Before I jump into things: If you happen to be reading this right after it drops, here’s a quick PSA (directed to readers who are also in the US, but relevant to anyone living in a democracy) – VOTE VOTE VOTE VOTE!! We all have a civic duty to stay informed and participate in our democracy. Please vote in Tuesday’s election if you haven’t already voted early. Research your candidates, and understand what they stand for. And critically, please vote as a citizen and not as a consumer. Voting (in my opinion, but this is my blog, so that’s all you get) is a profound act of participation. We are making our voices heard on what we think is best for our country and our fellow citizens.
This likely means acknowledging that the vast majority of those fellow citizens have had very different life experiences than you and that the stakes are higher for many of them each election than they ever will be for you. That can be an uncomfortable experience, but it’s one worth having. If you’re treating your vote like an Amazon purchase (picking the person that promises you what you want and what will help you as an individual, even if it hurts those more vulnerable than you and by extension our country as a whole), you’re doing this wrong. And our country needs you to do better if we’re going to survive. This PSA will make more sense later in this post. Ok, now onto the spreadsheet.
In 2019, as I was leaning 100% into my career change and planning to leave DC, I made a spreadsheet to help me decide where to move. I wrote a post explaining the rationale and how to use the spreadsheet. Even though I haven’t been on the blog much in the past few years, that remains one of my most popular posts, and I still consistently get people emailing me who have questions about using it for their own search. I’ve even recommended it to a few clients (with the caveat that it wasn’t official financial advice 😂)!
The Spreadsheet Update
A few months ago, someone reached out and specifically expressed that they were having issues actually customizing it – adding categories and cities. Which is exciting! Because someone is using it!
When I went back to look at the formulas, I realized there were some shortcomings in the setup, so I decided to make it easier to customize the inputs. This post walks through those new instructions, assuming you are already familiar with the general purpose and concept of the original sheet. If you’re not, go back and read the original post!!
Now, if you go back to the sheet, you’ll see a few new things – highlighted in yellow (image below). You can input new cities at the bottom of the list, and new categories in the new columns added to the end.
BUT, for this to work and not skew the data, you also need to add some extra information. One of the tricky things when entering new data is that some data points are good in higher numbers (Walkability scores), while some are better with lower numbers (price per square foot for home buying). To account for that, you’ll now need to indicate at the bottom of the sheet whether your new category is “good” or “bad” so the standardization formula knows how to treat it. (Going back to my original post example, Batman would mark the crime column as “good,” while most people would mark it as “bad.”) You shouldn’t need to change any data or inputs to the right of the dark dividing column.
This reader was interested in adding categories for whether there were bike trails in a city and distance to a body of water. There were a few tricky things with those specific examples that I want to highlight. Keep in mind that for categories that don’t have numerical value (Y/N for bike trails, for example), you’ll have to change your answers to a number. So 1 for Yes, 0 for No, with the “good or bad” line marked as Good (if you’re measuring the existence of bike trails, the positive number is a good thing). You also can’t put in ranges for distances, but you could put in the actual distance to a body of water or a ranking (from 1-5 for example) for how close the city is based on your own distance scale.
Here’s a screenshot showing the changes, with new blank cities and categories and the “good or bad” row. The image also links to the customizable spreadsheet!
As a reminder, you can customize this to your heart’s content, but you’ll need to make your own copy first.
If you do use the spreadsheet and either 1) update the data (these are all 2019 numbers…a lot has changed) or 2) add cities/categories, I’d love it if you could share that data with me or email me your updated spreadsheet/numbers!
The Me Update
(HARD turn from fun spreadsheets) After the garbage Supreme Court decision overturning Roe v. Wade that undermined our Judicial branch and the democracy that rests on it (if you think I’m overreacting, you’re not paying attention), I started thinking a lot more about whether or not I wanted to be in Ohio long-term. At a basic level, expansions of anti-abortion activist legislation could undermine my ability to have kids safely in a non-traditional or higher-risk conception/pregnancy. Or just any pregnancy. At the moment, Ohio’s “Heartbeat” bill is held up in the courts, but its future is uncertain. Additionally, and more fundamentally, I think there is something to be said for voting with my tax dollars. And when I first made my spreadsheet in 2019, I didn’t realize that my tax dollars might be supporting something like this (again, BECAUSE WE HAD PROTECTIONS THROUGH ROE V WADE). Ohio isn’t a utopia by any means, but if I were making my spreadsheet today, I wouldn’t have moved to a state that was actively trying to limit abortion access to SIX WEEKS.
The complicating factors? I have no intention of renting again. I also want my next home to be on more land, and ideally to be a property that I can grow in long term. And I’m not convinced I can afford that vision at the moment, especially with current mortgage rates. I’m loving my career change, but growing a business ain’t easy, and we’re not quite at the “Scrooge McDuck swimming pool of gold” level when it comes to my personal finances. So this is NOT an update saying I’ll be moving soon, but rather an update that I’m starting to *contemplate* moving *eventually.*
At the moment, the Minneapolis area of Minnesota is pretty near the top of my list, but I’ll probably update my spreadsheet categories to see if there are other hidden gems out there that have what I’m looking for. One definite new category: does this location still protect my fundamental human right of bodily autonomy even though I’m capable of childbirth? When a dead person has more rights regarding their body than someone who is pregnant, something is deeply wrong in our society.
Are there other factors you think I should consider when I update the spreadsheet for my search? Or other locations you think I should put into the running (nothing farther south than DC, or on the west coast, for weather and family proximity reasons respectively…). Comment here or shoot me a message!