Pasco Named a Top Place to Retire in the U.S.

Pasco has just been named one of the top 25 places to retire in the U.S.!

That honor comes from Forbes, which picked towns and cities of all sizes that provide high-quality retirement living at an affordable price. Their criteria focused mainly on financial considerations like median home prices, cost of living, and taxes. Non-financial criteria included crime rate, number of doctors per capita, and air quality, among others.

Pasco is praised for having a cost of living about 3% below the national average, while home prices (as of the time of Forbes research) are only 1% above national prices. Forbes also cites Pasco for having “pros” such as:

• Good number of primary care physicians per capita.
• Good air quality.
• Very comfortable climate.
• Serious crime rate below national average.
• Relatively low FEMA natural hazard risk.
• Strong economy.
• Good retiree state tax climate; no state income tax.

Among the “cons,” Forbes says Pasco is “not very walkable or bikeable” and has a “7% ‘excise tax’ on certain investment gains above $270,000, and a state estate tax.”

I’ve always said these honors are for the Tri-Cities as a whole, which you can see in the “pros” and “cons” listed above — a lot of that describes our whole area, not just the City of Pasco.

And by the way, this isn’t the first time the Tri-Cities has been recognized as a great place to retire, and probably won’t be the last, either!