The Big City. he moved back because he couldn't stand the fact that almost 'all the businesses in sandpoint closed before 6pm'... Which isn't true... We just don't have a big huge hot wild night life.
I like big city people... Just not the ones that view themselves as better then us because they have 13 starbucks within 2 square miles of where they live...

 

[thechickenchick]

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Wow! You arent kidding. 4 people per sguare mile versus 125

Thanks for the cool info!

 

[HarlansHollowFarms]

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We are talking apples to oranges here, however, you pointed out that to you trailers=low-class, and rural schools =poor education. We happen to live in a very prosperous part of the country and it is inappropriate to lump our part of the world into a stereotype.
As for the city data, they are very out dated in terns of medium salary and cost of housing...because of the rich job opportunities here, the medium salary has skyrocketed and so has the cost of rents...the average basement rental is going for $750/month, a real apartment is going anywhere from $750 to $1200/month. You can still get a nice house in town for less than $100,000 though.

This area has changed so much in the last couple years, what I paidd for my home and 20 acres 2 years ago, I can sell in a sellers market here for triple what I paid for it!

 

[thechickenchick]

Quote:
We are talking apples to oranges here, however, you pointed out that to you trailers=low-class, and rural schools =poor education. We happen to live in a very prosporus part of the country and it is inappropriate to lump our part of the world into a stereotype.
As for the city data, they are very out dated in terns of medium salery and cost of housing...because of the rich job opportunities here, the medium salery has skyrocketed and so has the cost of rents...the average basement rental is going for $750/month, a real apartment is going anywhere from $750 to ver $1200/month. You can still get a nice house in town for less than $100,000 though.

I agree. I can also tell you that I have no problem keeping my rentals full with GREAT renters. Our house here has been rented by the same gal for 3 years. She works at the Shelby prison and commutes 20 miles to work. Our house 2 hours from here is rented by a dentist. My point, they both have found good jobs.

 

[Sir Birdaholic]

I live 12 miles from a town of 6,000, & in the other direction 7 miles is a tiny town of 2,000. I'm in the foothills of the Boston Mts. in North Central Arkansas. You couldn't drag me away from here with a team of mules! I love this place. Come on down!

 

[nonseq]

I mentioned the schools b/c of my experience with them. This was highlighted for me just a few days ago. The test scores were released for Centre County schools, and the worst ones were the most rural. This was my experience as well. They just didn't have the money that the larger schools did, and it showed with the quality of the staff and with the behaviors tolerated or seen as normal.

I looked up the stats for our respective schools per county, too.

http://www.greatschools.org/cgi-bin...h&area=c&county=Richland&sortby=name&tab=acad

http://www.greatschools.org/cgi-bin...rfield&sortby=name&tab=acad&begin=0&showall=1


Test scores are from 2009 and are the 10th grade tests. I live in a fairly rural county, too.

Very often we extrapolate from our own experiences. We really don't have any other way of comparing situations. The US is very large. There is a wide range of incomes and experiences and what is considered an acceptable standard of living. Even with a 9% unemployment rate, Fairfield County has enough jobs for 91% of the people looking for one. With a base population of 125,000 people, that is a lot of jobs. As a mental exercise, if only one-third of the population were employable and of those 41,000 people, 91% had jobs, that still means that 37, 000 people have jobs. That is 3.5 times the entire population of Richland County. Do you see what I mean? They really can't be compared.

 

[mjdtexan]

Sounds like you might need my address.

Jk really.

I come with baggage and it aint Samsonite. Lots of fun though if you like fast boats, slow motorcycles, tractors, chickens, etc etc etc