I should have said "cost of living..."

Back in the early 1990's my job was getting moved. Plan A was Ventura Country, California. I'd have business trips out there, and was mesmerized with California... to visit. I would have got a COLA adjustment if my job moved out there. But, when the dust cleared I'd be living in a manufactured home with a roommate or two, and driveway parking if I was lucky. I wasn't looking forward to that. Plan B was to move my job to Floriduh and that's where I ended up. If my job has been moved to VC, I would have collected six months of unemployment and gone to grad' school.

I had a lot of business trips to Texas. But, everybody there I worked with eventually got transferred to San Diego, and I'd go out there a lot. There were some nice townhouses near where I worked out there. But, they were $800k. Most of the people from Texas were just trying to survive out there until they could get another job in an affordable area.

I'm going to have a drive-on lift in the Knoxville house. I'm going with one from American Custom Lifts (ACL). ACL's based in California. I asked them how they could afford to build their lifts in California. The sale's rep' laughed and said "We can't. Our factory is in Texas. Only the engineers and salesmen are in California."