This chart ranks the 10 best U.S. states to retire in as of 2024. Data was sourced from Bankrate.com.
To create this list, Bankrate analyzed all states across five categories with assigned weights:
  • Affordability: Cost of living, taxes (40%).
  • Well-being: Sense of community, entertainment (25%).
  • Healthcare: Quality, cost, and access to health services (20%).
  • Weather: Average annual temperatures, natural disasters incidence (10%).
  • Crime: Property and violent crime rates (5%).
One overall rank for each state was then calculated. The lower the number, the better the ranking.

Which State is the Best for Retirement?

Generally speaking, the best states for retirement are those that are affordable to live in and have warm weather.
Mississippi is inexpensive, but unhealthy. and full of crime.
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One might say it's cheap for a reason.
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Affordability and well being weightings are too high in this. I think they could have knocked 5% off of each of those and give 5% more to healthcare and add 5% to crime. No one wants to retire in a crime riddled area.
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Honestly, the better metric would just be where people actually move to. Trying to ad hoc a metric based on three factors is strange when we know which places retirees choose.
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100 days of 100 F
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No thanks.
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These are surely not th only measures to judge the best places to retire.
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Delaware seems odd, but I've also never spent anytime there. Otherwise, it's a little surprising none of the Southwest states made the list. Lots of people retire there.
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Pennsylvania seems odd too
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@0xbitcoiner is back and back with a chart!
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