Most Conservative Areas to Retire (Atlanta, Columbus: transplants, homes, purchasing)

[Meesh1966]

I am looking for a very conservative are that my husband and I can relocate to from deep blue Rhode Island. We have no children, are very conservative and are looking to retire somewhere where we don't have to worry about anyone confiscating firearms or violating any of the constitution.

Our budget for purchasing a property tops off at $250,000. We also want to keep chickens and do some homesteading.

Any suggestions would be great.

Thanks!
Michelle

[Columbus1984]

Originally Posted by Meesh1966

I am looking for a very conservative are that my husband and I can relocate to from deep blue Rhode Island. We have no children, are very conservative and are looking to retire somewhere where we don't have to worry about anyone confiscating firearms or violating any of the constitution.

Our budget for purchasing a property tops off at $250,000. We also want to keep chickens and do some homesteading.

Any suggestions would be great.

Thanks!
Michelle

Harris County, just north of Columbus, would be a nice option for you. Check out the county website https://www.harriscountyga.gov/

[vtecluder617]

Originally Posted by Meesh1966

I am looking for a very conservative are that my husband and I can relocate to from deep blue Rhode Island. We have no children, are very conservative and are looking to retire somewhere where we don't have to worry about anyone confiscating firearms or violating any of the constitution.

Our budget for purchasing a property tops off at $250,000. We also want to keep chickens and do some homesteading.

Any suggestions would be great.

Thanks!
Michelle

You can pretty much choose and live anywhere in Georgia, as long as it is outside the metro Atlanta area (and a few other counties) As a general rule of thumb, avoid looking in the following counties: Fulton, Cherokee, Forsyth, Cobb, Gwinnett, Dekalb, Douglas, Rockdale, Fayette, Clayton, Henry, Newton, Clarke, Bibb, and Chatham.

Now keep in mind, some of the counties I listed above tend to lean conservative, yet have a sizable moderate or liberal population.

[y8tiger]

Originally Posted by vtecluder617

You can pretty much choose and live anywhere in Georgia, as long as it is outside the metro Atlanta area (and a few other counties) As a general rule of thumb, avoid looking in the following counties: Fulton, Cherokee, Forsyth, Cobb, Gwinnett, Dekalb, Douglas, Rockdale, Fayette, Clayton, Henry, Newton, Clarke, Bibb, and Chatham.

Now keep in mind, some of the counties I listed above tend to lean conservative, yet have a sizable moderate or liberal population.

It was not so long ago that Cherokee, Forsyth, and Cobb were very conservative.

[trobesmom]

Throw a dart outside of the Atlanta area and you should be good.

[vtecluder617]

Originally Posted by y8tiger

It was not so long ago that Cherokee, Forsyth, and Cobb were very conservative.

I concur. I would say that Cherokee and Forsyth are still majority conservative. But with the sprawl and development, that has brought an influx of out of towners (like myself) which can lead to a more "diverse" political demographic.

[Born 2 Roll]

Originally Posted by Meesh1966

I am looking for a very conservative are that my husband and I can relocate to from deep blue Rhode Island. We have no children, are very conservative and are looking to retire somewhere where we don't have to worry about anyone confiscating firearms or violating any of the constitution.

Our budget for purchasing a property tops off at $250,000. We also want to keep chickens and do some homesteading.

Any suggestions would be great.

Thanks!
Michelle

Not unlike most of the U.S. outside of large urban population centers and metropolitan areas, Georgia is full of very conservative (extremely conservative) exurban and rural areas.

Basically almost anywhere in Georgia will fit your criteria OUTSIDE of the following 16 counties:

> Fulton, DeKalb, Clayton, Cobb, Gwinnett, Rockdale, Newton, Henry, Douglas, Fayette, Forsyth and Paulding counties (blue counties and rapidly blue-trending red counties in metro Atlanta)…

> Clarke County (Athens)

> Chatham County (Savannah)

> Muscogee County (Columbus)

> Bibb County (Macon).

Though, one very important thing to be aware of is that the Atlanta metropolitan area has been and is continuing to grow so extremely fast that it has been pushing Georgia from being a deep red Republican-dominated state towards being a purple swing state and possibly a decidedly blue Democratic-leaning state.

Six metro Atlanta suburban counties that were deep-red GOP-controlled and dominated counties about 15+ years ago (Rockdale, Newton, Henry, Douglas, Gwinnett and Cobb counties) are now Democratic Party-controlled and/or Democratic Party-dominated counties.

One more metro Atlanta suburban county (Fayette County) appears to be on the verge of flipping from GOP control to Democratic Party control in the very near future because of the combination of a very fast-growing African-American population in the north half of the county and because of how one of the world’s largest film production studios (Trilith Studios, formerly Pinewood Atlanta Studios in Fayetteville) has attracted a significant number of Southern California transplants to the area over the past decade.

