Where You Should Live When You Could Live Anywhere
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Summary
Melody Warnick is the author of If You Could Live Anywhere: The Surprising Importance of Place in a Work From Anywhere World, a new book about the importance of place in a work-from-anywhere world. In this episode, we discuss the factors you should include in what she calls a location strategy, from the cost of living in a place, to whether it allows you to build the kinds of relationships you re looking for, and how the place you live can be a part of your purpose in life.
Transcript
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Brett McKay here, and welcome to another edition of the Art of Manliness podcast.
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When we think about people who can live anywhere, we tend to think about corporate employed
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But many other kinds of professionals, from teachers to doctors, could hypothetically
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find a job anywhere, and thus live anywhere they'd like.
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If you're what my guest Melody Warnett calls an anywhere-ist, and have seriously or casually
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considered moving somewhere else, today we'll talk through the factors to consider and
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Melody is the author of If You Could Live Anywhere, The Surprising Importance of Place in a Work
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And in today's conversation, we discuss the factors you should include in what she calls
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a location strategy, from the cost of living in a place, to whether it allows you to build
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We also talk about how the place you live can be part of your purpose in life, and the
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elements that contribute to an overall quality of life.
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After the show's over, check out our show notes at aom.is slash anywhere.
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All right, Melody Warnick, welcome back to the show.
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So we had you on a couple years ago to talk about your book, This Is Where You Belong,
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and it's where you highlight this research about this idea of place attachment, where
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it's like why we feel like we belong to a place, why we like a place where we live.
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And you use that research to provide insights about how people can learn to love the place
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You got a new book out, similar theme of place attachment, but it's called If You Could Live
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Anywhere, and it's all about picking a place you love, so you'll move there.
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What made you explore this idea of how to pick an optimal place to live?
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So I'm kind of obsessed with the idea of place in general, but even before the pandemic,
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we kind of forget this, but lots of people were starting to shift to remote work.
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We were seeing towns offering $10,000 bonuses to people who were remote workers who would
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And so I started just noticing also that in my own hometown of Blacksburg, Virginia, people
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were arriving who weren't coming there for any particular job.
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It was just they could live anywhere, and they had done some research, and this was the
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So I became really interested in how people were making those choices.
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And then on the flip side, I was starting to speak with economic developers and chambers
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of commerce, doing some speaking related to this is where you belong.
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And that made me aware of this whole underworld of community economic development agencies who
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are desperately trying to attract talent and retain them.
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And so I just became curious about that kind of connection between communities who want
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people and people who are looking for the right community to live.
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Yeah, I hope we can talk about that because my own town, Tulsa, is sort of on the vanguard
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of that, of paying people to come to move here.
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But you make this case that a lot of jobs today are what you call anywarist careers.
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And then we'll talk about some of the surprising ones you wouldn't think would be anywarist
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So I think when people think anywarist, and that's just kind of the term I use for anyone
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who's a location-independent worker in some way, we automatically think of remote workers.
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And that can be these days, you know, almost anything, writers and marketers and coders and
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A lot of jobs that didn't used to be remote have gone remote.
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Something like 30% of Americans have the option of working remotely five days a week.
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So this is not an insignificant number of people, but anywarists are not just remote workers.
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I think of them also as just anyone who has greater than average autonomy when it comes
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So that could be a gig worker or a freelancer or an entrepreneur or a retiree.
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You know, maybe not your Broadway actors who, you know, are still tied to a specific place
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or your dolphin trainers, you know, who kind of have limited options where they're going
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But the other part of this is that even if you're not a remote worker, a lot of people
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are kind of realizing, hey, I have one of those jobs that really can be done almost anywhere.
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They're teachers, they're doctors, they're lawyers, they're builders, they're designers.
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So the jobs aren't necessarily portable, but a lot of people have kind of that anywhere-ist
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moment where they're making that choice about where to start the career or where to go next.
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And the answer might not be just any place, but you probably have more choice than you think,
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even if you're not completely location independent.
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Right, it's like a lot of jobs, they're in demand everywhere.
