4 Best Places to Live in Florida for Families [2022-2023]

This article is a direct transcription of our YouTube video, the video is linked at the bottom.

In today's article, we are talking all about four of the absolute best places to live in the entire state of Florida, if you have a family, the location, how that relates to the lifestyle, family friendly things to do with kids, public school districts, individual communities, and everything in between. So I hope you find a ton of value in this one, and let's hop in.

• Northeast seaside option - Nocatee, FL
• Tampa Urban Option - Tampa, FL
• Multi-Gen Dream Option - Lakewood Ranch, FL
• Peaceful Panhandle Option - 30A District

There's a lot of ways that people want to live, whether that's city or golf or Atlantic Coast or whatever it may be. And there's a lot of neighborhoods that relate to that same lifestyle. Picking an individual neighborhood would be very hard to get your head around the city. So I took a macro approach. And secondly to that other point is I spread across the state pretty good. If you have ties, whether that's family or preference to an area in this large large state. I wanted to give a little bit variety to be a kicking off point for you. So I hope that is incredibly valuable.

1. Northeast seaside option - Nocatee, FL

For one on our list. I'm calling the Northeast seaside option, and what I'm talking about here is Nocatee Florida and the surrounding area. Locationally, this is way northeast in the state of Florida, all the way in northern St. John's County on the Atlantic Coast, and I mean way northeast as in just two hours from Valdosta, Georgia. Another frame of reference is you're about an hour and a half from Gainesville, Florida, home of the Gators, and then 30 minutes south of the largest city in the continuous United States, which is Jacksonville, Florida. Okay. Why is Nocatee Florida potentially a great place for you and your family? Well, first off, Nocatee itself is in the city, it's one of the top master plan developments in the entire United States. It's technically located in St. John's County within Ponte vedra. Secondly, what's important about St. John's County, it's the number one ranked overall in the entire state of Florida Public School district.

It received several A's and B ratings on niche.com, on the teachers, the administrative infrastructure, diversity, inclusivity, and many more options. And then every single neighborhood in the entire Nocatee master plan development is zoned for this school district. Another possible perk is with these new post 2015 master plan communities, gone are the days of where you were just trying to find an individual neighborhood that was new and you were judging them based on amenities and things like these, like really narrow items. Now, the common place, the foundation is they all have lovely amenities. They all have the same roughly monthly fees, et cetera, right? What's new is they started taking 10 of these things, 10 different neighborhoods, and they started trying to get smart as a whole, in a macro sense. So they one, in one part, they added full life cycle, starter home, town home, villa, single families, your family grows, they had a bigger home with splash pads in there.

They go all the way to 55 and up, right? So it comes together in a smarter way, but it also gives you an ability to go a long period of time without leaving an area that are all going to live similar. And I think another big perk of this area particularly is the price range on nine plus communities in Nocatee right now is about 400K to 1.5 million. And if you shopped a lot of other places in southwest Florida, this would definitely be on a low end when it came to an average and a medium price point. All right, and one more thing before I digress, just to expand a little bit on those perks of Nocatee, 14 plus variety of trails and parks. So you have splash, you have kayak, you have road bike, you have hike, there is a Nocatee town center. There's year round events.

So a lot of reasons for people to come together. So if you're from out of state coming in should be easy to network beyond just the school district kind of thing. Also, I called it the Seaside option right at the beginning. This area is located very close to the Atlantic Coast. If you cross over the intercoastal, there's a myriad of really attractive Atlantic front beaches that are 6 to 11 miles, which then gives you a bunch of seafood options in that as well. And then finally, if you're a golfer even into the golf scene, this is a huge area for that. I think it's the headquarters for the PGA and the Champions Tour, and they do the players' championship right here. So a lot of PGA tour golfers actually live in the Jacksonville area, Ponte Vedra surrounding. So anyway, I think all in all Nocatee could be a really interesting option as our number one.

2. Tampa Urban Option - Tampa, FL

Number two on this list, I'm calling the Tampa Urban Option. The what of this is specifically Tampa, Florida City Limits, Hyde Parks District Beach Park, Ballast Point, Riverside Heights, et cetera. Locationally, where this is, this is what you think of when you think of Tampa, Florida. This is around all the stuff. It's in the city limits within Tampa, within Hillsborough County, but all of the airport, downtown, channel side, the sporting events for the most part, all cluster within a six mile square radius. So if you are used to living in a city or you're not a full suburban person, this gives you a really nice alternative. All right. Why is our Tampa Florida option potentially a great place for you and your family? Well, first off, if you're not a cookie cutter person, not everybody loves suburban housing and loves when you walk outside and you waved to your neighbor. And the classic Pleasantville, not everybody loves that.

