[booboo1964]

Thank you for letting me join the forum, it has been very helpful. My wife and i just returned from a 5 day visit in The Villages. Here are some of the impressions we got from our visit. I had researched quite a bit on the internet before we arrived, so i was eager to see if it lived up to the hype.

We arrived Saturday afternoon and as we drove by the first golf course I thought "that golf course looks good", but that is probably because it is the first one you see. I was wrong. All the courses we drove by while we were there were in good shape.

My wife's first impression was "wow, the houses are close together" (We live on 14 acres in a rural area). By Tuesday her opinion was "It is great that the houses are close so you can get together with your neighbors and you don't have a lot of yard work."

We took all 3 tours, the whole development is beautiful. Fenney is especially impressive with the newer amenities, putt and play, pitch and putt, and others. Everything was clean, well kept, and we saw several crews out trimming grass or bushes. We think the water bottle they give you on the tour has the "Kool Aid" in it."

The biggest surprise to both of us was the people. Everyone we met was extremely nice and friendly. Any questions we had they were glad to answer and tell us what a great place this was to live. At Brownwood Square Sunday night we met several people and everyone was friendly. I am not naive enough to think there isn't someone in the villages that isn't friendly, but we didn't meet him.

My wife and I have been planning to look at moving to the villages in 2 years, on the way back home she discussed calling a realtor to see what we need to do to sell our house in March. (I don't retire until then.)

Overall, all of you are very fortunate to live in The Villages. Of course you have worked hard for it and deserve to enjoy the fruits of your labor. We were very impressed, it was everything and more than we expected. This was mainly due to the friendly people we met. Hopefully, we can join you in the near future.

Realistically, our plan is to come down in September and rent for 2 months, and pick out something to purchase at that time. Unless the wife sells the house before that. Looking forward to visiting again.