Hey everybody it's Tristan Emond  mindful living realty realtor right here in rapid city, South Dakota. Welcome back to my YouTube channel. We talk everything about moving to rapid city, the black Hills and all the wonderful things of rapid city and the black Hills. One of the questions people are asking me a lot lately is.

How bad this is the wind there? Now I was born in the Southwest quarter of Minnesota. When we moved in 1990, he pretty much came straight across to rapid city. And so I've always been part of the upper Midwest and the wind has always been there. It's always been something I thought was normal. It wasn't even something that added to my what's the weather like in South Dakota video, which I'll post somewhere up here.

So it's try to answer the question. How bad is the wind South Dakota? So quick caveat. I of course live in rapid city. I understand the right wind speeds in the rapid city area. We do have the black Hills that has a tendency to kind of block some of that wind. So the winds and the priority, the winds, even in box elder, it seems like there's a lot more wind than there is in rapid city.

So some of my comments made. Here in this video are referencing more rapid city wind than across the state of South Dakota. If another city in South Dakota interests, you make sure you do your own research, but they'll probably stay pretty close to what I'm saying. So to answer this question, the first question I had was, well, what causes wind.

Anyway, according to the national geographic website, here is what they say. Differences. The atmospheric pressure generate wins at equator. The sun warms the water and land more than it does the rest of the globe. More equatorial air rises higher. The atmosphere migrates told the poles. This is a low pressure system at the same time cooler, denser air moves over the earth surface towards the equator to replace the heated air.

This is a high pressure system winds generally blow from high pressure to low pressure. The boundary between these two areas is called a front complex relationship between fronts cause different types of wind and weather patterns. So, if you've looked at weather maps in these United States, you've probably seen maps like these, where there is this little Swooshy thing that starts in Canada comes down across Montana and flows right through South Dakota on the way to Iowa, as it flows back up.

You've also seen pictures like this with a jet stream flowing in the same swooshy pattern right across the upper Midwest. As you can imagine, we'll have more wind when there's a weather pattern changing or there's something coming. You always know when the wind is blowing theres something blowing in last weekend, I had some clients in town and for whatever reason, we had two days of consistent, 20 to 30 mile an hour winds with gusts that reached up to 80 miles an hour in some areas.

Now that wasn't as bad as the a hundred mile an hour in North Dakota. I might just be prejudiced. Now that was different. That was unusual. Even the locals around town are saying, what's up with all this wind. Usually we may have one day of strong winds and the next day it'll calm down considerably. But for whatever reason, we had two days of really strong winds all by the third day, that was just under 20 miles an hour.

If you do a Google search for the windiest States in the United States, as you might imagine, South Dakota always appears within the top 10, it normally appears in the top five. We hold this honor right along with our Midwest neighbors, Montana, Wyoming, North Dakota, Oklahoma, Nebraska, and Kansas in the Plains.

There really isn't much to stop the wind. The wind was giving you a bit of a bug. Now you've been here before. Never fear. You'll have to grab out of your head and grab onto something everyday just to get out of the door. But there's typically some sort of wind movement in South Dakota. I found this really helpful site called windfinder.com.

So let's check out this windfinder.com website. So you can see here at the rapid city airport, it's currently blowing and seven miles an hour. Look at this it's January 29th and we've got 40 degrees. It was 50 degrees yesterday. Go back to how things are wierd around the rapid city, South Dakota area.

Here we have a yearly average 13 miles or hours on average gust of 32. I like this table down here. It talks about the speed of the wind per month. You can see here zero one miles per hour, under 10% of the time. Throughout the all the months, you can also see the trend of when picking up through the spring and falling down and during the summers and picking back up again during the fall.

So really what we're taking away from this is if you want to go water skiing and you love to ski on smooth, clear glass like I do, then you go in August. Finally, we can notice that they're really strong wind speeds. Over 25 miles per hour. Really happened only a few percentage at the time, every month, according to this map.

