[url]http://www.ar15.com/forums/topic.html?b=1&f=5&t=139230[/url]

DVD Tracker, I've got good news and I have bad news. I live real close to the Raleigh area. Most of what you said is true but there are some things you'd probably like to know that aren't so good. First, Raleigh is in Wake County of NC. From what I know, you will NOT be able to get a CLEO for Class 3 there. Durham county borders it and they also will NOT give CLEOs for sure. I live in Orange County which is next to Durham County and I heard that they will sign off but I'm not sure. As for gun laws, NC has some of the most stringent gun laws in the south. To BUY (Not Carry) a handgun, you must go to the local sheriff's dept and obtain a permit. They cost $5-10 dollars each after a background check which can take about 5-10 working days. I know someone who had to wait over a month in another county! After you have your permit though, you have to fill out the 4473 at the gun store, and the gun's yours. This is probably after the instant background check. That's not so bad is it? Wrong! For EVERY handgun you buy, you must go get ANOTHER permit! That's absolutely ridiculous isn't it? I know that Durham County will only grant 5 pistol permits to an individual per year. That's even worse than Sarah Brady's one gun a month policy! As for the ranges here, Raleigh has a few. The one I usually go to (Personal Defense and Handgun Safety) www.pdhsc.com is a pretty good one. It's an indoor pistol range where the staff is very friendly and helpful. Most of the people who go are nice polite people too. They even have an MP5 rental for only 15 dollars. That's pretty cheap for a MG rental. There's another big indoor range in Raleigh. I won't mention its name because I have nothing but bad things to say about it. You feel like you're entering either jail or a kindergarten class where they have absolutely 0 trust in you. You have to be buzzed in to just enter the firing area. You have to pay for every target before you can use it. The staff is unfriendly, unhelpful, and unknowledgable in general. To top that off, they have some of the highest prices and range fees I've ever seen. I was looking at their website where they were advertising some preban ARs and I almost spit Pepsi on the screen laughing at the Colt SP-1 (6001) carbine for $2300 or something like that. I'd say the funniest thing about that range though is their "No Rapid Fire" policy. You pretty much have to wait 3-5 seconds between each shot or you have chewed out by the staff. What makes me angriest is how the staff has no clue what they're talking about half the time and they disrespect you all the time. I think there might be a Durham Rifle Range which is a members only place too. Looking at some of the photos of the place, it looks really nice and it's probably free to shoot there if you have the membership.

For the non-firearm related stuff, I personally love the Raleigh area. Raleigh, Durham, Cary, Chapel Hill, Hillsborough are all situated together. It's actually a very very crowded area. Compared to CA, I'd say this place is probably a little more conservative. Compared to TN which is where I'm originally from, it's very liberal and northern. This area is also known as the Research Triangle Park. After all, 3 of the nation's best Universities are all within 35 min. of each other. You have Duke in Durham, UNC in Chapel Hill, and NC State in Raleigh. There's college kids everywhere. The best housing in the area is probably in Cary. It's a nice convenient quiet place snuggled between Raleigh and Durham/Chapel Hill. The housing in Cary is among the highest costing in the entire state though. As for the weather, it's got pretty hot summers and pretty mild winters for the most part. There are blizzards occasionally in a few years. Hurricanes really aren't a big problem because Raleigh's still like 150 miles from the coast. If you're in to military stuff, Fort Bragg's only about an hour or so away. They'll be GI's from the 82nd coming up to Raleigh and Chapel Hill every weekend for the nightlife. If you're single and in your 20's, the partying and nightlife is good in the area. Chapel Hill's Franklin St was ranked one of the best places to be for Halloween. That being said, there's tons of great college sports here to watch from football to basketball to soccer. Raleigh's also only about 150 miles from Wilmington Beach and is very convenient to Myrtle Beach too. I personally love this area despite its gun restrictions but that's just me. I guess you'd have to find out for yourself whether you like it or not.

I lived in Cary (suburb of Raleigh) from 1974 to 1981.  

Here's my take on it.

Summer is hotter & muggier than Florida.  I'd never lived somewhere where I could [i]not[/i] get dry.

The gun laws suck when it comes to handguns.

[i]Vinegar[/i]-based barbecue?  WTF??

"You ain't from around here , are ya boy?"

I don't miss it.  Arizona is better, even with the summers.

I live in Youngsville, heading toward Bunn in Franklin County.

I work in Raleigh and it only takes me about 15-20 mins to get to work.  

The RTP takes about 30min to an hour, but that should decrease as they are adding in another circle (540).

Majour (RDU) and minor airports are close by.

I'm not sure about class 3 in Franklin County, but you can probably post on subguns or http://www.grnc.org  GRNC kicks some butt and doesn't use the word compromise like the local NRA people tend to do.