If you don't, you're going to find historic bungalows. You're going to find old Florida homes that you don't have floor plans that they're putting out today. You're going to find charm. And also the fact of the matter is, if you really cool areas and you like cities, these areas have been invoked for a very long time. They don't have the land to plot everything down. People restore stuff. And if you simply want to be in an area like this, a lot of times you sacrifice house when it comes to size and space, that kind of thing. Secondly, the big thing, what you lose in potential house square footage, you gain in proximity in a incredible way, especially for the Tampa Bay Metro. You're 1.5 to 2 miles from the Glazer's Children Museum, Bush Gardens, Florida Aquarium, Lowry Park Zoo, the major walking districts downtown Tampa, Hyde Park Village in South Tampa, airport's, just a stone's throw away.

You have the International Mall, West Shore Mall, everything that you want to get out and about. I have two kids under five, and this is your like, you get off work and you could just run out for two hours all over the place, right? It's all right there. So I think that's a huge perk. And lastly, another one is, if you live in Tampa and one or both people in the couple work and have to commute to work, then this is going to save your sanity in a way that I can't even explain, right? 99% of people are coming into this area, whether that's downtown, it's a four exit radius, downtown, South Tampa, East, West, the whole city's right here, right? Most people aren't commuting over to St. Pete to work or to the suburbs to work. So 30 miles will take you an hour 15, not 30 minutes in Tampa.

So if that really matters to you on, you don't mind traffic, but you don't want to commute more than 15 miles. This is the only place you want to live. All right, and one more item before we digress on Tampa. Let's talk schools and education options. So most cities, and especially urban districts, there's a lot of boroughs, a lot of zip codes, a lot of schools change just on being three streets over. So what I decided to do was I want to give you a speed round research tool list to get you started. I think it'll be helpful, just at least point you in the right direction. So that's what we're going to do here. Elementary, what I check out on public rated schools, Gorrie elementary, I check out Grady, I check out Roosevelt, and also take a peak at McFarlane Park. Middle Schools, Coleman, Rampello, and Wilson Middle.

And then a big perk here is high schools. Again, cities are tough with school ratings. A lot of cities, let alone in elementary, all the way through high school, to stay at above a seven ratings, very rare. And a lot of urban cities, you got to go like a charter or private school if you want to want a higher rating. And ratings are what they are, right? Depends on what you care about. But this particular district for Hillsborough County is grossly above most. And Plant high school in South Tampa is one of the highest rated high schools in the entire county. So if you fall within that one, that would be a nice tuition free perk. Super quick interruption. Welcome back to the Ultimate Sarasota Florida relocation guide. If you're looking to buy real estate, sell, relocate, regardless of your timeline, I'm going to put our contact information here. Please consider reaching out if you're resonating with these videos at all. Secondly, really important, check out the description box below before you leave tons of helpful free resources, digital guides, analytical tools, much, much more. Thank you again for watching. Let's hop back in.

3. Multi-Gen Dream Option - Lakewood Ranch, FL

Our third on the list, I'm calling the multi-gen or generation dream option. Okay, the what of this conversation is Lakewood Ranch, Florida, that big suburb. Locationally, what you have here is, let's start with macro and then we'll go micro. So to the southwest Florida area, you're an hour south of Tampa, Florida. You are an hour and a half north of Fort Myers, which puts you two hours north of Naples, and then about two hours one way to Orlando, Florida within the city itself. Where that suburb fits into the realm is most of it's in Manatee County, but in reference that you would care about, you're about 9 to 20 miles depending on where you live, northeast of downtown Sarasota, Florida. So you're a little bit northeast in town on your way to Tampa, which puts you about 40 minutes one way to Venice, Florida. And then east of the beach, the closer you can get to the beach, of like the beach, I'm literally standing on here, Lido, is about 25 minutes one way.

