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AQUAHOLIC's avatar

My husband, (who was born and raised in Santa Barbara) and I, like to joke, "Living in SB is like being in the Mafia, once you're here, you can never leave". That's true for several reasons, the most pressing being, once you're 'grandfathered' in, you really can't afford to leave and come back at will, and even though our home is worth an absurd amount of $ relative to the rest of the U.S. there aren't many places that are as beautiful physically, or weather-wise as the 'American Riviera'. We spend the largest part of every single day outdoors, comfortable, dry and cool. When we remodeled our home 30 years ago, no one put AC in their homes, so neither did we. We are seriously considering AC now, but went with a ceiling fan in the meantime.... reminds of us all the summers we spent on Kauai! We'd love to downsize and move to a smaller place in CA, but even that feels like an impossible stretch in this obscene housing market. So, in many ways, we feel stuck, stuck in paradise, but still stuck. And now we must consider aging in place, and what does that look like? Lots of stuff to think about as we live out our final ⅓ of life... and it's that finite amount of time that makes landing in a spot that you will love, are comfortable, secure and happy in, pretty damn important.

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Joanne Laird's avatar

Toby - I have known you for a long time and your climate refugee hit home for us too! That is why Larry and I are leaving Maui after 20 years and are taking residence on Victoria Cruises Majestic vessel. Its a big risk / living on a residential cruise ship / but after taking 26 cruises in the past 25 years we are ready to see the world from our suite. We are booked for at least 3 years. Might just stay forever!!

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