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Ask HN: How to find a small town to relocate for remote work?

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Re: Ask HN: How to find a small town to relocate for remote work?

#141

Post by strken »

notatoad wrote: post #103

If you are just looking for a cheaper city, you're going to be disappointed by any small town. "A friendly bar" is kind of a big ask in a small town that might only have a couple bars. There could easily not be one that you like. Same with schools - in a city you have choice, in a small town you are going to end up with whatever the local school is. Maybe it's good. Maybe it isn't. And maybe the town that has a frien…

As someone who grew up in a very small town with exactly one pub and no other shops, this is a bit melodramatic. You can just walk in, order a meal and a beer, talk to the publican, and work out for yourself whether you like the place. There's something to like about most pubs.

The shops being further away also isn't a big deal. You'd think it would be annoying, but your habits quickly adapt. After running out of milk a couple of times, you learn to keep a can of evaporated milk in the cupboard. If you're out of eggs, you either have porridge for breakfast, defrost some frozen egg whites, or if it's really important you drive into town. It's not practically a problem.

From what I understand, the real things people struggle with are dealing with being alone, and learning how to have a social life with the different rules and constraints. My mum claims that when a new family moves to town, she can tell if they're going to leave by whether they leave the light on out the front of their house: the ones who're uncomfortable with darkness will go back, the others will stay. It's harder to maintain friendships unless you're organised, so clubs and groups are important to keep you socially active. Even your neighbours are further away and you don't have as many of them, so having a good relationship with them becomes more important than with neighbours in the city. In a small enough town you know everyone you see.

Re: Ask HN: How to find a small town to relocate for remote work?

#142

Post by throwaway787544 »

2Gkashmiri wrote: post #133
throwaway787544 wrote: post #119

I live in the outskirts of a poor rural town in NY. We have 2 bars, some restaurants, a coffee shop, a fast food chain, some dollar stores, a grocery store, hardware store, antiques, gas stations, etc, Library and a little theater, farmers market on weekends. River runs nearby with a put-in for kayaks and fishing. Biggest town/city nearby with big box stores is about 45 minutes. They have fiber internet here but it's…

I'm curious, how do you people deal with medical emergencies? I live in a city and I have 3 24x7 hospitals within walking distance. I have gone dozens of times on foot at 3 in the morning to get medicine.

"It depends."

My town actually has an E.R. and urgent care. We have a CVS in town too (my town has a lot of stuff!!). There are also medical taxis (there are no regular taxis here) and private hire ambulances that'll take you if you need a different hospital.

Typically you get the number of the closest general doc to you, and make good friends with your neighbors, so somebody can drive you to a hospital right away if you cut your leg off in the middle of the night. Could be a long way off or right around the corner, it depends.

The biggest thing I never anticipated? Car parts. My brakes went and rather than bring it to the local mechanics I tried to fix it myself. Walk into town takes about 40 minutes, getting the right parts took weeks.

Power also went in the spring due to freezing rain bringing down trees. Cell signal went, along with power and internet, and my water well's pump is electric; heat is propane but the damn heater's thermostat went, probably electric too. So being prepared to be off-grid once a year is useful.

Re: Ask HN: How to find a small town to relocate for remote work?

#143

Post by hax0rbana »

You have at least some of your requirements already. Pick a few candidate towns and scope them out (home prices, weather, healthcare, public transit, culture, local hangouts, art, whatever appeals to you).

When you think you found a good one, go visit in person and see if it meets expectations.

If you want a specific instance, check out Champaign-Urbana, IL. There's Research Park, the University of Illinois, a bunch of bars and restaurants, fun art sprinkled around town, gigabit fiber and homes are under $200K. We walk to the grocery store with our wagon and just fill it up instead of using a shopping cart. If you come visit, be sure to check out Black Dog (a barbeque joint). https://yourewelcomecu.com/

Re: Ask HN: How to find a small town to relocate for remote work?

#144

Post by missedthecue »

VoodooJuJu wrote: post #131
pontifier wrote: post #39

My method sure hasn't worked very well... or has it? I was looking for cheap warehouse space to start a business in, and did a nation-wide search for the largest, cheapest building in the entire continental US. I found one that seemed too good to be true. a 220,000 sqft metal warehouse and office complex on 17 acres. I thought the price was a typo at $375k.The agent assured me that the price was correct, and I flew o…

>I ended up buying about 75 more properties here You have the kind of money to casually buy up all this real estate, but you still went bargain-hunting for a warehouse? This reads like some kind of LARP or joke.

Judging by the content on his Twitter account he seems legitimate

Re: Ask HN: How to find a small town to relocate for remote work?

