Sometimes trips wind up giving you more than just a pause from everyday life. Heading to any destination during their busy season can bring the best weather, the best fishing, the best restaurants, the best experience, and with that the busiest of crowds. We've now been down to the Hilton Head area three times over the last four years. We took 2025 off due to Tara's wedding and our trip to Ireland. Thankfully, Theresa found a deal with her timeshare putting us at the Barony Beach Resort for $400 for the week, and chose to celebrate her 60th alone with me down there.
It was no doubt different weatherize when we got off the plane in Savannah last Friday with temps hitting the high 70's, but that was short lived. The cold spell that hit from
Maine down to Florida in the coming week had us bundled up with first light temps in the high 20's. So in our travels down there we've experienced the Africa-like temps of their summers and now they're dead of winter Northeast type of winter. Being there off season limited us as far as
activities like the beach, pool, and dining, but gave us the opportunity to explore the area some more, and the possibility of confirming in our minds where we just might wind up.
While it was intended to be a vacation it really became a working trip, both physically and mentally. We didn't "do" Hilton Head and the Lowcountry but used our time to do a lot of exploring of the various towns and communities in and around Hilton Head. We didn't eat out a
lot and most meals were of the fast food and take out variety. For the meals we did sit down for it was usually at one of the restaurants they had in the respective communities we visited. The
first two days we were camped inside Latitude Margaritaville where we had our heads and hearts set as that being our go-to place. We did several open houses through the last weekend and came away with the feeling that that place was for us. And for each small roadtrip we took I was always stopping to scout out the water and the various boat ramps that would hopefully see my boat trailered down to.
Out travels took us to Savannah, Beaufort, Bluffton, Hilton Head which was our base camp, and to Savannah. Theresa has a handful of friends already down there so she was able to visit them while I tagged along. The trip to Charlestown took us to the city center and the parking for the restaurant we were going to was $35. I told her there was a firehouse right near there so I popped in and asked if I could park in the back. In the end I wind up having a beer with the ladies before retreating to the firehouse for a hang in the kitchen for a couple of hours. And with each stop and interaction we had we always asked questions to increase our knowledge of the area and people's opinions of places to move to.
During a few of those conversations we were advised on things to consider before a move down south, which included being "sure" on Latitude Margairtaville. A friend of Theresa's friend lives in Sun City, a place we had dismissed, and invited us over for another look. I thought to myself, "Okay, I'll go, but we already know", being nice, but really thinking it was just a waste of time. But after being there, and rethinking out position, we came out with the lucky realization that Sun City was for us. Game. Set. Match. And so it began.
Sun City is a large, almost town like, 55 and over community located in Bluffton, well most of it, splitting Jasper and Beaufort Counties. It's broken up into four neighborhoods, or time of existence, the South Side, the North side, Riverbend, and the new and under construction West Side. Homes there vary in size and price, with the most affordable, but oldest, in the South, and the newest in the West, where they're higher in price. The thing that this trip did for me was confirm that moving isn't as much as a buying a home, but buying a lifestyle. One that's just not for me, but for Theresa as well. In the back of my mind I always keep the possibility of me checking out before she does, and what will she be left with and where.
That friend of a friend signed us in at the gatehouse and we had a two-day pass. We checked out the Town Center, the three golf courses, gyms, and amenities centers, and ate at two of their restaurants. We stopped people and asked questions, a lot of them. Yes, it's a 55 and over community, and a lot of these folks have been there since the jump, which puts them around 80' ish. But, that's also means those people are aging out and moving on to greener pastures, if you get what I mean, and new blood is moving in. We saw plenty of people in our age bracket, and the ones that were older were far more active and in better shape then we are anyways.
We hooked up with a realtor that we had sat with at Sun City in 2023. Even though we told her we're at least a year away she gave us the full tour which started with a stop at the new build sales office. And then we were off. Sun City can be a bit overwhelming with the various neighborhoods and models to choose from, but we liked what we saw.
If we moved, or when we move, we are looking at about a 1% real estate tax rate coupled with a $3,000 a year HOA fee, which covers everything from the amenities to the landscaping. That would come out to about $6,000 a year, far less than the near $20,000 real estate taxes alone we are staring down in New Jersey. If that alone didn't rattle my brain then the house choices did.
