Interesting summary, but it doesn’t take taxes into account. South Dakota, Florida, Tennessee are probably the best places to retire. Also, if you retire to a rural area, you can avoid high property taxes that are levied in suburban school districts.
“if you retire to a rural area, you can avoid high property taxes that are levied in suburban school districts.”
Yup—folks thinking about retirement should spend the time to create a budget—even if they don’t think they need to—just to understand what their expenses look like.
Property tax is a big one—if you can keep that reasonable you need a lot less income.
The higher income you need to pay high property taxes is taxed by the income tax—so you are being double taxed.
Likewise if you are driving less once retired you do not need a fancy new car—and that saves on property tax on the vehicle.
That was one reason we did not move to Texas—the property tax would be a big hit—and could get a lot worse.
State income tax was less of an issue because our taxed income was not going to need to be that high.
Biggest problem with TN for retirees is that pesky sky high sales tax on everything.
If your retired, a no-income tax state really doesn’t matter unless you are really withdrawing big bucks.