#145

Post by hax0rbana »

jbhouse wrote: post #66
duped wrote: post #3

Try the Midwest around rail commuter routes. Most of them developed small yet thriving downtowns that are quite quaint and affordable For example check out Geneva Illinois

illinois winters though...

I'm guessing that is sarcasm? Or you were serious and just never lived in Illinois?

The average temperature barely gets below freezing and rarely get more than a couple inches of snow.

https://www.timeanddate.com/weather/usa/urbana/climate

Re: Ask HN: How to find a small town to relocate for remote work?

#146

Post by newshorts »

tacitusarc wrote: post #118
GauntletWizard wrote: post #45

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Promote yourself and your town. I'm looking for a new home in the same way as the OP, and my best hope is that a few dozen like-minded nerds will gentrify a small town, because they have been so undercut by cities of late.

I’m sure you didn’t intend it this way, but this comment comes across as incredibly arrogant and unfeeling.

Was going to say something similar.

Having grown up in a small idyllic town, there was beauty in the slow struggle to live there.

OP would do well to try and learn the culture before seeking to change it. There’s value beyond “cheaper houses” and “craft beer” in these places.

Re: Ask HN: How to find a small town to relocate for remote work?

#147

Post by noahtallen »

davidw wrote: post #16

I think 'decent airport' is perhaps tricky, at least on the west coast. I think you'll need to be more specific about some other things like how small is too small or how big is too big, and what 'cold' means for you. This site seems to have some good search facilities: https://www.bestplaces.net/ Also agree with the 'college towns' comment.

Lots of other places, too. If you’re not near a moderately sized city, it’ll be at least 1-2 hours drive to an airport that has any commercial flights. Even in more populous rural states like Ohio, that means being pretty close to Cleveland or Columbus. Or in Montana, you’ll just have to accept having very few options even if you live in the second largest city (Missoula).

I’ve lived in more than one small town, and the airports within an hour or two drive were not decent.

Agree about defining small town — for me, that’s under 10k pop, which is extremely limiting. Places others might consider “small towns” (40k pop) I would consider cities.

Re: Ask HN: How to find a small town to relocate for remote work?

#148

Post by inferiorhuman »

jjav wrote: post #139
2Gkashmiri wrote: post #133

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm curious, how do you people deal with medical emergencies? I live in a city and I have 3 24x7 hospitals within walking distance. I have gone dozens of times on foot at 3 in the morning to get medicine.

> I live in a city and I have 3 24x7 hospitals within walking distance. Where is that, just curious? I can't think of any place with three major hospitals within a mile or less?

In San Francisco if you start from St. Mary's: UCSF is 1.1 miles away by car, CPMC Davies is 1.5. If you start at Kaiser's Geary campus: UCSF Mt. Zion is 0.4 miles away, St. Mary's is 1.1 miles away. If you start at SF General: St Luke's and UCSF Children's Hospital are 1.5 miles away – although UCSF only takes pediatric patients and I think Sutter closed the ER at St Luke's because focusing on specialists is more profitable.

In Oakland: Kaiser and Summit ERs are about half a mile from each other and UCSF Children's Hospital is about 1.5 miles away.

Lower Manhattan: Mt Sinai Beth Israel and Bellevue are about a mile away and there's a VA hospital with an ER next to Bellevue.

In Chicago: UI and county are 0.6 miles away by car and Rush is on the other side about 0.4 miles away. UI actually calls this the "Illinois Medical District".

In Seattle: Swedish First Hill and Virginia Mason are 0.4 miles apart. Kindred's right there too but doesn't have an emergency department. UW Harborview does have an ED and is 0.4 miles in the other direction.

Re: Ask HN: How to find a small town to relocate for remote work?

#149

Post by tonfreed »

You also have to remember that the culture is very different in the country. If you've been a city person for a long time, you're probably going to struggle to make any friends until you start acting like the locals.

Not so prevalent in a city where there's enough people to form smaller subcommunities, but in a small town you can't really do that and will need to put in effort to fit in.

Re: Ask HN: How to find a small town to relocate for remote work?

#150

Post by saxonww »

shrubble wrote: post #88
saxonww wrote: post #58

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No they really don't. It was a terrible attitude and a bad comment. The poster would be bringing money into the community. They would be paying taxes; if they buy a house, there will probably be property taxes, which typically support local utilities, schools, libraries, etc. They'd be shopping at local stores. The poster asked about schools, so they probably have or will have at least one kid - so purchasing things…

Every item you mention in your post, only concerns money. Do you see that materialistic attitude as accurately representing your views?

Sure. I think our society uses money as a medium of exchange, and that trade helps communities of all sizes fill gaps in skill and supplies that they're not able to provide on their own.

And I'd also argue that talking about someone paying taxes to support local services is not "only concerned with money," but whatever makes you feel enlightened, I guess.

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