Visit first. I considered ID when I fled CA about 8 years ago. It didn’t fit for us. We are pretty much rural/suburban people. I like to live by farms, but be able to drive into a real city within 30-45 minutes. I like to be at the supermarket and some other shopping within 10 minutes.
I’m going to mostly tell you the downsides, but really Idaho is a great fit for a lot of people. Every state will have its + and -, and everybody needs to find what fits. These are pretty much all the reasons why, even though we thought ID would be perfect, we didn’t move there.
Boise is isolated from other large cities. There are not a lot of great job options, even in the best of economic times. It’s just not big enough, so unless you work something with jobs everywhere (retail, restaurants), you are stuck. I don’t know how old you are or how many careers you’ve had yet, but remember that what you are doing right now is not necessarily what you’ll be doing next year. A layoff means you have a good chance of needing to move cross-country again. You also have to drive a really long time to get to museums and things that a larger city could offer. The upside is that Boise is really beautiful and has kind of a “small town” feel for a city.
If you want to move to a small town, be sure you don’t choose one that is mostly Mormon, unless you are also Mormon. You’ll be excluded, and Mormons will generally not patronize a non-Mormon business when there is an alternative Mormon-run business.
Rural areas can be a big shock for “city folk” who think “country folk” are all nice and “quaint.” You can run into some really bad people in the country. There is entrenched poverty, and there are meth issues.
Bluntly, the ID suburban areas look “poor” compared to other areas of the country. I drove through the surrounding areas to Boise, and one of the other “large” cities in ID, and there just wasn’t much to offer us.
Too many Californians. (lol)
The weather is really cold in the winter, but seriously, get a jacket and learn to layer. With modern AC/Heating, modern cars, and good snow removal, winter weather is no big deal (for me).
Things have changed a bit since you were here last. About 1/2 a million people live in the Treasure Valley, including 205,000 in Boise. We even have indoor plumbing now!
Did you visit Idaho?
It’s funny how perceptions vary. I live in the middle, also in the middle of nowhere. To me, Boise is the big city and I avoid it like the plague. I was there 4 years ago, I think. The people out here are mostly friendly, minus the few jerks which are in every population. They are miners, ranchers, and regular people. There is a goodly number of Mormons. I’m not, but we all deal with each other because it is 150 miles to the nearest Walmart or Home Depot. There are little museums in the three nearest towns.
I lived in southern ID a while, north of Twin Falls. I wouldn’t exactly call it wet or green or cool. The fields are green during irrigation season, everything else is sagebrush or cheat grass, waiting on a lightning strike. And it is hot down there if you are used to the cooler and higher mountains.
There seems to be almost no meth problems in the area. I think it is too isolated so those types migrate to where the supply is better.
Bring a job with you, just to be safe.
* Arizona
* Arkansas
* California
* Florida
* Georgia
* Idaho
* Illinois
* Indiana
* Kentucky
*Maryland
* New York
* North Carolina
* Oklahoma
* Tennessee
* Texas
Idaho is the only state that you'd have to fight me to get me to leave. Texas was nice, as was Arizona, and if I weren't here I'd be in one of those two. But Idaho is the home I'd always wanted, and didn't find soon enough. Museums and opera houses be damned...if you want quality of life, Idaho is the place to be.
The rural/suburban environment close to shopping can be found all over SW Idaho. Eagle, Middleton, Star, Kuna, Melba, Homedale, etc, etc, etc. I live in West Boise, not two miles from the busiest intersection in the state (Eagle Rd and Fairview Ave), yet in 45 minutes, I can either be out in the desert, or at elevation 8,000' in the mountains.
BTW, Mormons aren't boogeymen either. I have a good number of Mormon friends, and they're just good folks. If you tell them you're not interested, they'll generally back off. That's the case both in the Pocatello area and the Boise area, both of which I've lived in.
Idaho's not for everyone, just people who are looking for a damn good quality of life, rock-ribbed conservative neighbors, and extremely low crime rates. Even after TSHTF, I seriously doubt the JBTs will even come here, because they're vastly outnumbered by the fiercely independent and well-armed citizenry.
Check out my song "Sweet Home Idaho"...it sums up what I feel about my adopted home state. It's track #5 in the Music section of the left sidebar.
Big Dawg Music Mafia - AJ Anonymous' page
Scouts Out! Cavalry Ho!