They grow them big here…our new home.

Now that we’ve been here all of three months, we’ve learned some things. Some of it is great and some of it are you kidding me?!?

The biggie, Houses. Yes, houses are less by about 40% in Cary and even less an hour outside of Cary, but you’re an hour away from jobs and fun. The houses are new and nicer the further you go, but …. Property tax is easily 50% less, however, there is a property tax on cars in addition to registration. For example, we paid $250 to register our car and the property tax was another $250.

The roads are beautiful and smooth here and that’s because of the hefty property tax on cars in addition to registration and it’s forever!

Gas. Less! It’s about $1.50 less per gallon or $20 a tank. However, we drive around a lot more here. It’s like one big Metropolis where people think nothing of going to Raleigh, Chapel Hill, and Durham. Everything is 25 min away. Once we get into our house, we’ll have almost everything we need within 10 minutes, including pickleball. LOL.

Restaurants and Drinks are less by about 30%. One could probably say it’s even lower because the portions are enormous. We’ve done a lot of experimenting as the apartment life is not great for cooking. Think electric cooktop and razer thing pots. We have found a few places where the food and service are awesome. Our biggest shock is how many restaurants will serve the drinks in the middle of a meal. We raved on and on to a server that got our drinks out in no time before serving us any food. She thought we were kidding.

Cooked to perfection. Leftovers.

Food. Grocery stores are only a fraction less here than in California.  Say, twenty cents less for my favorite Chobani Greek yogurt. Dave’s Killer Bread is making a killing no matter where you live. A loaf is just as much in Cali as in North Carolina and probably Arkansas.

Veggies and Fruit. No savings here either and the quality is terrible unless you go to a local farmers’ market. Organic isn’t really a thing because it’s too hard to get the certification. At the Cary farmers market, one of the vendors was trained to farm in Oakland and now lives here. She says she’s better than organic. She’s right. Fantastic. Everything is very small though. I thought an onion was a shallot, for example. The organic at Whole Foods is from, guess where? CALIFORNIA! It’s not the good stuff and it’s probably been on a truck or something losing flavor along the way

A little piece of California…

California, New York…what grows in NC?

Remodels. We bought a fixer and we’re doing a lot of fixing before we move in. I’d say it’s about the same to remodel here unless you have time to really shop around for contractors. Ours is reasonable if you do your homework. If not, he’ll find ways to make money, just FYI. But that’s true no matter where you live.  If you want “designer” level names in appliances like Wolf or Thermador, it’s the same everywhere. Flooring is a little less because a lot of it is made in North Carolina or Georgia. This is one to shop as we scored on labor costs, about $2 less per square foot.

Utilities. It’s less, but that’s only from what our new neighbors tell us. We were getting hit with $500 for heating and electricity for a 2200 sqft house and $400 per month for water. We now own a 3600 sqft house and I’m told it will be about $300. Water, practically nothing because it rains in the summer so you don’t need to water as much. Most people do not have automatic sprinklers here.

The shocker: Beauty is EXPENSIVE! I learned pretty quickly a mani-pedi is $10 more and quality is rare. I’ve confirmed this with my “northerner” friends, i.e. New York/New Jersey. It’s not so much a particular salon that makes it great, it’s a matter of finding a good technician. After three tries, I found a manicurist I love and she’s fun to talk to about everything. She moved here from Florida two years ago where she used to have her own studio.

Hair is downright ridiculous! I’m still sorting through this one. The very first Saturday I played pickleball I met a blonde from Louisiana. Without asking, she told me she flew back to New Orleans to get her hair fixed. FIXED! I didn’t believe her. I told her I was referred to a salon.

“I’ll pray for you.”

“Bwhahahaha.”

She was right. In the first round, my hair turned brownish-green.

“This is a problem,” I said as calmly yet sternly to the poor girl, three years out of high school. The owner guided us out of the mess the best she could. Four hours later, my hair was blondish, brownish, greenish…passable. Luckily, I play a lot of pickleball so I can hide it under a cap.

I sent out an SOS via text to my newish pal here Ask Amy.  (I ask her a lot of questions.) Within a day, her daughter, fifteen years younger than me, collected six names of color-correction specialists in the area for blondes. ITS A THING!

When I got back to our apartment  I exclaimed to Hubby, “I’m going to fly back to California for hair appointments!”

He couldn’t Google up “best salons in Raleigh” fast enough. He found an award winner, and one that matched up with the rec from Ask Amy’s daughter, Ask Anne.

I have since gone to the remarkable color-correction stylist and I am happy to say, Winner! I feel like a movie star which is good because it is at movie star prices. As a friend said, you wear your hair every day, soooo, I’m worth it.;-)

Less than an airplane ticket…but barely.