Why Relocate?

I had always dreamed of relocating to Florida but I never thought it would actually happen. I thought it was too expensive and I didn't want to leave my family. Things began to change when I was unemployed for 10 months during the recession in 2008 - 2009. Near the very end of my unemployment, I became desperate for work and I began my search out of state. I ended up getting a job in my hometown of Baltimore so luckily I didn't have to move. Jason and I were not engaged yet at that point but he still supported me and said he would move.

Fast forward a few years to Star Wars Weekends 2011. I had been interviewing for a very good job opportunity where I would work from home 100% and I received the offer letter and paperwork while we were on vacation. I felt like such an adult sitting on a bench at EPCOT looking through the offer! It was definitely the most adult thing I've ever done while on vacation in Walt Disney World. A few days before I received the offer, Jason and I woke up early and went to stand in line for celebrity fastpasses at Hollywood Studios at 4AM. We met a lot of cool nerds (oxymoron intended) that morning and most of them were locals. They were very prepared to sit for hours while we were not. We couldn't be prepared because we did not have the luxury of our own car. We had taken a taxi that morning. They had tents, food, entertainment - basically everything one would need to sit in line overnight. We talked about how cool it would be if I got the job and we did move to Florida so we could be locals for Star Wars Weekends 2012. And we will be!

After that trip, we had many conversations about moving. What tipped our scale was the cost of housing. It is WAY cheaper to live in Florida than it is in Maryland. But, the drawback is that in Florida the houses are built much closer together. At that time we had also been looking into Disney Vacation Club and I crunched the numbers. With our base cost of living being so much cheaper in Florida, it's just a no brainer. Relocation is the better financial decision.

But what about the emotional part? We would be leaving our families behind. For me, it's not so bad because I know my family will come to stay with us at least once a year. They're already planning Christmas 2012 in Florida! We hope that Jason's family will come to visit us too and we are planning to fly home at least once a year. We'll see how that goes once we start having babies! It was a hard decision for both of us to leave our families but we both need a new adventure and we're not going to find it here. We're both tired of living in the same place - we literally live in the same zip code where we have lived since childhood - and we're looking forward to exploring a new place.