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So I think you mentioned one person, she was a like a reading specialist for elementary school
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And so she could just go, she could live anywhere.
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Like she could literally, but it's tied to a specific place, but she could be any place.
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She and her husband were living in Santa Cruz and realized that their careers were,
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you know, they weren't exactly remote, but they could be done in a lot of different places.
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And so they did this huge road trip all over the country and explored lots of different
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places, eventually settled in Graham, North Carolina, a small town in North Carolina, not
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And for the first time in their lives, they could afford to buy a house.
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And that meant that Janae could start a business baking sourdough bread.
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And so really that shift in location changed a lot of things about their lives.
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Well, so what this makes us interesting, this is a different dynamic from maybe what our
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Your parents would just, they'd go to the, they'd move someplace because the job was there,
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You had to make, you had to learn to love the place you live, right?
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Like the first book would be for that type of person.
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My husband got a job at Virginia Tech, you know, academics are one of those people that
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are kind of semi-anywhereist where they have moments of being able to choose, but aren't
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And, you know, there's this feeling of you only have so many choices, you're going to
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But I think for a lot of people, just our relationship, our expectation from our place
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It used to be that people just, they got the job and they went wherever the job was
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And now there's some research that people who are graduating college choose the city where
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they want to land first and then they get the job.
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So, you know, being in the right place is the most important thing in that equation.
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And I think it's important for most of us, maybe even more than we think.
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Well, this is a challenge though, because I think a lot of people who could work from anywhere,
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they don't take advantage of that because like choosing where to live, it's just like
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And there's so many factors and it can overwhelm people.
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For example, my wife and I, we could work from anywhere, but we've been in Tulsa, Oklahoma
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We don't plan on moving anytime soon, probably ever.
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So why is it that, you know, are some anywhereist game for moving?
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Because I'm sure there are other people, you highlight people in the book, they're going
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to try different places, but others like us aren't.
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I actually think that you're maybe the best case scenario.
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You know, I think when people all of a sudden realize that they have that freedom to move
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anywhere, that they are location independent, it's sort of this heady moment.
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And people feel like, oh, we're wasting that if we don't move.
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But the reality is, you know, not everyone needs to move and you shouldn't feel like you
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So I divide anywhereist into kind of three broad groups.
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There are wanderers who are just people who really crave adventure.
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These are maybe more like digital nomads, people who are trying out lots of different
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places and aren't in the mindset of really trying to settle any particular place.
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And then there are seekers who are a lot of the people I write about in the book who
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have that freedom to be location independent, and they want to make the most of it.
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And so they're sort of in that process of actively looking.
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But the third category is what I call settlers.
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And those are people who maybe have that freedom to move, but don't need it because they're
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And, you know, in my mind, you know, I wrote a lot in This Is Where You Belong about the
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If you're in a place that you love, that's serving you and your family, you've probably
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There's no reason to just think, well, geez, my boss just came and told me that I can work
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So, so I need to find, you know, I need to find my new city, you find your new city, if
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you are drawn to that, if that's going to be something beneficial for you right now, but
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you certainly don't need to feel like you're some sort of, you know, remote worker loser
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So how do you figure out what kind of anywhere you are?
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Is it just sort of feeling like, well, yeah, if I just want to stay here, I'm a, I'm a
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Yeah, I tend to think it is just kind of your mindset around moving and that can change
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throughout your time and a place, you know, for a lot of people, it's like, we really loved
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this city when we were young and single, and now we're starting to have kids and it's just
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not working for us quite as well as it used to.
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So we definitely go through, you know, we're not necessarily just one or the other permanently.
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Well, if you are in a place where you can move anywhere and you think you might want
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to move, you recommend developing what you call a location strategy.
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And that involves thinking about going deep into, you know, what's worked for you in the
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past, the kinds of places you're drawn to, and what elements of your life are the most
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important to you that you're looking for in a community.
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For example, might be if you have kids, really good schools are important, or you want, you
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And then you also recommend, you know, thinking about those deal breakers.
