Quote:
Originally Posted by cannedairspray
Obviously, the weather thing is the hardest part. It crosses off basically all of the country. I'd tell you Raleigh might be nice, but you probably wouldn't like the summer. Or Madison, but you certainly wouldn't like the winter.
You basically want a Mediterranean climate. That's the West Coast and Hawaii. Oregon and Washington are cancelled out because of an "anti-California bias" (why would you care? How would this discrimination affect you?), and Hawaii certainly isn't cheap. So now we're left with California, but where is cheap that's also near lots of cultural/sporting amenities? The entire Redwood area is crossed off because of the latter.
Maybe somewhere around Santa Cruz? Close-ish to the Bay Area, just stay to the north part of Monterey Bay because the southern part is gonna be too expensive. I had a studio there for over 1k and that was a decade ago.
You're probably either going to have to concede on one of your criteria or go international. If you still want to stay in the US, my votes are for the first places I mentioned: Madison or Raleigh, in that order.
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The southern Appalachians is probably as close to "good weather" as he'll come outside CA. The summers are mild due to altitude and the winters, in NC and southward, aren't too harsh. Asheville, Birmingham, Chattanooga . . . . I spent 4 years in Durham, next door to Raleigh, and if weather's the criterion I vote an unequivocal thumbs down. Nothing's like a central Carolina ice storm and the summers are typically hot/humid.
Frankly, the "hate Californians" thing in the northwest is probably over-rated but the rainy winters are another issue. Even in Northern CA that problem can be bad enough to send me packing to Tucson (when the jet stream dives south and brings SF Seattle's weather).
San Diego, near the ocean--like La Jolla--unquestionably has the best weather in the continental US and I'd rate it over Hawaii too (Hawaii's too humid and a bit too hot for my taste). I haven't looked into it, but for low taxes and cheaper living, maybe look a bit farther south in Mexico (not all the way to Cabo but across the border).