I too am trying to figure out the best place to move to as I have been a MN resident for all of my 57 years and am tired of living through 9 months of miserable winter weather just for a few weeks of perfect days in summer. We can have tornadoes here but at least you get some time to prepare. OK and TX have tornadoes more frequently and I fear its just a matter of time before one destroys your property. Florida and the gulf coast would be nice but then again it's just a matter of time before a hurricane hits you and wipes you out. Then I think about AZ, but I really believe they will have a water crisis someday in the next 20 years. Your property there could become worthless without access to a water supply.
Nashville is certainly a good contender with mild winters and has the preferred red state status, but housing prices have been crazy there for the last decade.
I have been here continuously for 51 years now, no one I know has ever been hit, only once was there a tornado bearing down on us and it went back up or dissipated long before it got here. The fear of tornado's here in N. Texas is overblown (okay, that was unintentional, but still funny). Come on down and laugh at the natives when we have one of our rare ice storms. Hail is a more realistic fear of living here.