So now let's check out sioux falls real quick. Their wind speed today is about 11 miles per hour. And as usual, they're a little bit cooler than us in the winter time. If you scroll onto this map down here, of course the trends are very similar. Gradually growing into April, going down to August and then back up again through the fall through October, November, what's interesting about this is the high percentage of low speed and the smaller percentage of over 25 mile an hour winds based on this map, the airport in rapid city.

It's actually a little bit windier than the airport in sioux falls. So what are some of the advantages of having lots of wind number one less mosquitoes. Now I'm not going to say there aren't any mosquitoes, but when the wind is blowing, it certainly calms down the activity of those mosquitoes around you.

Aside from those really still summer nights. Number two. Cools you down in the summer, it's always nice to have a little bit of breeze going on. So at least you, when you're sitting in the shade, you can feel a little bit that breeze cools you down a little bit makes that lemonade just a little bit sweeter.

There were three Kite flying go up. The high is number four, wind energy. Now I know South Dakota, isn't the top of this list. But if you go East, there are a number of wind turbines doing their job. It really just is something that you kind of get used to. Just last night, I met with my clients that have been here since November, and I asked them, so have you noticed the wind?

And they said, well, you know, except for those few days of wind that I mentioned earlier, Not as much. You'd love to have the windows open for the breeze to bring in the fresh air during the spring, but not so much when it's blowing that snow around and gets kind of cold. So if wind is something that you absolutely hate, South Dakota might not be the best place for you.

So what's the wind like where you from leave me a comment below and let me know. Thanks for watching everybody have an amazing day and remember love where you live. When you send it flying up there all at once. You're lighter than air.

You ready? It's time to go. Snowshoeing.

Hey Everybody It's Tristan Emond here with mindful living Realty, a realtor right here in rapid city, South Dakota. Welcome to my YouTube channel. I talk everything but moving rapid city and the black Hills. And the wonderful things about rapid city and the black Hills. And this episode today of Tristan about town we're snowshoeing at the big Hill trail head, just outside of Spearfish, South Dakota, to get to the big Hill Trailhead go Southwest from Spearfish on Tinton road at this trail.

Head is not only snowshoeing trails, but also dedicated fat bike trails and groomed ski trails across the parking lot. There's also snowmobile trails.

Whatever your winter sport, you'll find it at big Hill trail head

suddenly the trail is gone.

all right, we survived so we went about three miles. There's a bunch of different groups you can go on about. We missed one. So we only went three miles got up here about 10 o'clock. We were here till about noon, couple of hours. If you come up here and make sure you do a few things, make sure you dress in layers.

I took my coat off about halfway through. Make sure your boots are plenty waterproof. I even have some, a lightweight pants and put on my jeans, but I didn't get too hot. So I don't want snowpants, but just to make sure that you stay dry. It was amazing day for hike. The sun was shining. The sky was blue.

The wind was down on quite a bit. And then right now it's 53 degrees. So it's gets plenty warm. Thanks so much for watching everybody. And if you liked this one, check out these other ones while the black Hills hikes and, uh, you know, Hey, Don't forget Love where you live .

Hey, everybody is Tristan Emond here, mindful living Realty in rapid city. A new special episode today for you guys. I'm here with Ramsey who is in Sioux falls, South Dakota. So we're going to have a little rapid city versus Sioux falls video for you today. So first of all, I'll have Ramsey introduce himself and tell us a little bit about who he is and how he is over there in Sioux falls.

Yeah. Yeah. Thanks for having me. So my name's Ramsey I actually have been in real estate since 2019. So came from a sales background. Always had a passion for real estate. Just helping people in general from, you know, families finding the perfect home from investors standpoint. People like to find those houses that have opportunity or just building, you know, so with lots and, and whatnot.

So coming from a sales background from the car business, and it was a bit different. But I'm really glad I made the transition and I absolutely love everything about real estate. Yup. It's a lot of the things translate though. Once if you come at it from a. A matter of how can I help you? You know, that it's the same, same idea as far as, you know, selling homes, selling cars, as long as you come from the same attitude, it really kinda makes things kind of makes me flow.

