Old House Dreams - where should I go live?

[Kashka-Kat]

Ive been getting daily old house listings from Old HOuse Dreams for several yrs. As I contemplate moving from my once liveable, but now rapidly urbanizing and increasingly unliveable city.... and possibly selling my house.... I keep seeing these wonderful old houses in the emails and I cant help but think .... what if I just up and moved somewhere else where I could get a beautiful, intact historic house for a fraction of the cost of one here in WI?

I would say that based on what Ive seen in these listings, Iowa and Maine seems to have the most houses that are both affordable and architecturally appealing. (ie not remuddled too much).

Has anyone out there done that - let your love for old houses be the major factor in where you live?

Where do I want to live? One thing is I would need my real estate to earn me money somehow, if only to make some cash via air bnb. So that would mean the location would have to have some appeal as a destination, and be within a few hrs of a major or mid size city.

[GinaC]

I didn't know about Old House Dreams when I bought my house. I wish I would have, but I can see many ways how it could go wrong unless you actually go to the house first. Photos can be very deceiving, and will not take into account the neighborhood.

I knew I wanted to live in Vermont, and I also love Montreal, but I didn't want to live in a big city. So I just looked at a map and saw Newport, then visited to make sure I would like it. At the time I was looking to buy land to build a log cabin, but after two years of not finding anything suitable I decided I'd look for an old home to "restorovate", not younger than 1950. I signed up at Redfin and this one came up, but I thought it was in an area of town that I didn't like. There was also another house listed that I also liked, but didn't love. The next time I got an update, the price on this house was reduced, and the other one was still available, so I contacted my realtor and took a trip to look at both of them. My realtor told me that the street that the other house was on had a problem with drug dealers. Looking at it, I would have never known. My street is mostly retired doctors and my neighbors are awesome.

"Location location location" is an old realtor meme, but it's very true.

[Willa]

It's a dilemma. The reason that houses are much less expensive in some areas is due to the regional market, employment and all the other factors. I don't know that it is easily possible for a person to move to a better house in a downmarket area and have the same return as a less good house in a better area. Like you would have to CREATE the desireability for a new Air B n B in a depressed area, which might be an uphill battle. And if it turns out you hate the new location, how hard will it be to sell ?

I moved from Toronto, where rent and real estate is extremely expensive to London, ON (about 2 hrs away). When I moved here the market was kind of slow and a lot of houses sat on the market for an average of six weeks, and sold for about $ 5000 under asking. A comparable house cost about 1/6 of a Toronto house. Gradually that has changed, selling prices and rents have escalated and now there are flippers gnawing their way through the housing inventory. While I could sell my house (imagining the severe issues with the gas station next door not being a factor)for more than I paid for it - a lateral move into a different house at the same price would probably yield a less good house than what I would be giving up, if that makes sense ?

I have a friend who has an Air B n B in the house he purchased over 30 years ago (he paid about 1/10 of today's value). There are two other apartments in the house, plus his former office, and the Air B n B suite. He's in a great location in Toronto. It sounds like during the busy spring/summer/fall seasons that the Air B n B makes more money than if it was a standard apartment rental (and apartments in Toronto are crazy expensive - like $ 2000.00 or more for a small 2 bedroom). BUT - during the winter period there are often long spells with no bookings = zero income, even in this great location. And he has to be available to do the laundry and general tidying between guests. His own house is about a 15 minute drive away. He's had a few long term rentals to people who are in the midst of renovations, who live in the area but these are the exceptions not the rule.

I also have a friend who has worked for an anti Air B n B group for several years. Air B n B in Toronto has really worsened the already super-tight rental housing market for the entire city, created issues in residential neighbourhoods, and even hotel associations have been complaining. In Toronto, a lot of real estate got snapped up and converted to Air B n B by some sketchy foreign business entities (Russian mob ?) who masquerade as individual owners but actually have 150 or more different rentals. These entities absolutely do not care about the effect their business model has on the other homeowners. Situations were happening like a narrow victorian row house with four small bedrooms was fitted with bunk beds and fold out sofas to accommodate up to 16 guests per night - usually 16 young guests who came to the city to party - that disturbed other residents every weekend, which resulted in legal battles.

I think relocating elsewhere is a gamble. A great house at the fraction of the cost of your current location is an attractive fantasy. But - if there is no job - or only menial very low paying jobs - then that is a serious concern. But - if you are able to cash out your current house, buy a great house outright, then live on the rest of your proceeds plus a so-so job that is the trade-off/compromise ? Some people have been able to make this scenario work - especially if their job is some type of telecommuting.

[phil]

lots of people do that here as they near retirement. we have many old logging towns with depressed house values , but no jobs . some work remotely and do really well. they are good for retirement so long as you dont need to be near a hospital. maybe the trick is to keep a condo in the city and rent it in case you want back later in age.