All right. Why could Lakewood Ranch, Florida potentially be a great place for you and your family? Well, first off, I live in Lakewood Ranch and I have a family. I just built a house. And so I'll talk a little bit about my story as it relates to that in case it resonates with you in a second. But the next thing is just the straight note chaser of this conversation is Lakewood Ranch, Florida is the number one master plan, multi-generational community in the entire United States. And it's that for a reason, you have 30 pl..., it's huge, way bigger than a lot of these other ones, 30 plus communities, more than half you could still build in. Oldest house in the entire area was built in 1995. So the way they built this thing, it was so new and they had so much land and it was owned by one family, it was smarter.

If you have 30 plus communities and the oldest one was 95, then it's the way the streets drive. It's the way they're oriented to each other. They knew the plan so far in advance, maybe they got way bigger, faster than they thought, but they had some semblance to what was going to happen. So it doesn't feel like it was puzzled together. It's a little smarter, it makes sense to the town. You get further, it gets cheaper, you get closer to the high schools, it gets more family friendly, more two storeys just makes a lot of sense. And with 30 options, you don't have a plan B, C, you have a plan, D, E, F, G, whatever. So I think that is one. Secondly, they were one of the first to get smarter about the knock on the suburbs, right? We're walking Lido Beach here. Everyone that moves it's like beach coastal proximity is the thing, right?

Lakewood Ranch, if you're from here, was the boonies. But if you step back and you look at how far this really is, Sarasota's a very condensed town. It's not Tampa Bay. It's not Jacksonville. It is very, very hard to get more than 40 minutes one way. And that's not 40 miles, that's 20 miles, 40 minutes one way from the coast. And if you get to that coast, you have Anna Marie Island, Longboat, Key, Siesta Key, Lido, Venice Beach, Caspersen, Brohard, Minnesota Key, you have world class beaches. And they're all about the same distance, right? So very far on a map here is actually close than most major metros. I think that's one. Second, people don't go to the beach every single day, including people from here. Two, especially with a family, right? Bed times and you have stuff to do. But what everybody cares about is they don't want to be like, I'm in the suburbs and every time I want to go on a date night, or every time I want to take my kids to walk around somewhere, I have to go to town, I have to go to downtown.

They were one of the first to solve that. So there is three major town centers that all have access to this area that are specifically Waterside Place, which is a brand new downtown. It's a proper downtown, downtown Lakewood Ranch existed, and University Town Center, all of these are within a very small radius to each other. So urban walkability is back, non-chain restaurants are back. Lakewood Ranch, I mean downtown Sarasota's, like cool restaurants, Libby's, Owen's Fish Camp, Selva, Nancy's Barbecue, their second locations are all there, A1A coffee. So it solves like everything but the beach, which I think is incredibly important because you can go, I have a five year old and an eight month old. You can go to one of these villages and it feels like once you're in there, it's safe. The streets are wide, there's not street traffic. Most of these people live in Lakewood Ranch.

They were pumped to move there. So everybody's intentional living. So the way that people act in community, they're not like it's ours and not yours. They all, they're pumped everybody else is there too. And a lot of people aren't from here. So they are excited to meet new people because they moved away from their network. 40% of the land in Lakewood Ranch of the 55,000 acres is set aside for parks and green space. There's tons of public parks outside the neighborhoods, Greenbrook, Adventure Park, Summerfield Park, you have a huge soccer sports complex there, really high rated schools. Lakewood Ranch High, you have Nolan Middle, you have Goliad Elementary, ODA, the high end, 7th grade to 12th grade, upper school is located in university in Lorraine. So all that to say, I myself, I grew up around Siesta Key. My parents live on Siesta Key.

I love suburban housing myself. My wife's not really a suburbs person. She would live here if she could, but with a family, you have sacrifices that are in that respect. So we really weighed moving up from around downtown Sarasota to Lakewood Ranch. We've been there for about four weeks now. We moved into a community called Isles Alpha University. And my hedge was, I love the city, but I have kids and it's tough. My office is in downtown Sarasota. So I had all that kind of things people struggle with. And the thing is, if you have to pick a suburb and you're doing what's right for your family and stuff, I don't think the sacrifice is as big as it used to be in a lot of facets. And the cool thing is, the reason I went northeast and not south is because most of Sarasota is clearly showing they're moving towards Lakewood.

