I am currently looking at a Job in Chattanooga. Went thru the first interview and headed for the second.

This is a no relo job (my field doesn't get relocation, that's for college grads).

Main reason is leaving Va for the mountains and freedom of TN.

What can you guys tell me about the Chatanooga area? I am from SW VA around Roanoke originally.

Chattanooga>Roanoke

I work for the DOE at the moment. This would be working for Southern energy (chatanooga gas) I do cryogenic refrigeration process plants, operations, mechanical, controls, electric.


I would never ever live in any city. If offered a job, and I accepted, we would look for a place around 30 min out, where I would have troom to shoot, in the 300K range, prefably on a mountain area.

Kimball/Jasper area if it were me.

You don't have to go far out of town at all to be "out of town".  Out towards Ooltewah-Ringgold Rd, Harrison, Signal Mtn, any direction really.

You might be pressed to find somewhere you can shoot that is within 30 minutes of your job and is under 300k, but if you’re willing to up that drive to 45min or an hour you could start looking in Sequatchie county or Meigs county where that would be much easier. I can shoot on my land and I’m about 40 minutes from my job in Chattanooga, but I’m just over the line in GA so I have to pay state income tax, and apparently we’re a blue state now so there’s also that. If I ever move I’d probably end up in Meigs.

Real estate, especially anything with land is selling FAST right now so I’d probably take a weekend and scope out some of the areas mentioned here and see if you think you’d be a good fit, because you’ll likely have to put an offer on something sight unseen. For example, I like Meigs county and think it’s nice, my friend has 20 acres there and a great backyard range, but his closest neighbor is a white supremacist who smokes meth. To me that’s a selling point, you’ve gotta have a certain number of people like that, or at least people with run down trailers and large piles of scrap metal in the front yard, per square mile to keep the big city liberals from moving in and taking over, but you might not see it that way.

I have had the same sentiment for years.  I don't want liberals moving here, the old meth house near me is a good deterrent.  Although we've had our run-ins, they're very submissive when staring at the bang bang end of an AR.

I'm further north in McMinn.

I wish more people were rude to out of towners, I also wish our state wouldn't advertise, and I definitely wish Chattanooga would quit making top 10 places to live in magazines.

Guys I grew up in deep SW Va. Thats like home to me and I promise we are a +2 good guys.

Half the reason I aim to move is I can't fucking STAND living under NoVA trash anymore.

I drive 45 min now, and that's fine, I suppose. If the place (on call) will allow it.

I have interview number 2 on Monday. I dont know if the money is there. We will find out I suppose.  But it looks like I have made the cut so far.

Oh yes, we want you here, I was just stating some obvious around here. Lol

Hope it works out, meet up sometime as well.  Join our Signal group?

if things get serious, yeah.

I was looking on zillow around the soddy daisy area. there seems to be land. I can get 5 acres for 50K. 5 acres in a rural area ought to get me a shooting spot, an I can maybe build a house for 250K? I wouldnt even know where to start.

Soddy is a good area. One of my coworkers just got engaged to a pretty wealthy doctor and she wanted to get land and build a house. They got the land but he told me getting anyone interested in building a house right now is difficult because a lot of crews are tied up rebuilding from the tornado we had last Easter. Not sure how big your family is but if it were me I’d pick out something nice from Clayton Homes and call it a day. You could put the money you saved into a nice garage or something.

Good luck with the job, I hope it all works out for you. Chattanooga really is a nice area.

Yeah Soddy is fantastic. That should probably be doable but there’s no time for procrastinating when buying. Shit goes faaaaaast. No idea about builders though.

unfortunately after some doing some research, a toxic manager I used to work for, works for this same company. Someone I swore I would never work around / for again. Ever. Not for all the tea in China.

Looks like this opportunity is a no.

Well shit.

I hoped that you passed that info along when declining the offer.

Well damn.    Don't blame you though.

I didn't. It would not matter even if I did, I am certain.

You made the right call, jobs are never the problem compared to personalities. And you can take that as a statement about the true nature of their management if they hire that quality of manager you have experience with.

If it makes you feel any better, I moved from CA to escape its politics. In that time, home building went from about $125 sq ft to closer to $200, so building is also quite an expense compared to a pre-fab.

Good luck in VA. Indicators seem to point to TN being very over run, hopefully its time to turn into the next GA is not far behind.