As stated above, forget about Class 3 in Wake county unless you are willing to open up a little side business to side step the CLEO req.  There's a group of class 3 shooters that gather in Thomasville.  Mostly a great bunch of people.

The tech side employment took a majour slide, but is slowly starting to pick up again.

No basements in a lot of areas.  Soil is horrible for them.  However, YMMV depending on where you look.  I had a house built last year and gave up trying to find someone that would do a basement.

It's really hot and humid during the summers. Wake county requires a character witness to get a PURCHASE permit. no private handgun transfers, you also need a permit. I used to live in mecklenburg county it took me 8 weeks to get a PURCHASE permit.

I live in Cary, just outside Raleigh in Wake County.  What everyone has said about Class 3 in Wake County is correct, the local sheriff, who has been in power a long time, won't sign Class 3.

As far as pistol permits, you no longer need a character witness in Wake County, you simply go down to the Sheriff's office and fill out a form.  Processing takes 5-7 days and you can purchase up to 5 permits at a time at $5.00 per permit.  It is a permit to purchase...there is no gun registration.  When you purchase a handgun, the seller keeps the permit, it is not turned over to the government.

NC used to be a lot gun friendlier...I grew up in the state and things have really changed.  A lot of folks from northern cities and CA have moved here and changed the flavor of a great sourthern state.  The rural areas are still very gun friendly.  The state does allow open carry, though some areas like Durham and Chapel Hill have local ordinances against it.  Our legislature just passed a measure preventing cities from suing gun manufacturers.

I shoot at the Sir Walter Gun Club which is close by and full auto is allowed.

Lived in Raleigh for awhile, hated it. I'm not a redneck by any stretch of the imagination, but unless you like 30-something yuppie idiots with 2.5 kids who drive like damn fools and have a huge mortgage on a suburban home you will not like Raleigh.  Although the many thousands of illegal hispanic immigrants don't seem to mind that much, actually.  Definitely a clash of cultures here--white, black and hispanic all going in different directions.  My single friends hate Raleigh, it's a working family town.  

Whatever magazine your wife read must be out of date.  The triangle area was damn decent back around 1990, but has since been utterly spoiled by mass migration of shitbags from the north.  North Carolina is fast becoming the New Jersey of the south (literally--people from Jersey migrate here in long convoys) and I see no way that that trend will stop anytime soon. It will be like Atlanta in a few more years, but I'll have moved completely out of the state by then, probably.  Did I mention the anti-gun governor and the no-prize US Senator John "I wannabe JFK" Edwards?  Of course, Helms is here, too, but he's sort of a sad, old caricature and should have retired two decades ago.  Everyone accuses Helms of racism as if they had enough brains or historical context to really know what the hell they're even talking about.

If you do move to NC, to yourself a big, fat favor and don't move to Wake, Durham or Orange Counties where the taxes are high and/or the anti-gun liberals run the show.  Durham is a pit, avoid it at all costs.  Charlotte is probably the same way, but I don't know.  Many of the other counties seem to have the opposite problem--overly religious, uneducated hicks and trailer trash who enjoy (for example) dog fighting.  Take your pick.  Neither is my cup of tea.  Asheville has some nice aspects to it, so do the coastal areas, but I never seem to be able to find the right mixture here.  Maybe it's just me.

The weather is decent as long as you can stand the hot, hot summers.  Class III is easily done in most counties if you get to know the right people--make a donation to the sheriff's reelection campaign, for example.  The old south (old boy system, that is) is very much in operation.  The pistol permit thing is fucked up, but it sort of works--keeps the guns out of the hands of the blacks, dontchaknow.  That has to be what it was meant for, the way it was setup.  

DVD...my advice, I think you and your wife should vacation in Raleigh for a week or two.  I know when my wife and I were looking at places to live, thats what we did.  

We considered the Raleigh/RTP area.  We made many of the same observation that Trickshot did.  There are way too many transplants...not just that, but it seems like these folks are yankees that want to move somewhere and refuse to try and blend in with the culture.  I have nothing against transplants...I just can't stand the ones that move somewhere and then try to make their new home like their old one.  There is very little if any southern feel to the wake/durham/orange areas.

If you do go there, I'd check out the Harnett area (south of Wake co.).  I'd watch going east and north of Wake co.  The crime rate seems to go up in these area, the percentage of folks below poverity is higher, and I just never really liked those areas.

