When the 2700 square foot house across the street from us sold, and turned into a rental, that was our cue to leave a neighborhood and a city that had been steadily deteriorating for the past ten years.
It broke our hearts, because it used to be a beautiful little city, but the crime, the congestion, the quality of life destroyed, left us with no other choice.
We're now in a tiny little town on the Oregon Coast. The weather this past winter was quite challenging, but it's quiet and peaceful here. We still get a lot more rain and a lot less warm sunshine than we did in California, but we're content. We were just getting too darned old to put up with all the craziness in California.
If it makes you feel any better, the weather in California sucked this winter. We had seven weeks of nothing but rain in the Bay Area.
I understand why you felt the need to leave. Things are bad enough now, but if we get a demonrat governor, I may have to pack my bags, too.