So yeah, so obviously my name isTristan Emond mindful living Realty. I've been in real estate since 2006, so that's 14 years and it's been a while now, my goodness. We started out with some corporate real estate world and then my wife joined me 2010. And then coming 2016, my wife and I said, you know what?

We can do this ourselves. We opened up our own real estate, brokerage, mindful living Realty here in rapid city. So that's my little half story. So we will get going out more about our towns. So Ramsey, tell me a little bit more about Sioux falls. What a population what's it known for? You know, give us a little one, two, three on Sioux falls in general.

Yeah. Sioux falls is literally big city living, small town feel a year to year. I mean, Sioux falls is just growing and growing. The population I want to say is right at around 190,000. And it sounds like we're going to, we're getting a lot more people in here. You know, what it's what it's known for is the Falls park is like one of the main things that Sioux falls is known for.

It's the big Sioux river falls. It's a falls literally in the center of the town. There's so much history with it. So that is, I'd have to say what Sioux falls is primarily known for. I, you know, that's there's a lot more to talk about it, so. And we'll get to that. Of course. Yeah. So for those of you that aren't familiar with your South Dakota history Sioux falls is on the East side of the state on along interstate I-90  and rapid city where I'm at is on the West side of the state.

Rapid city is about 75,000 people in rapid city proper right now. And of course we're doing the same thing we're growing. We're getting more people coming in. R w just outside rapid city is boxelder, which is which owns the houses, the Ellsworth air force base. And it sounds like as long as things move forward, we can get another mission to that base, which is going to bring in another few thousand people.

And if you consider rapid city and then some of the outlying towns such as box elder Piedmont black Hawk. We actually ended up with kind of about a hundred thousand in our community area, as far as that that's concerned as far as population is concerned. And I think the thing rapid city is most known for is a gateway to the black Hills.

And here we are on the way to Mount Rushmore, we've got president's downtown and his statues, we have all these other very presidential things because of course, you know, we're. Right next to Mount Rushmore. So that's the main things, I guess about rapid city. We'll talk more about that here in a little bit.

So let's transition as we talk more, we've talked about our, our city's growing 1990 and I've seen it. Nothing but grow. So it's, it's just gonna keep going. So how's your housing market going? What's what's going on with the housing market over there? Yeah, I wanted to add one thing as well from my side of the state to your side of the state.

I don't think anyone understands like the difference of you know, the physical features of the area over, you know, on the East part of South Dakota, it's mainly all flat. You know, we don't have a bunch of Hills, you get about three hours down I-90 which is the, where we drive from one end of the other in South Dakota three hours down there by Chamberlain.

It completely changes you have Prairie's. You got Hills trees, you have absolute, it looks completely different. So, I mean, that's one thing that I think that I truly appreciate is just with it being, you know, South Dakota from the West to the East, the difference from just going from one end of the other.

Yeah. Yeah. And it's four and a half hour drive. You know, if you go 80, that, which is the speed limit. If you go a little faster, you might be able to hit, well, you're usually between four and five hours, you're getting from rapid city to Sioux falls and yeah, right at Missouri rivers kind of splits the state really instead of.

North Dakota and South Dakota should have been East river and West river. That's kind of how different our, our, our state is. We have East versus West river competitions all the time. So but yeah, it's a little more definitely agricultural all the way around. But East side of the States have considerably more farmland, corn beans sunflowers where West river, a little more cattle ranches, a little more horse ranches, a lot of hay fields, not as much corn and actual farming type.

So a hundred percent. Yeah. Yeah. So, you know, rolling into the housing market over in Sioux falls. I mean, it is absolutely a crazy, I guess you could just say it right now. We have, you know, I'm not sure if it's the same for you over, you know, in rapid city area, but we're getting buyers. I'm getting people from all different States right now.