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You know, maybe you can't deal with a place where it's a hundred degrees plus in the summer,
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or, you know, you can't deal with like just a long, bleak winter.
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And then you think about in the book, you focus on some big overarching factors you might
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want to consider when you're developing your location strategy.
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The first one you talk about in the book is recognition.
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What do you mean by a community giving you recognition?
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So it's kind of going back to that idea we were talking about where there is this whole
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So there are communities out there that want you.
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And it's sort of like an echo of what we might look for in our workplace, right?
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For people to be truly satisfied at work, they need to feel recognized and rewarded and
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I think towns kind of, especially when we're location independent or remote workers, towns
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They're providing some of those things that we've always saw in our workplaces and towns
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So I started thinking about, you know, what are the ways that towns sort of recognize us?
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And I think it starts with a community that is willing to welcome you.
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You mentioned Tulsa Remote, which I think is the original program started in 2018 that
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started offering $10,000 to remote workers who were willing to relocate to Tulsa.
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And, you know, it was like BYOJ, bring your own job.
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And to date, around 3,000 people have done that and have brought, you know, all these
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And it's gone so well that dozens and dozens of cities across the country have started similar
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So you have like Bentonville, Arkansas, that is offering $10,000 and a bike to ride on the
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Other cities are offering free land to build a house on or a discount if you buy a home
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here or we'll help you pay off your student loans.
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There's a website called Make My Move that catalogs these offers.
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So a town doesn't have to pay you to move there per se to be a welcoming place.
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I talk about Iowa City and Cedar Rapids, Iowa that created a program.
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And if you were someone who was moving to the area, you would get matched with sort of
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a community mentor who would take you out to lunch.
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They would maybe take you to a community event.
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So I really like to look at what our community is doing to show that they're welcoming places,
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that they're open to you, and that this is a place where you can settle in and build a life.
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And so that's kind of what I think about when I think about recognition in a community.
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So you also have another factor to think about in your location strategy, and that's
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How can living in a place make you feel wealthier?
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So that is one of the, probably the number one motivator behind mobility among location
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independent people is this idea that you can basically give yourself a raise by moving
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So, you know, for instance, if you're in San Francisco, and your job is remote, and your
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boss says, yeah, feel free to move anywhere, and you'll make the same salary.
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If you move to, say, San Antonio, Texas, it's like getting a 200% raise, because the cost
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of living in San Antonio is about 43% of what it is in San Francisco.
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So, you know, some companies do adjust salaries depending on where you live, but there are
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definitely places where your money will go farther, and a good cost of living calculator
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I think for most of us, you know, we're looking at home prices, which have skyrocketed in the
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And so the thought of moving to a community where, hey, I can afford to buy a home or I
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can save, you know, several hundred thousand dollars if I live in, you know, this small
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That's a huge factor in quality of life, right?
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If you have all of a sudden a lot more spare cash.
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You know, we think about things like transportation costs or food costs, healthcare, entertainment,
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And that's a term for this way of kind of using your location to gain a monetary advantage.
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For a lot of people, that's simply something like moving to a state that has no state income
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tax or moving to a state that has lower property taxes than you're used to.
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Some people even, you know, move to other countries.
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You know, if you are willing to go be an expat in Costa Rica or Portugal, you can have a really
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And I think that is, you know, a huge factor for a lot of anywhere.
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A lot of people move from really expensive places like from California, for example.
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That's the one you hear about in the news all the time to cheaper places because they're
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trying to take advantage of their jobs now remote because they had to go remote and they're
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Yeah, and unfortunately, the side effect of that is that those Californians are driving
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Yeah, I'm always, I love, you know, I do the Zillow thing.
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We're always comparing like, oh, you have a friend moving to California from Tulsa and
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you see what, you know, how much does a house go for in California?
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It's always shocking to me because it's like this like tiny home that would be, you know,
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It's like $700,000, $800,000, something like a million dollars.
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And like, if you move from California to Tulsa, you would be, you could buy a mansion for like
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what an average home would go for in California.
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And people do, you know, like I remember we lived in Ames, Iowa for six years.
