Retirement destination?

[ExplorerXC]

I lived in Tennessee for ~13 years.  Went to college in Nashville back in the day when it was still solidly red and Redneck.  Good place to be.  

But as I understand, Nashville's been infected with the kommiefornia virus for which there is no cure.  

What about east Tennessee?  Some outlying areas east/northeast of Knoxville?  

 

[Tom B]

Well, 5 years ago when I retired, I moved to E TN to get away from commie Connecticut. In a small town between Greeneville and Johnson City where most of my neighbors are cows. They recently built a handful of houses down the road, but I still shoot in my backyard.

[gun sane]

We're seeing quite a few Yankee plates on the roads south of Knoxville.  And Maryville's getting more congested than a pool hall on Free Beer Night.  But according to the last election, it's still all red.

[ArmyBrat61]

Jefferson County still has open spaces, for the moment, just depends on what you're looking for. 

[1gewehr]

You didn't mention what kind of area you want.  Urban, rural, suburbs, or something else?  Do you have school-age kids, need access to certain facilities, want to see sports, etc?

If you want to live in a city, Knoxville is probably as good as it gets in TN.  Nashville and Memphis are solidly liberal-run cities, with Chattanooga being surprisingly liberal.

Suburban areas around any city are usually solidly conservative.  When my wife and I moved up from Atlanta-area 16 years ago, we actually got up early in the morning so we could drive into Nashville  so we could see what commuting to work would be like.  At the time, that sold us on Wilson County versus other areas.  Do your homework and you can avoid a lot of problems.

And there IS a cure for Commifornia influence: teach people about actions and consequences!  All government programs are some form of vote-buying to get support from one group at the expense of the general public.

[gregintenn]

Tennessee is full. Cal back later?

[Garufa]

East TN is full.

[DC551]

I tell people on a couple of other forums that TN is full as well. My little town in north middle had 700 people when I moved here twenty years ago. Pushing 4K now. Clarksville had 45K when I was first  stationed at Ft Campbell and it's at almost 200K now. Glad I bought land when I did, looks like the invasion will continue. 

Edited March 29 by DC551

[Gunner2k]

On 3/27/2024 at 8:50 AM, ArmyBrat61 said:

Jefferson County still has open spaces, for the moment, just depends on what you're looking for. 

Yes it's awesome in Jefferson County, but more and more farms are disappearing and being replaced with Subdivisions.  In Dandridge the people from up north are buying up the lakefront properties without even actually seeing them.  You can notice a change in the people in the grocery stores already.  Also, don't get as many of the hey buddy waves as you used to going down the road.  You are very right though, there's still a ton of wide open spaces in places like new market and stuff, but for how long?

[Gunner2k]

On 3/27/2024 at 8:27 AM, gun sane said:

We're seeing quite a few Yankee plates on the roads south of Knoxville.  And Maryville's getting more congested than a pool hall on Free Beer Night.  But according to the last election, it's still all red.

I used to think Maryville was really a place i'd like to live 20 years ago and i'm not hating on the place now, but it's unbelievable how much it's grown.  Can't even get in the Lee's Chicken parking lot anymore lol.   Well that's always been like that from time to time lol

[Gunner2k]

To answer the original question though.  Look for Rural areas in East Tn,  There are still some great places, but seems like all land and houses have skyrocketed due to the influx of Northerners and Californians.

[ExplorerXC]

 

On 3/27/2024 at 7:50 AM, ArmyBrat61 said:

Jefferson County still has open spaces, for the moment, just depends on what you're looking for. 

That sounds like it.  The last place in TN I lived was Jamestown.  ~7 years.  

[ExplorerXC]

12 hours ago, DC551 said:

I tell people on a couple of other forums that TN is full as well. My little town in north middle had 700 people when I moved here twenty years ago. Pushing 4K now. Clarksville had 45K when I was first  stationed at Ft Campbell and it's at almost 200K now. Glad I bought land when I did, looks like the invasion will continue. 

I moved here to a small burg in Oklahoma 18 years ago.  I was ~50,000 people.  We bought a tidy home on the outskirts of town.  Now the city has 117,000 people and our town council (retired teachers, liberals from out of state) are planning on even more.  Even though traffic is insane, stressed infrastructure, accidents, etc.  I.  Really.  Hate.  Liberals.  

[ExplorerXC]

On 3/27/2024 at 9:40 AM, 1gewehr said:

You didn't mention what kind of area you want.  Urban, rural, suburbs, or something else? 

Retired.  No kids.  No pets.  No friends.  Just my wife and me.  Looking for rural.  Modest acreage.  Maybe could build unless the right place comes along.  Church is primary.  

[ExplorerXC]

10 hours ago, Gunner2k said:

To answer the original question though.  Look for Rural areas in East Tn,  There are still some great places, but seems like all land and houses have skyrocketed due to the influx of Northerners and Californians.

