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You can try somewhere near Olympia or Spokane, WA. Both have better housing prices but proximity to major cities with decent employment opportunities.

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Just a headsup that Olympia and Spokane have VERY different weather systems. East and west of the Cascades is a huge divide. One side gets hundreds of cloudy days per year with roughly 40in of rain, the other gets a lot more snow, more sunny days but only roughly 10in of rain. Most likely when most people think of the PNW they are thinking of things west of the Cascades.

Interesting. I'm assuming Olympia is the typical rainy weather associated with the region, what's weather like in Spokane?

East of the Cascades is all high desert - really hot summers, really cold winters. As I mentioned more snow. West of the Cascades you don't even get snow every winter - so in Portland and Seattle some winters you get a little snow, some winters you dont get any.

In Spokane, Bend, Boise you get a bit of snow, about 10 inch of rain per year (about the same amount of rain as San Diego actually).

And yes Olympia will be what youre likely imagining the PNW to be - damn near constantly gray, always wet, lots of evergreens, etc.

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