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My husband was in grad school there and we had friends who, or they became our friends
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who moved from California to this, you know, little college town in Iowa.
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And they had the nicest house of anyone that we knew.
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And I don't think it was that they were just rich.
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It was just that they had owned a home in California and they sold it and they moved
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to Iowa and they were like, you know, we're millionaires now, apparently, you know, like
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there's this other thing that happens where we kind of create these anchor points for pricing
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And that's why when you're moving from one part of the country to another, it can be shocking,
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you know, the differences in prices, sometimes in good ways and sometimes in bad ways, you
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know, like a really hard move if they moved back from Iowa to California, just because
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So if you're anywhere, you've got some ways to make some money here.
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So first you got cities that are probably going to pay you money to move there.
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Tulsa will pay you $10,000 to move here if you're a remote worker.
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And if you're moving from California to Tulsa, you're going to save a bunch of money on cost
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So this is, it could be, you could, it could be substantial.
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And this is, you know, as we've looked at remote workers and location independent workers
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making these choices, cost of living and affordability is number one for everyone.
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And I think that's probably even more true now after a year of inflation and crazy real
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So it really is a huge factor when people think about where to live next.
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Are there any calculators that you recommend checking out online off the top of your head
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CNN, CNN.com has a good cost of living calculator.
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There's just a ton out there and, you know, don't put all your belief in a single cost of
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living calculator because those numbers do change.
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But if you're making this decision for yourself and thinking of moving to a place based on
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affordability, definitely take the step to really research for yourself.
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You know, how much am I going to pay for car insurance here?
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Or will I have to fill a boiler with oil at the beginning of winter?
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You know, expenses really can shift from one area of the country to another.
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You know, like you think of New Yorkers, one of the most expensive cities in the world,
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And so there are different things that can kind of balance out some of the expenses in
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We're going to take a quick break for your words from our sponsors.
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So another value to consider in your location strategy as an Anywhereist is connection.
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So connection, I just mean relationships with other humans where you live.
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And that I think is probably the number one most important thing that people can have if
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they want to be happy in a place, if they really want to be a settler and, you know,
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Like people, towns have personalities, which can be hard to pick up on if you're just visiting.
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But, you know, you think about who are the kinds of people you like to hang out with typically,
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I've done some location coaching recently, you know, helping people make these decisions
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And one woman I talked to, I think, took a really great approach.
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She was considering Denver versus Bozeman, Montana.
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And so she would do visits to these cities, and she would kind of strike up conversations
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So she would go to the yoga class, you know, find a local yoga class.
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And then afterwards, she would kind of like try and talk to a couple people and invite
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And, you know, if that was a success, that was a pretty good sign that she could find her
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So I think, you know, for a lot of us making these Anywhere's moves, we're not necessarily
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moving to a place where we already have a lot of friends, although some of us are, that's
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But, you know, when you're looking at a community, try and figure out where do you imagine meeting
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What are your entry points going to be to this community?
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You know, the internet can be an awesome place for friends.
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It doesn't replace in-person friends in a new community, but I think it can facilitate
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So you throw out online, you know, on Facebook or Instagram or whatever, hey, I'm thinking
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And you start having, you know, coffee dates with people.
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And that can kind of give you a sense of, will I be able to make friends here?
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And so that's an important thing because you might move someplace and let's say you have
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I can't, I can't think of a hobby off the top of my, like fly fishing.
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I did some fly fishing this weekend, but you move to a place and you want someone to fly
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Well, I mean, you probably live with it, but it'd probably be better to move.
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If that's important to you, you might want to move someplace where there's an active,
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And just kind of identifying that beforehand, like, oh, I really love to play rugby.
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Is there a group in this town or nearby that plays rugby?
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You know, like those have been my friends in the past and they don't necessarily have to
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be your friends in the future, but if that's something that's important to you, identify
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if there's a community for that in this new place that you're thinking about and sort of
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find out how can I tap into that when I get there?