I really do think you should vacation there.  Just imagine that yall are actually living there for a week.  go out to different restaurants, take rides in the country side, go to ranges and shoot some, meet up with some ar15.com'ers, goto wal-mart see what the folks look like.  I think after a week or so, you two should have a good feel for the area and as for weither or not its somewhere you might want to live.  Good luck...Sloth

DVD Tracker.
I moved from the PRK (Los Angeles) to North Carolina almost two years ago now.  What a difference as far as gun laws and housing costs.  I am about to buy a house for $200K that would cost $500K in LA easily.  I live in Wilmington which is a coastal city in New Hanover County.  I have a lot of family in Raleigh and I like it there.  There are quite a few gun shops with all sorts of stuff that is frowned upon in the PRK.  There are a lot of colleges in the Raleigh area (NC State, UNC, Duke etc...) which add to the nightlife and what not.  Good place to live IMHO!

http://www.esri.com/data/online/tiger/usdemog.html

http://www.esri.com/data/online/esri/usthselect.html

http://www.esribis.com/free_samples/zip_code_searches.htm

http://www.auctionweb.com/aanc/

http://www.johnsonproperties.com/

Okay here are some links you might be able to use...(i'm stupid and have never figured out how to post hot links...i just hope they will work).


The first two will give you demographic data for anywhere int he us (play with it a bit there are all sorts of really cool features to look at).  The third link will give you a demographic snapshot of an area.  the fourth link is for the auctioneers association of north carolina and the fith is a real estate company located sotuh of raleigh (they have a vary random assortmant of properties...plus everyone i've spoken with there is super cool and very helpfull).

http://www.apbnews.com/

almost forgot...apbnews.com.  if you scrool down the page...almost to the bottom on the right hand side you will see an zip code look up.  it will give you a relative crime rate for an area.  its a rating from 1-10 and looks at both the violent and non-violent crime rate.  

hope this all helps.  sloth

I just re-read my post and felt I came off a little too negative--there are a lot of things to like about North Carolina, I was just trying to give you the flavor that you don't get from the magazines and tourism websites.

I admit it--I am a transplant, but as sloth said there are two kinds of transplants--those who try to blend in and those who bring their big-government yankee ways with them.  I am of the first kind--always been a southerner (although have lived in the north), so maybe that's the difference.  North Carolina is burgeoning with the second kind, unfortunately--I bust on New Jersey a lot, but it does seem that those who leave Jersey never fully comprehend their reasons for doing so and stubbornly seek to impose the same kinds of "progressive" social controls that made taxes go through the roof and life unpleasant and created the incentive for them to move to a "freer" place to begin with.  

I've found lots of libertarians here, too though.  And this place can't be all bad because you can get moonshine without revenuers' stamps if you know where to look.

I guess I'm now glad VA has preemption laws.

DVD-

South Carolina is worth a look. Upstate is great.

Gun laws:

Class 3 legal
CCW legal
Private Party Handgun and rifle sales legal.

State funded rifle ranges

Just take a look at SC. Or if you want, I can show you 'round.

Don't move to Asheville (we've got too many people). NC has got mtns, beaches and AR-15s are legal! I live near Asheville but I've been to Raleigh area before. Don't worry about pistol permits-the schemes better than CA.

CRC

I usually don't agree with garandman...but in this case I have to.  I went to college in Greenville and it is by far my favorite place to be.  It (the upstate...Cherokee, Spartanburg, Greenville, Pickens, Oconee and maybe Anderson and Laurens counties) is conservative, pro-gun, friendly people, great restaurants, near perfect weather, relatively low crime rate and  wonderful outdoor activities (the mountains and lakes).  If I could find a job there my wife and I would move back in a second.  

Western North Carolin is also nice.  We spent a good bit of time in Hendersonville.  Beautiful place...espically in the fall.  

Other nice places in North Carolina...the area between Charlotte, Greenboro, Raleigh/Durham and Fayetteville.  I spent sometime at a friends lake house in the Unwharrie mountain area (near Albemare) very nice area...the Cleveland/Rutherford co's west of Charlotte are very nice as well.  

Places I'd stay away from...the north eastern part of the state...around Rockingham (the city) and the counties east of the Pee Dee river that run along the South Carolina border (i alreay mentioned the areas east (of Johnson co.) and north (east of Rockingham co.) of Raleigh/Durham).  I've never heard many positive things abotu Greensboro either...but haven't been there enough to formulate a stong opinion.  

But, no other Southern state requires them to buy a pistol.

Well, Atlanta is shall issue with no permit required to buy, Georgia has a very pro-gun governor, even if he is a DemoCRAP, and Georgia has preemption laws to keep each little podunk town from making it's own gun laws, so don't knock Atlanta.  Raleigh just wishes it could be like Atlanta.

LarryG,

My brother is in Georgia and GA gun laws mostly rock. Way better than NCs thats for sure. But DVD Tracker is moving from CA so any southern state is better. Besides Raleigh has the better hockey team. [:)]

CRC

Well, you've heard all about the gun stuff and the weather.  My only advice is, if you do  move to Raleigh and ever meet ANYONE named WASON (yes, WASON is the correct spelling), run like hell the other way. The person well be well educated, pleasant, and seem like a nice person. He or she will also stab you in the back at the first available opportunity.

How do I know this? I was married to one of them once, and she, with her family's help, stole everything but my teeth. [;D]