Stocks are falling, oil prices too. I'd wait for a result of the black plague as it may affect how many houses we need. No one is immune, It's more serious than anything we've lived through, and spreading fast. Hard to predict.

[Nicholas]

As stated in BumbleBlog below Fort Lauderdale became crowded expensive and obnoxious. We lived about 2 miles north of downtown and about 2 miles from the beach. But the days of Connie Francis and spring break were long gone, and I do miss that era.

We were thinking of the beautiful ten acre parcel we once owned in north Florida but it was in a one traffic light town, Fort White, Florida and the nearest anything was 12 miles away.

So we compromised and bought this little family farm house in this peaceful historic town with its inexpensive costs that cares deeply about its history and preservation and am very glad we did.

[nhguy]

My wife wanted a new career which I agreed with, but I wanted to live in the White Mountains of NH. She agreed, our neighbor bought our 1840 cape on 53 acres, we bought a place in the north for 1/3 of our selling price in our former town 2-1/2 hours to the south. We will have probably put as much into the house as we paid for by the time we are done. It's my last old house, so I am going to have some fun with it. Kitchen renovation plans are about done, the work starts in late April. We picked a contractor who would let me work with him on the project. He and I have worked on several other projects together and it all went well. As far as finding an old house I guess you need to write down the criteria you want/need. The type of house, the amount of land and setting. I'm a New Englander so would pick Maine from your list, as being near the ocean would be a place of interest. Good Luck

[Lily left the valley]

The short answer is, "yes, I did choose where to live based on my love of old houses." Some of what's below is based on our personal experience, and the latter is thoughts based on what others have suggested.

When we met, I had warned my now spouse early on that I planned to "retire" to Massachusetts. With him being a Florida born, this was important to point out because I was dead set on my plan and I knew he wasn't terribly fond of snow and ice. He already knew I loved old houses and living in them, though he likes to say he just likes "interesting" houses. Age isn't a definite factor for him.

After a few "follow the work" moves, and then a retreat to stay with family in NJ when work was hard to come by, he found himself working for the USPS and I was property managing. His job gave us some leeway when we realized we weren't getting any younger, so why not make the leap to MA then? The trouble was...where in MA? Although we've lived in other expensive states, we still didn't want to put ourselves in a hole we'd never be able to dig up from, as it were.

I had a blessing of serendipity. When I got tired of looking at maps and MA forums one day, I went to look up the Gardner Museum I used to haunt when I lived in the Greater Boston Area. One of the results that popped up was not the Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum, but a museum in a small city called Gardner in north central MA. Amused by this, I did some poking about, found a lot of 1900-1950 homes on Zillow there, as well as a few other amenities that satisfied my mister's need to not be too rural. Out of nowhere, a possible place emerged.

He looked into open positions in the area, and we did a few day trips to suss out Gardner, other nearby areas, and look for rentals. (I should point out these "day" trips were 5+ hours each way that we fit in when we could.) Our plan was to rent first, which would make for an easier home buying search. He managed to get a lateral transfer, and I almost got a job myself (they wanted me to start sooner than I could.) We made the leap anyway, figuring I could always find something later.

Our home search was an interesting one (and well documented here). One thing that really helped us out was we had not owned before, and I found a local first time home buyers program that helped us through the process--especially since we knew no one here before moving and had no close by "help".

In the end, our finding Beebe was a lot of luck and good timing. There were some points where we thought things weren't going to work out, but Fortune smiled up these two fools, and we've managed to weather those times.

If you plan to use your home as a B&B, you really need to do more research beyond the usual home purchase. If you've never run a business before, you may be shocked to find out how complicated and expensive some cities and towns make running any business (especially well established touristy areas). There are lots of variables to consider. (Also check if a town has explicitly banned Air B'nB style rentals.)

If your next purchase after the move is meant to be your forever home, will you find yourself buying bigger than you need just so you can have those extra rooms to rent? Will you have to pave over that nice garden on the east side of the house to provide code required parking? Do you plan to always rent right up until you go out feet first for the last time, or do you want to retire at some point before that, ending up with way more home than you can maintain? There are loads of stories out there promoting the Bn'B model, but that doesn't mean it's really good for everyone. It just makes for quaint photo spreads and heart warming stories about how folks finally are living their dreams.

I don't know what you do for a living now, but is there a different business you could run from your home (not necessarily a gig online) instead of hoping for rentals? Maybe there's something you always wanted to learn how to do like piano tuning (or giving lessons if you play), or being a locksmith. You might also consider things like running a small garden designer or home organizer business, even maybe do tax preparation work.

As someone who has made the long distance leap in part due to her love of old homes, I wish you the best with whatever you decide.