Our 'tentative' plan is to have a condo here and a condo/villa in Florida for the winter.
The fees here are only $145.00 a month and that includes your water/sewer/garbage. Insurance would be cheaper and I'm sure utilities would be too.
The complex here does allow pets but mine don't bark so I'm not worried about that part...although I could hear other dogs in the building I suppose.
I'm not sure about kids there...I'm sure there are some but I've never seen any outside playing or anything.
We would want an end unit and preferably on the first floor so we could easily walk the dogs. We have looked at a few and the one on the ground floor has an open patio but we would have it enclosed into a heated room...that is allowed. That would also ad to the square footage. We like a larger end unit on the second floor that is totally move in ready but I just don't know about being on the second floor with dogs.
The parking is limited, one car garage (open to the other garage spaces which I'm not too crazy about) and you can park outside at your garage door. Each unit has a pretty large storage room at their garage stall.
One thing I have noticed is that some buildings we walk into you can smell cigarrette smoke. I don't know if that is from people entering the building with a cigarrette or if it is actually coming from their unit. I certainly wouldn't want my home smelling like cigarrettes when we don't smoke.
Oh, there are 2 complexes on culdesacs in this condo community and each has their own HOA. Also, each group of condos has a basement under the building in the middle so there is somewhere to go in bad weather. Yah, that's a concern of mine
We have owned and flipped so many houses in our married life that letting someone else do the yard, snow removal and maintenance at this point actually sounds pretty good!
I think I would feel better about closing up a condo for a few months each year than I would about leaving a private residence for several months.