Too small? Too close? Privacy? Those HOA rules? All things to consider, but we'd be buying a lifestyle, not a custom built home on a large wooded lot. No basements, most no stairs, perfect for that post-stroke living. No more leaking, flooding, drafty, grass cutting, snow shoveling, New Jersey living? Sign us up. Now nothing is perfect, and the grass isn't always greener, well it is down there, but the consensus when asking many about the regrets of relocating down there, "We should have done it sooner", adding, "It's hard to find good pizza and bagels." But we found good bagels, and it's just outside the gates of Sun City.
Last year a couple from New Jersey opened Nosh New York Bagels. They're made everyday in New York and flown down to the Lowcountry and cooked onsite. The only
negative was they don't sell those containers of white milk that I like to enjoy with a scooped out and toasted bagel. But once down there I can bring my own and save a couple of bucks at checkout.
And then the question is what would we do down there? How many ceramic crafts and exercise classes can you take? Would we take up golf or pickle ball? Moving down there would probably mean we'd still have to work but how many people hang up their work belts at 58 and 60 respectively? I could, and would love to, learn that fishery and start guiding again. Sitting in Sun City, where 278 and 170 meet, means I have a straight shot to the waters around Hilton Head and Beaufort, depending on which way you turn. And both put you on Port Royal Sound and out into the inshore waters of the Atlantic Ocean. Or we could put our multi-state nursing licenses to work.
While there we did some job searches and Theresa applied for a job and I stopped into the two colleges which are literally attached by border to Sun City. I met with the Dean of the Nursing program at Low Country Community College and she asked when I could start. The other is the University of South Carolina Beaufort- Bluffton Campus, which has a baccalaureate degree nursing program. I could walk through the woods or take our golf cart to work. That surely beats that commute I had to Essex County College, or even my current gig at Capital Health in Trenton.
So we left Hilton Head with a plan, one that we communicated with our real estate agent, "We'll see you in 2027". But then after some talking to each other, and a conversation with my Dad, "Why wait?". And that twisted up my head yet again. Yes, why wait. The only thing we physically have as a life changing anchor is the house, a place where we lay our head and have our worth tied into. And then of course we have our hoarding disorder stuff, and lots of that, but truth be told, anyone who's up there in age and has lived in a place for a bit, has too much stuff as well.
While looking at Zillow can be like looking at a picture at yourself with all kinds of filters added on, the price of real estate just always seems to go up. I have to laugh at Zillow's
$968,800 estimate, but anything remotely close to that would be a big win for us. How nice would it be to live without a mortgage and car and school loans, and of course those oil deliveries, each month? Over at Redfin they have a more realistic range of our home's worth
coming in between $771,000 and $933,000. But getting ourselves and this big old home ready is going to be a huge undertaking, and that would be in time for a spring 2027 move. And what about an early summer 2026 move? Well probably delusional. But really what has to be done? First, get rid of it, all of it. They say when you move down there, "If you have to store it you don't need it". And what's funny is how many storage places there are located around 55 and over places from New Jersey down to Florida. My parents just downsized and they to have a selection of storage units they need to rid themselves of.
So yesterday it began. The start of a new chapter that may take 12 weeks or 12 months to write. We made a pile and dropped it off at the local church thrift store, picked up a bunch of those yellow and black bins from Home Depot, and then started with the what and what doesn't go down with us.
So as I wrap this post up I look out at a second round of snow falling here in Titusville. Yesterday's firing up the snow blower was fun but today it'll be a drag. And looking at the picture above I ask, if that's me to the left do I want to be working on the house and blowing snow in my Golden Years? And really how many years do we have left, and good ones at that? I remember the conversation between Andy Dufrense (Tim Robbins) and Ellis "Red" Redding (Morgan
Freeman), in the 1994 movie, The Shawshank Redemption. (Yes, that came out 32 years ago). When Andy said to Red, "It comes down to a simple choice, really. Get busy living or get busy dying". Well now I have to get busy shoveling before getting busy packing.