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You know, no matter where you go, it's important to remember that moving sucks and you're very
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likely going to have a period of time where you feel a little lonely and, you know, it's
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But if you can give yourself that head start of, you know, I'm going to go to this yoga
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class and I'm going to take my dog to this dog park.
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If you know that there's a few concrete things that you can do to try and make friends, I
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think it makes you feel a little better about it.
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Well, and speaking of communities having their own personality, you know, some communities
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But for some people that might actually be bad because like, ah, to them, it's like
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Like that's important to, like, it might be, I'm going to move to this rural town and
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like the sense of community is good, but it might not fit your personalities.
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And, you know, you just might not be the small town person, you know, like towns sort of
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And one of the things I talk about in This Is Where You Belong, which is really about,
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you know, hey, you landed in this town, you hate it, here's what you do now, was learning
00:25:23.320
So, you know, the example for me is I moved to a college town, college football is really
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So even though I don't care at all about football, I want to be into what my town is into.
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And so I have made an effort along those lines to sort of embrace football to a point.
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But if you can identify that beforehand, like this is what I love to do with my time.
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You can kind of check out whether that's something that's happening in your community, whether
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I talk in the book about a woman who was on a road trip with her husband and they fell
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in love with this small Midwestern town that had really adorable homes that were affordable
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and just kind of on a whim, they decided to move there.
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People were indeed friendly, but they just realized fairly quickly that they just didn't fit in.
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And so she became very focused about figuring out where are we going next, did a ton of research.
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You know, for her, it was important to be in a community that had yarn shops and movie
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And, you know, her, she identified her dream place was Eugene, Oregon.
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So a far cry from a small town in the Midwest, but sometimes we have to have the experience
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that wasn't a fit to really identify what the fit would be.
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What related to this idea of connection is family or, you know, proximity to family.
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When you talk to people who are considering moving, is living by family a big factor?
00:27:08.180
It is for some people and it's not for other people.
00:27:11.300
It's one of those things where for some people, that is the thing that they're trying to get
00:27:16.940
closer to parents or siblings or, you know, maybe adult children.
00:27:22.100
And for other people, it's more like, how far away can I get from these family members?
00:27:29.040
We definitely saw that as a driver of moves during COVID.
00:27:32.980
You know, I think that was an aha moment for a lot of people.
00:27:36.780
I live on the other side of the country from my family and all of a sudden there's this,
00:27:42.940
you know, pandemic that's going to keep me from having any contact with them for a long
00:27:50.120
And studies have shown that almost half of Americans during COVID had some sort of reassessment
00:28:00.660
And I have to imagine that family factored big into some of those decisions, you know,
00:28:06.880
like having support as you raise kids or being near aging parents.
00:28:12.460
So I think there's also research that shows if you live within an hour of several family
00:28:22.100
So I think family should be a big consideration, at least a consideration in the sense of you
00:28:29.640
need to decide really intentionally whether this is important to you to be near family.
00:28:36.460
And, you know, it's okay to decide that it isn't, but it's something that everyone probably
00:28:43.700
My family, in our mobile years, never really prioritized living near parents and siblings.
00:28:55.340
Most of our family is in the West, Arizona and Idaho and Utah.
00:29:00.580
And I have to say that there's a little regret there, honestly.
00:29:08.700
And every so often they kind of complain about, they didn't really know their grandparents really
00:29:13.380
well, or they didn't really know their cousins.
00:29:15.960
And, you know, we're always making trade-offs like that when we decide where to live.
00:29:21.200
So, you know, that's a question to ask yourself.
00:29:24.140
What are you going to regret most when you make a choice about where to live?
00:29:29.960
Because in my experience talking to people about this issue, it's like the grass is always
00:29:35.560
It's like people who live away from their families, like, oh, I wish I...
00:29:43.160
And my, you know, the kids can know their cousins.
00:29:45.340
And then the people who live by their family, like, oh my gosh, I need to get away from
00:29:49.380
There's like so much drama and it's just crazy.
00:29:54.920
I think you don't know until you actually do it.
00:29:57.640
Yeah, it definitely is super complicated and it makes life complex.
