I have been getting a lot of private messages asking more about living down here and the move. I was avoiding posting anything because I just got here and there is problem tens of thousands of people who can tell a better story of what it's like to make the move more. Since there does appear to be a lot ofinterest and a lot of people considering doing it also I figured maybe this was a good spot to just give a first month here update... I'll do this in sections for the questions that commonly come up..
Why the move?
It's really about my daughter. Her lifelong struggle with anxiety still has the next hurdle of working with anxiety. It was really a eureka moment of hers on a trip in 2014 where it just hit her that "you can work at disney". I started to ramp up trips to disney and central florida to really explore if this was a possible way to help her with this next challenge or just a fad.. We also wanted to check out central florida for non-disney and what is the weather really like at all different times of the years.. After a few trips, her interest just getting larger and working with her doctors it just made sense to give it a try.. by the end of 2015 we had a good idea what cost of living was, the areas we were interested in, a very large list of pros for moving and just 2 cons which were minor and not show stoppers..
My appreciation of disney is more of my creative side and my love for behind the scenes.. I don't really have the same emotional attachment many have except for how it calmed and made my daughter happy to be there. We had a big discussion of which Disney we wanted to be near to line her up for what might be a longer lived career and not just the next person to work in the park. For what she likes and would strive with, it's actually down here in florida and not any of the other locations disney has offices in.
NYC vs Florida.
it's no secret, NYC is stooopid expensive. However with stoopid expensive comes salaries to match. I didn't change jobs and I just took a week off and moved down here. All the pros of florida being nowhere near the price of nyc, differences in taxes (no state income tax) and I didn't need a job and my pay is exactly the same as when I was in nyc. I actually found a new way to save money at disney, just move here and keep your same job. more money ends up in my pocket, life costs less and we're closer to things we like to do for fun, including disney. The best part, I still have my entire vacation budget available so I can still afford the same cost trips just new destinations. Oh and work has an amazing remote policy and they will time to time want me in nyc at their cost plus I can take some other trips (2 per year) for no reason except I want to work from the office here and there. free work trips to nyc, live in florida, it cant' get much better than this..
There is a lot of exclusive to nyc things. I have 40+ years of how to be a new yorker and life just isnt' the same down here. In some ways it's better and in other ways it's very different. nyc has about 50 different ubers you can call, including bikes, ice cream trucks, food delivery, package messenger. You can even buy stuff for a discount and they deliver it. They pick up my charity stuff, etc etc etc etc... Everyone delivers, including fast food and if you've never been to nyc, everything isn't that far and you don't need to drive.. That might be the biggest thing, I need a car now... It's not better or worse, it's just new and different.. I took that into account when deciding if I wanted to be here and there is enough of what I like to do outside of theme parks here that I'm enjoying it so far and just starting to branch out..
Where to live?
I posted a link earlier in this thread about this question I asked on the orlando forums here. It gave a lot of great insight into communities, where I might be overlooking and things. My list of rather small.. I work from home, I need a room that I can work at any time no matter what is happening in the house so I need an office or a room to call an office. We need 2 bedrooms and we prefer open floor plans. They just work better for us. We prefer a standalone house but would take a town home or condo if we loved it.
One of the hardest things to adjust to with working at home is how to separate work and life.. It's really easy to get caught up in what's happening around the home, it's really easy for others to not understand how your working from home, it's really easy to forget to stop working and most of all, it's really easy to never leave the house and become depressed and trapped.. A very big must have for me is what I had in nyc. I needed to be able to leave the house for work type breaks. Coffee or breakfast in the morning, lunch in the afternoon. I wanted it walking distance because it's really easy to forget to excerise also. I know I couldn't find nyc in orlando but I searched for neighborhoods with reasonable groupings of things I wanted within walking distance.