Thanks.  A lot of the recommendations aren't that far from where I used to live in TN.  Jamestown, just north of Crossville.  But we didn't have good medical.  Had to drive to Nashville.  That's why I'm thinking closer to Knoxville.  

[gregintenn]

15 hours ago, Garufa said:

East TN is full.

So is middle Tennessee!

[Erich]

We came here over 5 years ago to get away from liberals and high costs. But so did everyone else. The pandemic forever changed the face of retirement. Add to that corporate land and home grabbing to expand rental markets, anything within reasonable driving distances is over priced for retirement.

The Question becomes how far away from needs/ amenities can you tolerate. At a minimum, 45 mins to an hour out of major urban areas seems to give decent value. Especially if you are willing to work undeveloped land.

[FUJIMO]

Hope you got deep pockets if you're coming east of Knoxville. Jefferson,Cocke,Grainger,Sevier,Greene,etc . Ridiculously inflated values are the new norm.

[gary_boom]

It’s not 1884 anymore. A neighbor moved to Kingsport from Murfreesboro and was surprised how many churches are in Kingsport.

[Darrell]

^^^  My wife and I spent a week driving around eastern Tennessee to see if we wanted to move here. It became notable to us if we drove more than three or four miles without seeing a church! There were places where we saw churches on both sides of the road. 

We've been here a tad over five years and really like it. But as Fujimo states above, the prices seem to be skyrocketing. I see five acre parcels selling in my area for well over what I paid for my 20. So it goes.

[Jamie Jackson]

My Primary Care office has been processing 5 newly relocated California residents per day for over 6 weeks (according to his scheduler).

5 per day!

West Knoxville is growing much faster than it's infrastructure can handle. 

Folks are welcome. Change is inevitable. 

All I ask is you assimilate and embrace what's left of our culture...

I'm a "bitter clinger " and proud of it. 

Knoxville has excellent health care. Just know the competition for it is putting a strain on services. 

Get established and be patient. 

Just recently had this conversation with a friend. 

 

Best wishes. 

[Gunner2k]

Can't blame these people for leaving Cali, but theres a reason it's so awesome to live here besides just the natural beauty from God.  These people need to embrace what we have and remember what they are leaving.   You know if enough outsiders get in, it can start changing election outcomes and they have been indoctrinating the kids for years.  I have some hard core God fearing back wood farm family and some of their 20 something year old daughters are nothing like All the previous generations.

[Garufa]

4 hours ago, Jamie Jackson said:

Knoxville has excellent health care. Just know the competition for it is putting a strain on services.

It is putting a massive strain on healthcare resources.  Knoxville doesn’t have the medical infrastructure to handle this kind of growth, especially from a regional standpoint.

Another big problem is resources for the elderly.  Not only are there not enough independent and assisted living facilities, many transplants are bringing their parents or whatever with them and putting them directly into those kinds of places.  Not to mention possibly being at the age themselves they might need one soon.

[Jamie Jackson]

Totally agree @Garufa.

 

The five new patients a day I mentioned were all Medicare transplants. 

 

It' gonna get much worse. 

[Defender]

All well said.  Wish our State government  agreed.  The Governor, the dept of labor and dept of ecd along with tourism and others and the rest , spend a lot of money enticing transplants.  First they go after businesses, and while many say yaya, better jobs, most times, even if they hire local people, the better jobs are brought with them, or if they are new jobs, then there’s not enough qualified locals to fill positions so then the companies start recruiting out of staters to move here.  Nashville has 100 folks a day moving here, and that’s a conservative estimate.  People say that like it’s a good thing, but it just isn’t.  The infrastructure can’t support it, despite the almost constant road construction and other infrastructure, I don’t thing the bridges and sewers and water and definitely the electric grid was designed to support these numbers and it cant keep up.  We’re heading for disaster.  Add to that that the political landscape is rapidly changing as well.  Over time, people move to a new place and sooner or later seem to want to make it like the place they left, because they remember the good parts of that place not the bad.  Look at the nashville traffic, better yet, drive in it.  Its very busy and steady at all times of the day and night, then locks down at peak times.  If there’s an accident then the local roads and highways are swamped to.  As someone said above, the suburban areas are usually more conservative but not so much around nashville.  Everyone wants to bring more peopl, offer more stuff then struggle to keep up the infrastructure.  We’re gonna end up with a state income tax, mark my words. It’ll start small, but it’s coming.  Sales taxes aren’t gonna be able to keep up with infrastructure needs.  I so wish I’d bought some land back in the day, way out instead of living so close to nashville.  I figured there was plenty of time, then all of a sudden, boom the housing thing happened.  Who can afford to buy a house with decent amount of land these days?  Californians, I’d say, LOL.