00:30:01.700
We actually had friends here in Virginia who just a couple months ago picked up and moved
00:30:07.680
back near family, didn't have a job, just decided this is the thing that really matters to us.
00:30:15.640
And so far, based on what I've seen on her, you know, Facebook account, they're super happy
00:30:22.800
You know, they're doing dinners with parents and siblings and cousins are playing with each
00:30:28.400
So, you know, maybe that's like the idealized honeymoon phase of living near family.
00:30:33.740
You have a couple months where you're just like, this is amazing.
00:30:37.760
And then all of a sudden there's, yeah, the drama and the angst of it.
00:30:48.380
So another factor is this idea, a community can help you feel a sense of purpose.
00:30:56.460
So that, again, kind of goes back to this idea that, you know, our town can sort of provide
00:31:03.060
some of the things that typically we've looked for in our workplaces.
00:31:07.540
There was a study that Adam Grant did with Facebook where they surveyed thousands and
00:31:12.700
thousands of Facebook employees all over the world and asked them what mattered most to
00:31:17.160
them in their job, what helped them be engaged and feel satisfied with their work.
00:31:22.320
And it sort of boiled down to what I call the three P's, profession, people, and purpose.
00:31:28.340
So profession just being people want to feel like they are good at their job, they're learning
00:31:35.760
People is you want to feel like you like your boss and your colleagues.
00:31:39.380
But purpose was this category of people want to feel like the work they're doing hasn't an
00:31:46.580
impact in the world, that it's making some sort of positive effect on the world.
00:31:51.100
And the reality is, how many of us have a job like that, right?
00:31:58.960
But if you're a bookkeeper or a marketer, you may not find that sense of purpose in your
00:32:06.000
work, but you absolutely can find it in your community.
00:32:09.660
I think there's lots of ways where we can feel like we're having a positive impact in the
00:32:16.440
world and we're creating meaning for ourself when we get really deeply involved in a community.
00:32:22.420
You know, we start volunteering for local organizations.
00:32:25.840
We build relationships in our community, maybe mentor people.
00:32:31.260
We start a nonprofit or raise money or become a friendly neighbor.
00:32:36.720
We're really fairly simple actions that can help us remember sort of what we want big
00:32:48.360
So maybe you can look for a place if there's something that's really like a cause that's
00:32:53.060
Like if, I don't know, conservation is really important to you.
00:32:56.860
Maybe there's like a small town where that's, you know, sustainable farming is a thing where
00:33:03.780
I'm thinking like church, like that's a big part of people's purpose in life for a lot
00:33:09.220
And maybe you pick a place where there's a vibrant church community there, or maybe you
00:33:14.080
go to a place where it's not that vibrant and you feel like you can get things going
00:33:20.360
I actually, a really great point that, you know, one of the things that I do in the
00:33:25.820
book is talk about, I talk about a lot of small towns because that's kind of my,
00:33:30.000
my secret mission here is to make people give smaller towns a second look.
00:33:36.380
I think a lot of them have a great quality of life to offer, but we don't need to move
00:33:43.740
And that can kind of be part of the purpose is choosing a place that needs you, you know,
00:33:48.560
that needs your contributions to become even better.
00:33:52.640
Not like you need to choose a place like, oh my gosh, this place is so crappy.
00:33:57.360
But, you know, moving to a place with that mindset of contributing there instead of just
00:34:03.060
expecting the place to magically meet all your needs.
00:34:07.560
There's someone in our congregation of church that's like, why'd you move here?
00:34:13.300
And I'm like, that's like, do you have a job or anything?
00:34:20.640
I've heard that story from a lot of people, honestly, you know, people who are spiritual
00:34:28.160
or religious allow themselves to be drawn to particular places.
00:34:33.120
They maybe don't even know why, but, you know, that's pretty common to feel like God
00:34:40.720
And I think that that's, you know, that's a real thing that we all kind of have missions
00:34:47.800
in life that we're fulfilling and we fulfill them in our, in our towns, in, in our cities.
00:34:54.500
It's the whole, you know, think globally, act locally.