I'm not going to get into exactly where I picked but I'm really close to everything I want. I found a nice 4 bedroom with 1 bedroom on the first floor which makes a perfect office. We have a nice open floor plan so we socialize really well when we're both not hiding in a room with a closed door. great places to ride bikes, walk, jog for many miles if I want it. great grouping of coffee, food and some entertainment. I'm really happy and it was the top of the list of where we wanted to rent the first year. Oh year, we decided to rent. We're not from here, we didn't spend much time outside of theme parks when we visit in the park. Most importantly, we don't really know if we're going to like it or like the weather when we're always in it.
Daily life?
This is where things are interesting. You may have heard them talk about food off site on the podcast time to time.. What your not really hearing is there is so many places fighting for any "they left disney" tourist dollars that most meals I can get cheaper by eating out.. not everywhere but we're starting to discover some really amazing places.
We came down here for the right reasons. We didn't come here to vacation for the rest of our lives. I still work every day (and many nights when there is something urgent). We still have daily life.. my daughter is job hunting.. We did change and got out of some ruts.. I'm walking around more (thanks pete, no seriously the progress he made with weight loss by walking has actually helped modivate me to walk around more). Some days, walking around does mean walking around disney
We're looking at bikes to ride around town more instead of needing a car. We're really close to thigns we need. Since I dont' have a daily commute I'm actually trying to sort out if uber is just better right now. We can always rent a car or truck when we need to do a weekend of errands but 99% of the time, I don't need a car.. my daughter will need a car when she figures out her work situation and I'm prepared to help with that.
Now there is a lot more local things going on that we're really enjoying. Car shows, music festivals, farmers markets. My friends that play in bands have all passed through on tour so I'm still seeing people I know, just when they are in orlando and not nyc.
How has disney changed?
We actually got ready for this on trips prior to coming here. This is one of the reasons I've become more active on this board. Webcasts and podcasts kind of giving a glimpse of what it is to be a local. the trip was filling in other things to do nearby. universal show for that other theme park down the street. We started to apply our version of it to how we were vacationing here and it actually made the place better. We're happy with a couple hours of just being there and doing nothing. We have smaller goals.
Disney is right there and it will be right there tomorrow. We don't have to do everything over a limited vacation. Right now we're concentrating on things we really love and new things coming out. Skippers changing menus, we better get over there to eat.. After hours event? That sounds interesting... Star wars fireworks getting closer to changing, we better go catch them.. Having a bad day? I know a place to forget about the world and listen to other families argue about money instead.. The ability to hear something interesting is happening, changing, about to close, just opened and we can be there in 30 minutes if we want (after work that is).. We can also not go and wait until another day. Most things will still be there.
figure 30 minutes door to door for anywhere on disney property. Universal is about the same, maybe 10 minutes longer depending on traffic.. Oh did I mention universal isn't fair either? we are starting to learn more and explore that place. We've barely been there but plan to change that. We do like it, but we're complete newbs and that unplanned lost puppy. Disney, I can be your vip guide, universal I'm clueless and lost.
the recent single fp+ has really made it easy to get fastpasses. it was a mess the first day or two and I'm waiting to see what it's like when the first 60 day out people arrive having used it but right now it's possible if you keep looking and know when you look to get one for almost every ride. I'm also seeing htem using the red cards to guage fastpass+ wait time. I think the system has been alerted to add in more if the ride is staying reasonable. I even got a 7dmt at 9pm on a thursday once (haven't tried since).
Are you happy you moved? What do you like/dislike?
Very happy. We haven't been here long. It's too soon to say what we like or dislike because we can't tell the difference between dislike or it's not nyc yet. We're starting to meet others and purposely avoiding tourist places when possible to be able to meet people that will still be here in a week. Weather has been amazing although 90s and humidity have started and spring is over......
Hope this is a little glimpse into someone that has recently move here that everyone has asked for.. feel free to ask about anything. I have to check grammar tomorrow since disboards doesn't work starting at 4am and I don't want to start this over tomorrow.