Another metro Atlanta suburban county (Forsyth County, which historically was one of the absolute most ultraconservative exurban counties in the entire U.S. before about the year 2010) is a GOP-controlled county that appears to be very rapidly trending purple on the strength of continued explosive growth, including an explosively fast-growing Asian population that is reported to be the fastest growing of any county in the entire U.S.

Meanwhile, West metro Atlanta outer-suburban Paulding County is a solidly GOP-controlled county that is experiencing some very noticeable demographic shifts that may make Democrats more competitive in the county within the next 15 years or so.

And while metro Atlanta has experienced massive amounts of migration into the area from the Northeastern U.S., the Great Lakes/Midwestern U.S., and other parts of the Southern U.S. for decades, metro Atlanta has experienced a very noticeable surge in migration from the state of California since the start of the pandemic.

Californians had already been moving into outer-suburban South metro Atlanta areas like Fayette and Coweta counties in some noticeable numbers over the past decade because of the explosion of the TV/Film production industry in the area during that time.

But since the start of the pandemic, Californians have been moving in significantly greater numbers into the North Atlanta suburbs and exurbs (North Fulton, Forsyth, Cobb, Cherokee, Gwinnett and Hall counties) and affecting the political environment in those areas.

Georgia may be a Republican-controlled state today, but with the massive rapid demographic shifts that the state is experiencing as the population of the Atlanta metropolitan area continues to explode, there seriously appears to be no guarantee that Georgia will remain a GOP-controlled state.

With Georgia’s explosively fast-growing population of racial and ethnic minorities already making up at least half of the state’s population (up significantly from when racial and ethnic minorities only made up less than 30% of Georgia’s population in 1990 and before), Georgia appears to already have the demographic makeup to be a much more purple state and potentially even a blue state.

And Georgia appears to be likely to continue heading in a decidedly more purple and possibly blue direction politically over the next 10-15 years as the state appears to have the potential to look more like bluer states like Virginia and Washington state, or even like even deeper blue states like Maryland or Illinois as opposed to neighboring deep red GOP-dominated Southern states like Alabama, Tennessee, South Carolina and Florida.

Georgia has lots of very conservative deep red areas outside of the 16 aforementioned metropolitan counties, but the state as a whole appears to be trending decidedly purple and possibly even blue over the next 1-2 decades.

So if want to live in a state that may be most likely to remain a GOP stronghold for the long-term future, Georgia probably may not necessarily be the best choice as a relocation destination out of a deep blue state like Rhode Island.

[Born 2 Roll]

Originally Posted by y8tiger

It was not so long ago that Cherokee, Forsyth, and Cobb were very conservative.

Originally Posted by vtecluder617

I concur. I would say that Cherokee and Forsyth are still majority conservative. But with the sprawl and development, that has brought an influx of out of towners (like myself) which can lead to a more "diverse" political demographic.

Forsyth County in particular appears to be becoming much more and more of a total question mark politically moving forward.

Forsyth County remains majority-conservative (or majority-Republican) today, but the explosive population growth in the county (including the continuing explosive growth of the county’s Asian and Hispanic populations, along with a significant number of people moving into the area from a decidedly left-of-center state like California) seems to put the future of continued conservative rule in the county into very significant doubt.

I can remember when Forsyth County only had three public high schools (Forsyth Central HS, South Forsyth HS and North Forsyth HS), while others of us might be able to remember back when Forsyth County only had one public high school in the county (Forsyth Central HS, formerly Forsyth County HS) during the time when Forsyth County had a population that was effectively 100% white.

Today, Forsyth County has eight public high schools, four of which (Lambert HS, South Forsyth HS, Denmark HS and Alliance Academy for Innovation) have ‘majority-minority’ student populations where racial and ethnic minorities make up a majority of students enrolled, and a fifth (Forsyth Central HS) appears to be on the verge of becoming a ‘majority-minority’ high school.

Overall, racial and ethnic minorities currently make up about 53% of all students in the Forsyth County Schools system.

… This in a county in Forsyth where the racial/ethnic minority population has grown from virtually zero before 1990 to almost 40% of the county’s population today, according to some population estimates.

Despite the county’s notoriously super-ultraconservative history, the ongoing massive rapid demographic changes that the county is experiencing have Forsyth County starting look a lot like the Washington D.C. outer suburb of Loudoun County in Northern Virginia, which is a historically deeply conservative exurban/outer-suburban county that has transitioned into Democratic Party control over the last 15 years.

[Thulsa]

Here is a blue/red voter map for the 2020 election. That should give you some clues.

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2020...ion_in_Georgia

Secondly, city-data.com is a great source for checking out the area you're considering in terms of income levels, demographics, educational levels, home values and so on.

Keep in mind that some rural areas here may be completely lacking in a hospital or medical facilities.

[masonbauknight]

Originally Posted by trobesmom

Throw a dart outside of the Atlanta area and you should be good.

Simply untrue. Clarke County (city of Athens and University of Georgia) is arguably one of the most liberal counties in the state, and it was even 50 years ago. Chatham County (city of Savannah) is liberal in the city but can be very conservative in many of its suburbs. Georgia is not all about Atlanta all the time.