Conflicted: It’s the perfect description of how homeowners feel when faced with the reality of relocating from one city to another. It’s both exciting and mind-numbing, frightening yet courageous and it brings up feelings of both melancholy and elation.

Moving from one home to another is a life-disrupter, but moving from one town to another is a major upheaval. Watching that moving van drive down the street, fearful that it’s the last time you’ll see your belongings, is just one of the moments of angst you’ll face when relocating.

Between then and now you’ll need to find a real estate agent and a neighborhood and, finally, a home – all in a town that may be thousands of miles away.

Relocating to Upstate SC doesn’t have to be a ghastly process. Let’s make a plan and get you into your new town, neighborhood, and home, without many of the hassles.

Your Ideal Home

Knowing exactly what type of home you want is the first step in your relocation process. From single-family to multi-family homes to condos and townhomes, get clear on exactly what you want. 

Then, decide on how much room you need - both in living space and the number of bedrooms and bathrooms.

And, don’t forget the exterior. With a condo, you may not have much of a choice about outdoor areas, but if you’re in the market for other home styles, determine what you require outdoors.

•          Do you need a garage? If so, how big?
•          Is a backyard important?
•          Do you need outbuildings?
•          Is a swimming pool on your wish list?
•          Do you need a fence for your dogs?

Choosing Your New Neighborhood

Your preferred home style may help narrow down your choice of neighborhoods. For instance, depending on which of our wonderful cities you’re headed to, condos may only be available downtown.

If you’re in the market for a luxury home, you may find them only in certain parts of town. If you’re bringing the horses, the boat or the golf clubs and cart – all will help you choose a suitable neighborhood.

In general, however, you’ll need to answer some questions to figure out where you want to live:

• What is your priority? Is it a quick commute to work, being located in a quality school district, close to public transportation or recreational amenities?
• Do you crave city living or are the suburbs more to your taste? Rural living has a lot to offer as well.
• Do you love the sound of kids playing outside your window or does it grate on your nerves?

Research Is Your Friend 

If you don't know yet how much you can afford to spend on your new home in your new city, we would be happy to refer you to one of our trusted lenders. They can help you know exactly how much home you can afford. 

When you have a handle on your budget, you'll find the home buying process immensely more manageable. 

But, you must also take into account that the cost of living where you are now may not look at all like the cost of living in our area.

How much do groceries cost where you are now? What about gas? Utilities? Even taxes can be very different from one area of the country to another!

To get a handle on your future costs, you can go online to a cost-of-living comparison calculator, such as this one  at CNN Money or one with more detailed results at Bankrate.com.

Let’s Find A Neighborhood

Now you have an idea of how much you can afford to pay for a mortgage every month so it’s time to check out what’s available in your affordability range.

On our website, you can search any town in our area and any price range you wish. Just go here and you can even sign up to receive new listings as they hit the market. 

One final tip:

Don't rely on the information about homes that you find on the really big real estate portal sites because much of their info is unreliable!

Although they would like you to think that they have all of the active listings in any given area, they don’t.

The only accurate listing of homes available is in a region’s Multiple Listing Service database, which you can have access to on our website.

We look forward to working with you on your relocation to the UPSTATE of SC! We cover the following Counties: Anderson, Greenville, Pickens, and Oconee.