00:34:58.880
And so wherever you end up, that's the local where you're going to act and where you have
00:35:10.940
What factors contribute to your happiness in a community?
00:35:15.200
So I talked about affordability being something huge that a lot of Anywhere's are looking for.
00:35:20.120
The second thing that Anywhere's are looking for is quality of life, which is a really sort
00:35:26.640
of nebulous term that I like to describe as just your access to the things that make you
00:35:35.780
So we know that there are a few things that have been proven to, to make people happy in
00:35:43.400
You know, people having social connections is a huge one.
00:35:48.220
People tend to feel more content in places that are walkable.
00:35:53.400
There was a study, um, uh, about a decade ago from the Knight Foundation in Gallup that found
00:35:59.700
that the three most important factors to people feeling satisfied in the place they live are
00:36:09.700
So feeling like the place you live is beautiful, feeling like your place has things to do and
00:36:17.200
people to do them with, and feeling like your place is welcoming.
00:36:24.460
But again, those vary dramatically from person to person.
00:36:29.380
You know, what, what I find beautiful in a place may not be what you find beautiful in
00:36:34.780
So it's kind of becoming, you know, familiar with what that looks like for you.
00:36:41.380
And I sort of think, you know, understanding what in your daily life will bring you joy.
00:36:48.360
One of the stories I tell in the book is of a couple, Amy and James Hebden, who were living
00:36:54.880
Amy started her own business and James joined her.
00:36:59.080
They could move anywhere and Seattle was really expensive.
00:37:03.420
So they started this process of looking around, but their number one consideration was honestly
00:37:10.200
You know, they really wanted to raise chickens.
00:37:13.860
They were excited about having the chicken kind of life and, you know, like having a garden
00:37:23.820
That was really high on their list of what's going to make us happy in our daily life.
00:37:29.520
And so they, they ended up in a town in Tennessee and, and are doing really well there.
00:37:35.180
So I think if you can sort of identify, you know, having a place where I go every morning
00:37:41.240
to grab coffee is going to make me happy or having a great library is going to make me
00:37:47.000
Those are kind of the quality of life factors that matter to you.
00:37:51.520
And that should be on your location strategy list for sure.
00:37:55.960
You talk about, you highlight the mayor of Paris, Texas.
00:37:58.960
She had an initiative to make it a 15 minute city where anyone, you can get to anywhere
00:38:03.160
in the city in 15 minutes, whether by foot or public transport or bike.
00:38:07.300
Like I kind of like, that's one of the things I love about Tulsa is that you can get anywhere
00:38:13.500
You can get downtown in 20 minutes, have a great meal and then get back home in 20 minutes.
00:38:18.300
But then it's also, I love the location because we've, we're like really close to nature, but
00:38:25.280
I would hate to live someplace where I'd have to drive hours to get someplace remote.
00:38:32.000
We got the Apple store, we've got a big arena, Taylor Swift comes, but then I can go
00:38:44.540
This is what you do when you love a place, you know, you develop this thing called place
00:38:49.720
attachment, which is just those feelings of being at home.
00:38:53.400
And one of the signs of place attachment is actually, I like to tell other people about
00:39:02.020
Like, Hey guys, Tulsa is the best and you should come live here.
00:39:06.200
If you live in California, you can buy a mansion in Tulsa and then we'll go to the
00:39:10.480
Let's get all the Californians to relocate in Tulsa.
00:39:14.260
We got like nice trails along the Arkansas river.
00:39:18.600
So this is all, all these factors are, they're really abstract.
00:39:21.340
Like you can go online and do some research in these different Facebook groups, but you,
00:39:26.880
you don't really know until you actually visit the place.
00:39:29.940
Like how do you, let's say you, you, you've created this spreadsheet of different places.
00:39:34.560
Do you recommend just actually going there and kind of giving these places a test, test
00:39:41.400
I don't recommend moving to a place that you've never been to, which I know happens.
00:39:45.920
I met a woman who lives a couple of towns over from me recently and she moved during COVID
00:39:52.820
was an anywhereist could go anywhere in the world.
