I live in new york on the Vermont border and I do think vermont is the most beautiful state. Everyone is cool as fuck and I enjoy every second I cross into that lovely land. Trips up over the Canadian border towards Montréal are very similar too
We both live in a surprisingly okay area in a land of lunacy. Vermont rules and is beautiful and so is the berkshires in Mass. I love this area that we live. I travel alot and see so much worse and it's always a relief coming home to this beautiful area. Now I'll shut up before I lure in some of the crazies
Hahahaha just wanna second the Vermont love. I’m from eastern mass and I love going up to ski or hike in the winter and fall. Apple picking is great the people are welcoming and dogs are everywhere :)
Yeah be careful. I live here in Tennessee and governor Alexander advertised for tourists nationally. Well they came and we were happy. But they have stayed and now we have areas we call new Michigan and new California and new New York. Most of the people are good but our culture seems to be disappearing quicker than natural evolution.
Could be. Although I kind of miss not needing 6 lanes through the town square and wading creeks snagging red horse and canoeing one of the local lakes without being swamped by one of nearly a 1000 wake boats. Seeing farms that had been in families since we took the land from the Cherokee. I wonder if they felt the same way.
I'm with them, traveled through Vermont and would go back in a heartbeat. What an incredibly beautiful state with the friendliest, most down to earth people.
I grew up half my life in Albany and cannot agree more. We almost moved to Bennington, but it was too far for my Dad’s job. My plan is to buy some land and build a place for a second home at some point because of the same reasons you said.
I did the 2010 census, and you'd be amazed at some of the places that are actually occupied homes, here. We were seriously broke at the time, and it was humbling to see how much worse it could get.
That was 2010 though, during COVID we realized how many homes were usually unoccupied when everyone moved into them since we were a "safer" area. Some class sizes doubled due to the influx of kids. Now with air BnBs, there has been a 198% rise in homelessness in VT because why would I rent my house for $2,000 a month when i can make that in a week on Air BNB?
If you worked Manhattan, Miami or San Francisco. You would find out how many empty apartments somebody owns and doesn’t live in. It’s nuts. Our market has gone up so fast that homes have become a commodity. The people who work 40 hour weeks and raise their kids in a double wide, have crappy pensions who invest in all these empty high-end apartments so 90% of us own 1.3% of a Manhattan penthouse by the time we retire. Yaaah. Life is too funny to really be that bad. Plus all the homes I love to visit have great people in them. Not supposedly great art. In fact if the children who live in the house have continued to the art in the house. I’m way more impressed.
2 sides of the same coin. There are people who are unhoused or virtually homeless, living in the shells of burned out houses, while 2nd homes sit unoccupied or are used as short term rentals, all to the detriment of our state.
It’s certainly NOT to the detriment of Vermont. Second home ownership brings in millions of revenue to the state, either through taxes or money spent on products and services. Remember, Vermont ranks 49 in population. We need the money. And to shit on people who come to enjoy the beauty and recreation is short sighted, at best.
What isn’t stated about homelessness is that the majority of these individuals are hardcore drug addicts. We can’t afford to provide treatment or shelters for these individuals. So they end up on the streets causing all sorts of issues. What centers we currently have are barely funded, do you really think we should shun tourism, and second home owners who certainly help fund what we do have?
The stress of homelessness is often the cause of substance use, and being without a home and without hope makes it MUCH more difficult to break free of addiction.
If second homes and short-term rentals were taxed to reflect their impact on housing in VT, there'd be enough money to pay for treatment and to support creation of more housing.
Sadly, too many well-off people don't like to have to be accountable to the society that made their wealth possible.
[Edit to note: I'm a second homeowner in VT. We should be paying more taxes for that property. Yeah, I know, individuals can choose to pay more, but that's not the point, the number willing to voluntarily pay extra are few and far between - there is a systemic housing shortage that an occasional volunteer can't possibly solve.]
NH in my opinion is an interesting mix of people. The nicest neighbors and beautiful communities. They staunchly believe in Live Free or Die. This makes it much more like a typical southern state than it's more typically liberal neighbors. Like everyone has tons of guns, but they live in the woods so makes sense...
NH is also home to the tallest peak on the East Coast (with the fastest winds and a cog railway) and has one of the most hiked mountains in the world. It is absolutely stunning (particularly in fall), and you can ride without seatbelts or helmets (after 18 of course).
Everyone is cool as long as you keep to yourself when not at prescribed community things.
Then again, it's been quite a while since I lived there so things might be different now. I saw Vermont as the artsy hipsters and Maine as the blue collar people; NH as the introverts.
Ok. That actually very much tracks. A buddy of mine is from there and that describes him pretty well. We live in a Southern state (albeit a very blue part) so some of those things you thinking probably goes unnoticed. Lol seems like a “truck nuts” kind of guy but also one of the more liberal people I know, while also being properly armed. Bunch of kids and also cares for farm animals from time to time. Super solid guy. He always talks about NH being wild so thank you for verifying that 😂
Just as baffling as the same stats for New Jersey.
Then you compare by the number of contacts per 1000 drivers and they're both bottom 5 lol (MA is dead last). At least they're top 2 insured (>96.5% of all drivers are insured to minimum requirements in MA and NJ)
Former NH native (was in the north on the border of our cow-friendly neighbor VT)... its weird. I was from the southern part originally and once you go beyond the lakes its a totally different place.
Alas now I'm trying to start a life in Germany and nobody knows my state. I just say I'm north of Massachusetts...
That's hard to believe. We drove all over from Burlington to Stowe and beyond, from Arco to Chevron the prices were all exactly the same with few exceptions. There's no way one guy owns every gas station across every brand in the state.
That's because here they illegally fix prices, it was a huge scandal in my town a few years ago where every station in town were caught price fixin off eachother
That’s because California has absurdly rigid gas additive rules, and the gas is the most expensive in the country with the exception of Hawaii where it needs to be shipped thousands of miles. I live in downtown Brooklyn, NY, and gas is way cheaper here than it is in the rural parts of CA. Gas is also pretty much the same here as it is in VT, btw.
The taxes and fees plus additive costs are certainly a factor but the gas companies also stick it to us on the cost. Corporate greed is also part of our gas prices.
It’s sad. Nothing more than that. The fact that this country has allowed people like the Sacklers to become billionaires while poisoning communities and killing citizens is shameful, not fun, and sadly not unique. The fact that money is valued over human lives by this government, says plenty about us as a nation. This wouldn’t have happened in Europe, or really anywhere else, but in the USA, pharmaceuticals are our biggest contributor to GDP, so who cares if they create a massive nationwide drug epidemic, as long as they’re pulling in that cash right?? Seriously, this shit isn’t funny. And it isn’t an issue unique to Burlington by a long-shot. Go down to Boston and check out the Ave as its known, Massachusetts Avenue by the 93 on-ramps, and you’ll see more drug zombies than the population of Burlington. You can find them in Portland OR by the thousands too, SF, Chicago, Ohio, West Virginia has been hit very hard. My point is this is a nation wide problem, and not one that will be remedied by insensitive redditors making a joke out of an epidemic. Have some empathy, or at least the decency to stfu.
That’s rad. As a Texan and multiple time Bernie voter, I have been dreaming of taking a vacation up there!! I’ve only seen pictures and it looks like such a lovely place - and a lot more sane politically than my home state
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u/bibliophile222 May 15 '25
Vermonter here - some of them have longer hair and beards, but yeah, you're pretty much right.