[jnieman]

Our son lives in Boca Raton and I decided to do some checking at some of the cities North of him about an hour to see home prices for 55+ communities in Port St. Lucie about 20 miles inland. Through my internet searches I found a planned community called Traditions. I thought it was a mini Villages. Several 55+ Villages with different names building houses and each community has a regional recreation center in it. We toured the model homes, sat down with the realtor to go over costs and fees etc. We are in the $250,000 price range. The lot sizes very tiny, the garage space barely fit two cars but no room for any cabinets. Hardly any attic space. 2 bedroom with den so just two decent closets. 1400 sq ft. EVERYTHING was an upgrade. No ceiling fans, 6 foot sliders instead of the 4 panel we get, cheaper doors, badly constructed moldings, terrible landscaping with bright red mulch, streets hardly wide enough for 2 cars to pass, hardly any restaurants or stores to go to, no pharmacy nearby, hardly any doctor's offices nearby. The recreation center shared by other communities with people of all ages. Get this: HOA $434 per month! Plus $25,000 bonds.
The HOA included basic cable, landscaping, security alarm. None of the great things we get here. I think they had about 10 clubs to join but had run out of space at the rec centers for anyone to create a new club. Pool shared by families no separate adult pool. The list goes on and on.

By the time we were done we had spent the entire day there and were so ready to come back home to paradise. We really do have the best of everything here and now I love my home so much more I can't express how happy I am to have it and live here in our great Villages. Plus I forgot to mention the free golf! No such thing there!!! You'd have to drive quite a ways and pay top dollar.