You know, it's a sellers market currently I'd say the hottest price ranges in town right now, or 200,000 that. Are remodeled up to the 300,000. There's just that in between that has been absolutely blowing up. So those are selling, I want to say within the first day multiple offers. So do you have a lot of new construction opportunities kind of going out or is that kind of tough or where's that at?

Yeah, so new construction East side Sioux falls there. It's, they're building all over on the East side of Sioux falls West side as well too. They are expanding a bit, but North and East side are absolutely blowing up towards the Brandon towards the Harrisburg. It's like. We're connecting to all of these little cities.

As far as current new construction, it gets pretty cold. So they're, you know, they're waiting to break ground. I think they're going to hit the ground running a year within a couple of months, but that new construction is big know. Yeah. Yeah. So I actually got to actually asked that question to you. You mentioned some of the smaller towns around you, so like Harrisburg and tea and Beresford.

Aren't that kind of like. Small town. I mean, fringe almost just kind of subsidiary of Sioux falls in some ways. Right? A lot of people traveling back and forth or, yeah. Yep. So I would say Tea you got Tea South Dakota that's more towards the West side. You have a. Harrisburg in Brandon, that's going to be the East, North ish area.

And then you have Gerritsen. So you got all these little small towns and were quickly expanding to them. I remember, you know, when I was little, it was like, there was a bit of a separation to get to Tea especially that to Harrisburg and, you know, it is just expanding and expanding. So it's connecting to all of these little towns.

Yep. That's kind of how it rolls, right? Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Same thing here in rapid city, I just did a search a couple of days ago, active residential properties in rapid city and actually active residential in our entire MLS. There's 136 properties available for sale. Usually right now we have four or five, 600 as we get into spring and we're getting a little higher to that.

So yeah, our inventory is severely limited and just like you, you know, we're getting offers on properties very quickly. And it's multiple offers over asking price and you know, all these things that, of course, many of you have heard across the country as well. So it's it's, it's tough tough for buyers right now.

Of course, it really good for sellers because they get, they get their, their pick of the letter kind of idea. Right? Yup. Yeah. So and then yeah, do answers also about new construction. Obviously rapid city was built up against the Hills and well, everybody in the. Sixties and seventies had the same idea, everybody else's well, let's go build up into the Hills.

And so that's all built all new construction, just either we're going to go North, East or South. And that's where all the new construction is kind of working around rapid city and a lot of it's going on and there's a one new development that's going to be at 700 acres. I think it's going to be like some 15,000 homes.

I believe in this, this development that they're just starting now. So it'll be a few years before they get all those, all that put together. But right now they're. Building them. I mean, they're getting sold before they can then build them. There are, there are literally streets that have for sale or sold signs on the lots, waiting for the builders to come to get to them.

And it's just a matter of yeah, we'll get to you when we get to you have a good day. Right. So it's kinda nuts. Yup. We're seeing that here as well, too. So I've been working a couple of new construction deals right now and they're just Hey, we're trying to get the framers, you know, to get to that site so they can get the house going for, for my clients.

So, yeah, that's just something that I, you know, with me being newer since 2019 you know, I'm like, is this normal? Is this how, you know, this is how it normally happens? Well with, because of the pandemic delays of some of the materials that's caused additional strain. And then, you know, as we've gotten increasing demand for the supply, and then also then the contractors, the sub subcontractors, you know, their demand is high.

And then when in rapid city here, you know, we had a hail this, this summer. And so all the contractors are busy. They're trying to fix all that stuff too. So it was kind of a crazy mess as far as all that's concerned. And we're gonna start seeing the new construction prices going up as materials. Do you know prices just keep, keep going up for now until that normalizes at some point.

So, yeah. Yep. So let's go into employment opportunities. What Sioux falls known for what what can you where can you get a good job in Sioux falls? Well, you know I'd have to say the medical field in Sioux falls is. Probably one of the biggest opportunities here. There's so much opportunity.