It's university Fruitville Commons to University Parkway is where all the stuff wet, the 5 to 10 different cold press juice, all the places, their second location. And that's not spread around town, It's not onesie, twosie. Every single one of them is in Lakewood Ranch. So I was like, if I'm going to do it, then when I get home, I can get my jollies of stuff that I enjoy there, work in town, it's all very close. It takes me 25 minutes to get to downtown. So anyway, if that's kind of like you where you're transient and you feel like I'm making a big choice, but you need that 3000 square feet and loft and you have two kids. You know one of them waking each other up at night in a small little bungalow, then I think this could also be a good option for you.

4. Peaceful Panhandle Option - 30A District

Our fourth and final one for this particular list, I'm calling the peaceful Panhandle option. And what I'm referencing here is the 30 A district corridor in the Panhandle Florida that is a unique small collection of basically beach towns that surround in a very tranquil way, the much busier Panama City to Destin area. Locationally, the name 30 A, if you're not super familiar with the area, its namesake, is from the actual Road 30 A, which I think technically is in South Walton County, Florida. But basically what you have here is roughly 20 miles a really, really awesome coastline. And like I said, it stretches from about Panama City to Destin. And that's where you see all these beach towns cluster I'm going to talk about in a minute. On a macro sense, you're two hours one way from Tallahassee, Florida where FSU the university's located, and roughly about three hours from Mobile, Alabama.

Why is the district of 30 A in Florida potentially a great place for you and your family? Well first, if you're looking to raise your family and your crew in an environment like you can see here as a backdrop. Something that's very different than the average, it's not for everyone. This area particularly has an interesting way to satiate that need. You have everything full on beach front mansions, of course, with that beautiful coastline all the way to beach style niche bungalows. And then beyond that, what you won't find here is this area is incredibly protected from commercial development, massive high rises and chain restaurants and blah, blah, blah. And a lot of local locals, beach people hate that stuff. So this is going to have your following little local breakfast places and coffee shops and you can really have that place where you're regular at all these places and a safe environment for your kids.

So if you haven't visited this area, and we'll show a lot of footage here, but if you haven't visited this area, I can't harp enough that this feels like this old school throwback of a place and it feels like it's completely its own. So if you're looking to get off the radar and look for something completely different, especially with all the minutiae we were in the last couple years, this would be on my short list. So now I want to, again, I'm just trying to add as much value as possible. So I have some notes with me so I remember the order exactly, but I want to give you the west, east, the name of all these towns. So in this video, I don't want to make it 400 minutes, so it'll give you a nice research list. That's what we're going to do here. All right. So what I would consider Dune Island Beach, I'd look at Santa Rosa, Blue Mountain, and Grayton.

Moving my way to the right here, opposite on camera. Watercolor, Seaside. Seaside is the town that literally the Truman Show was filmed. Now it looks like Pleasantville looks fake, right? But that would be a new construction option or a newer option in a beach coastal environment, which is rare. Seagrown Beach, watersound, Seacrest, Rosemary, Inlet. Some people consider Sandestin. But you can see the myriad of different towns that you could hop around that are all going to live similarly. And that would be, again, going from west to east along that 20 miles on 30 A. A couple of things to finish off here that you're going to find aesthetically and lifestyle wise is one, in my opinion, this is a place that it's intentional living. People don't accidentally end up here. It's a destination spot. It's the dream. Everyone that's there, if you fit the same vibe, then you're going to find a really nice community.

This gives you a really laid back, small town beach feel. It's very golf cart friendly. But the cool thing is with all those different beach towns based on age, lifestyle, and price, you get quite a variety. You know, again, the bougie mega mansion exclusivity thing, but you get funky, crunchy kind of town stuff. You get like pastel colors, you get more family friendly communities. So in my experience, I grew up really close to the beach and the family thing in the beach usually don't coincide incredibly well, because well one, the price point, the age of these things, you don't how people ended up there. So it doesn't really feel like master plan. So you don't know who has kids, who doesn't. It's very, very random and it's not as guaranteed as like a Lakewood Ranch or Nocatee. This area I think would differ a bit because it's a lot more master plan of a beach community than the average Joe.

Conclusion

All right folks, that is a wrap for this article. Really hope you enjoyed it. Secondly, you're looking to buy real estate, sell real estate, relocate. Regardless of your timeline, please consider reaching out to my team if you're resonating with these videos at all. Lastly, before you leave, check out the description box below. Free digital guides, free analytical tools. My website there is going to be an ever growing library or free resources there, so we would love for you to check that out. Most importantly, thank you for reading. We'll see you on the next one.