As someone who once spent a winter in Minnesota, I heartily disagree with No. 1.
I heartily disagree with not posting the list.
All lists of this type, are dependent on the criteria used to compile the list. The severe winter weather found in a Minnesota town will cause some to take it off a listing such as this. I take it that weather was not among the subjective criteria used by Money magazine.
Agreed. Minnesota is actually a fairly miserable place to live, weather-wise. Sure, the air is pure, there's lots to do outdoors (weather permitting), and those midwestern Lutherans are nice to a fault.
But the summers are *hot* - not Arizona hot, but hot enough with humidity to be miserable. Those 10,000 lakes they brag about mean nearly constant high humidity. Oh, and what's the other thing having 10,000 lakes around means? 10 billion mosquitoes and other bugs. So sure, if you enjoy sweating through your clothes in minutes, and slathering chemicals over all your exposed skin...
Then there are the winters. Cold? As cold as Arizona is hot. So cold the moisture in car exhaust routinely freezes onto the pavement at intersections - creating thin layers of nearly invisible black ice, causing innumerable fender benders at red lights. So cold spilled hot coffee will literally freeze before hitting the ground. Get used to the idea of shoveling the same snow multiple times. It won't melt from November through March, and the wind will keep putting it back where it wants it.
Anyone else notice that most of the "nice" places to live are places you've never heard of before? Or maybe only in passing, or maybe only because you lived somewhere nearby and recognize the town name? I believe there is a reason for that. Places "off the map" that don't attract a lot of attention can be really nice places to live. Get too much publicity - like making this list - and leftists take note and decide they'd like to move out of the third world s**t-holes they've created. They move in, vote for the same dumb ideas they always have, and in the span of a few years can ruin a once nice place to live. Lather, rinse, repeat. Consider lowly Louisville CO as an example. 10 years ago it was #1. Now it has a higher tax rate than 93% of the rest of Colorado. Imagine that.