00:39:57.160
And she and her husband got on Zillow and fell in love with a house and just bought it
00:40:02.640
sight unseen and moved to the small town in Virginia.
00:40:05.740
And when I met her, she was kind of like, we love the house, but, but the town, not so
00:40:12.920
So I think there's, you know, a high capacity for disappointment if you're just, if you're
00:40:21.300
doing that, if you're buying a home and you've never been there.
00:40:24.140
So certainly I recommend that people visit bearing in mind that being a tourist in town is not
00:40:31.260
So, you know, I mentioned people who have done, you know, a month in each in different
00:40:38.240
cities or who have done a road trip around the country.
00:40:43.180
If you can do, if you can swing that, I think that's a great approach.
00:40:49.440
So I think, you know, doing a visit, kind of absorbing the vibe in a place is really helpful.
00:40:57.900
Doing your research to figure out how much of the things you're looking for does this
00:41:05.580
But I think kind of the addendum to that is that no matter where you live, you will almost
00:41:12.880
certainly get to a point where you think you've made a terrible mistake.
00:41:18.260
And that's because, A, no town is perfect, and it may take you a hot minute to discover
00:41:25.080
why, but B, it takes a while for us to fall in love with communities.
00:41:32.380
Place attachment peaks about five years after you move somewhere, and five years is a long
00:41:39.140
time to feel like you don't necessarily fit in.
00:41:43.880
So I think, you know, we can choose to be intentional about falling in love with the
00:41:52.480
place that we've chosen, even though, you know, once you move there, you might discover
00:41:59.340
And also, you know, none of these decisions have to be permanent.
00:42:03.700
You don't have to stay in a place that turned out to be horrible for you.
00:42:09.340
But I think you got to give yourself a lot of grace, and you have to give your new community
00:42:16.700
This is just a process, even, you know, no matter how carefully you've chosen, it just
00:42:23.040
is going to take a little while to really fall in love with that community.
00:42:30.540
I think, I imagine the best way to do a test run is instead of staying in a hotel there,
00:42:37.580
So you actually feel what it's like to live, right?
00:42:40.360
Because, like, the hotel is usually off by the highway, and it's different.
00:42:46.560
And then, yeah, give it time, because it takes a while to get that place in attachment.
00:42:50.640
And then, yeah, don't be afraid to course correct.
00:42:54.260
They went to Iowa, and they're like, we don't like Iowa or the Midwest, wherever they were,
00:43:00.820
Yeah, so you definitely can course correct, but don't course correct too soon.
00:43:06.520
You know, be as intentional as you were about creating a location strategy for yourself
00:43:11.300
and being really thoughtful about where you wanted to live.
00:43:14.300
You should be just as intentional and thoughtful about settling into the place and trying to
00:43:23.120
So, yeah, I think doing a test run, staying in an Airbnb, trying to meet people, attending
00:43:28.800
community events, eating at local restaurants instead of McDonald's, like, living like a
00:43:35.280
local would live, you know, a week isn't probably enough time, but it will certainly give you
00:43:40.720
a sense of what life would be like in this place, which I think is what we're all imagining
00:43:46.720
You know, what would it be like to live in this place?
00:43:49.680
Well, Melody, this has been a great conversation.
00:43:51.000
Where can people go to learn more about the book and your work?
00:43:54.060
You can go to my website, which is my name, MelodyWarnick.com, and I have links to my
00:44:00.140
books, This Is Where You Belong, and If You Could Live Anywhere, and you can also subscribe
00:44:04.100
to my newsletter, which is all about place and why it's so important to us.
00:44:16.660
She's the author of the book, If You Could Live Anywhere.
00:44:18.520
It's available on Amazon.com and bookstores everywhere.
00:44:20.640
You can find more information about her work at our website, MelodyWarnick.com.
00:44:24.320
Also, check out our show notes at AOM.is slash anywhere, where you can find links to resources
00:44:29.400
Well, that wraps up another edition of the AOM Podcast.
00:44:39.240
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00:44:42.820
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