Moving On Out Plan, Rebooted

OK not much of a title, but I don't care. I'm trying to seriously plan my back-to-Florida move. I know it won't be any time soon unless I somehow win the lotto, the plan now is to wait until my 401K cashes out, which will be in about two and a half years. This of course assumes a number of things: that I'll still be around then, that the 401K will have any money in it at all, that there's no crash happening, etc. Also there is the whole "job" thing, I doubt I'll be able to retire at 59. The ideal is a transition out of this office job into some working from home gig that nets me at least as much as I make now, and hopefully more since Florida isn't cheap if I manage to make it all the way back to Miami, which is what I want to do.

If the housing situation stays the same in my old home town, rent will not be cheap, but may be manageable. The outlying areas are of course my best bet, Homestead and around there. I do not want to live in the north part of the county if I can help it. Even though I lived in Hialeah for a few years, I didn't much care for it. North Miami always depressed me for some reason. Northwest is too close to the airport. I refuse to live on the Beach, any of them. Coral Gables and the surrounding neighborhoods actually looked promising when I looked at apartments.com earlier today. Efficiencies and mother-in-law studios seem to be prevalent, but there are some bona fide apartment complexes as well that only charge *one* arm and leg. And Homestead and around Cutler Bay seem to have a few income-limited apartment complexes with reasonable rates. I really would prefer a normal, bland apartment. They are easier to keep clean than the cute, quirky places I've lived here in Virginia. Lots of Miami apartments have tile floors instead of carpets, for example. 

Car insurance will be fun. Possibly I can offset that expense by working from home *and* not driving around too much. At least Miami *has* a public transportation system, unlike this dump.

Another thing delaying my triumphant return to the burg of my childhood is the covid situation. The hilarious governor cocked it up (how Florida of him) so right now it's a plague pit. So I have to wait until that's blown over. My ruthless, selfish inner child hopes this will make rental prices plunge even more, but I'm not going to count on that.

Let's fantasize what I'm going to do when I move: first, I'm going to get rid of as much stuff as possible. I want to move down with nothing, basically, except my computer, my cats, and my clothes. I can get everything there. That's part of the fun of moving if you ask me. I wish now I'd gotten rid of even *more* things when I moved up here, but at least I only moved with one car's worth of crap. The thing will be to take less crap. Maybe a few books and keepsakes, enough to fit in a small box. Then I will furnish my new place slowly. Bed first, of course. A chair and/or couch, depending on where I move. Dishes to eat out of. Now that I mostly use a laptop, I don't really need a desk right away. I don't need a tv either, I lived without one for ages and hardly use the one I have.

Man, I wish it were two years from now.