There's Sanford hospital. You have Avera, you have the children's hospital, you have the heart hospital. There's the specialty clinics. So I'd say that's just for the medical field part. And we've got a lot of people, doctors that come in from all over the, you know, again, Sioux falls is known for its outstanding medical centers.

And then from there you have banking and accounting. We have a lot of new banks coming to Sioux falls as well, too. And from what, from what I'm reading, it sounds like it's a very tax friendly place for businesses such as. For banking and accounting. And then education we have. The university center, right in town, Augustana college university of Sioux falls.

We have tech schools. So there's a lot of education opportunities on top of that, just schools in general, again, with us expanding out towards all these little towns and growing, you know, it's just, there's two schools being built right down the street from me over on the East side. So there's a lot of opportunity in those areas.

And then lastly, Sales from car dealerships to retail stores. We are growing in every angle. And I would have to say those industries. Yup. Yes. And I hear Amazon is coming to town. Yep. Yes, Amazon is actually coming here. I want to say there next year is when it was planned. You know, the plan was, it was going to be finished.

That's going to bring in a thousand jobs and there's another big company. I don't know if they've announced it yet. But they're also part of it. Well, I don't want to hear that's good. 500 jobs as well with that company coming in here. So. There's a lot, lot going on. Yeah. And with your proximity too, I mean, proximity is kind of a loose word, but you know, I mean, Fargo isn't too far away, a lot of people hop on a plane and go to go to Minneapolis St.

Paul. Right. And they kind of little commuting back and forth. I imagine it a little more of a big business in Sioux falls than it is over here and outside of the state. Yes. Correct. Yep. Yeah. So here, here in rapid city, you know, we're, we're smaller. We have everything you need. Some of the biggest, some of our top employers are kind of similar.

We do have the medical center you know, and so in Sioux falls, you've got a lot of smaller towns kind of all the way around on the East side of the state, a little more sparse on the West side of the state. So we're rapid city kind of has the only hospital within about a hundred mile radius. So we got everybody coming to town, not only for the hospital, but also for the services for Sam's club, for the shopping and for the concerts.

When, you know, when, if we ever have concerts again, you know, that kind of thing. So the hospital center and all the medical facilities around it is also a huge employment opportunity for us here in rapid city. We've recently joined. I think they joined with Mayo clinic. And it's called monument health now is that is the hospital here, here in town.

And so, you know, that's a huge employment opportunity. We also have a lot of financial. Employee employment opportunities. That's another big one on the list. Ellsworth air force base employs a lot of civilians as well as their, their airmen. And then also anything of course, related to the tourist industry.

Of course with the black Hills, that brings lots of tourism. So if you're an hospitality, workers, restaurants, any kind of the did you attractions everything in the black Hills? All those, those, those types of jobs are very ready really available. Especially as, you know, tourism did it didn't slow down last year, either even with the pandemic.

I think we were actually up because everybody came to South Dakota to camp instead of going and going wherever they were going to go. I think so the laws were a little bit more lax. Yeah. If they wanted to do, I had one guy in Florida that was just trying to get a A box for him the back of his van to come drive up and he couldn't even get that ordered because everybody else is ordering.

It was kind of, you has got an interesting scenario and that scenario, how many people were coming out to different places and camping across the country actually during, during during the last year or so. Yeah, it was a good idea. All right now, we're going to talk about the top three things. That six that's three, three things we love about our cities.

So Ramsey number three, Sioux falls we'll work our way to the best number one. So the number three thing in Sioux falls this may shock a lot of people, but it's things to do. A lot of people ask, you know, what is there to do in Sioux falls depending upon your lifestyle and just share some things that I enjoy it.

And it is eating. So I like to eat, you know there's a lot of different restaurants in town local ones as well, too. So you won't find them everywhere. I'd have to say burger joints. There's a lot of burger joints and we just had this big burger burger battle, 2021 in town. 24 restaurants make a burger for the month of January and everyone in town votes on it.

So yeah, so there's just like a lot of like cool little places to eat. Bike trails, there's a 19 mile or right around 19 miles. It's a bike trail that goes all the way around the town. So from. Majority of it. You'll ride along the big sioux river. It'll take you down by the falls park. It'll take you through downtown and it'll take you basically all around town and it's, it's really pretty.

So I really enjoyed that. If you're trying to get out of the town area, there's the Palisades. That's over in the Gerritsen area Palisades state park. There's it's, it's beautiful trees and a river goes right through there and there's little cabins. You could stay on the river. It's very small and miniature versus, you know, the West part of the state, but it just feels a little, you know, you're a little secluded and you get to be with nature and then good earth state park.

It's another thing to do. It's. Again, there's just a lot of sightseeing. So if you like to golf, we have five golf courses in Sioux falls. And then they've just opened up great shots. So it's just like top golf. So they got the, they got the bays and, and going out and golf. And when it's cold, you know, you get the heat coming down on you.

So that is a few things that I like to do in Sioux falls. And then the water park isn't too far away. Isn't it? Yeah, a good point. There there's a wild water West. It's like 15 minutes off the West side of town. So when you get to the West edge, about 15 minutes away, wild wonder West is a, a big water park we have in town.

They got a nice big, lazy river, a swim up bar and just go-karts paint ball, all sorts of cool stuff to do out there. Yeah, I love waterpark. They took away our waterslides a while ago. So I was looking at that waterpark, but I don't think I follow it on Instagram. I'm like, yeah. Someday take a day tour and spend a day at the water park.

Yeah, it's fun. Yeah. Number three, thing about a rapid city is, is downtown. Actually have some clients had just moved into the Western historical district, which is just. A few blocks downtown, and they've talked about how they've just loved going to different restaurants. And they've been going to trivia every Thursday night at some bars and had a blast doing that and meeting a whole bunch of different people at different bars and different locations and different restaurants enjoying all the restaurants downtown there's a lot of different flavors and different varieties.

And so they've been enjoying those pieces. And then main street square is amazing. Development that they built a number of years ago, where they have video or movies at the park they've got every couple, every month they'll have some sort of event. So I say, you know, they used to a Halloween event or a Halloween event a bridal events, so many different things that they do in main street square during the year.

And then during now, now you can go down and go ice skating. They've got an ice skating rink in the middle of town. That's always fun to wrap around except for this week when it's, you know, negative three degrees. And then also downtown in the summer is Thursday nights. On seventh and we, so they get, there's a band that comes to town.

It's a free band. People get together on the street, listen to music. There's a, there's a beer garden, there's plate spot for kids to play. And just the general atmosphere of getting together, doing stuff downtown, enjoying all the, all the different activities, different things to do downtown. And there's, you know, there's a canvas2paint, so you can bring your family down and paint.

There's the escape rooms. Those kinds of things. And so new, more and more things are being built downtown too. And being brought into downtown to, to make it a great place to check out, to visit, to get what you need to enjoy the restaurants and, and just enjoy altogether. So that's my number three for rapid city.

What's your number two for Sioux falls? Well, my number two would have to be. Events. There's just a lot of events that go on all different times of the year. Like for instance, we were just talking about one of them. I really liked it was the burger battle. You have The St. Patty's day, you know, all downtown there's the zombie walk, they do.

So it's everyone dresses up like a zombie downtown and goes and you know it's cool to see everyone out and about there's hot summer nights, where they bring all the Corvettes in downtown they'd line them all up all over. You have the arts festival Again, similar situation. So there's just a lot of unique different events around town.

Everyone kind of expresses themselves and it's for, I can almost guarantee for every type of person there is something that you would enjoy to go see. So events, so that kind of tied into things to do. I guess you can say that I did on my number three. But then I'd also like to toss in there. Just opportunities.

I'd say Sioux falls with it growing. They're just, there's a lot of opportunity for everyone as well, too. So it's a free market. It doesn't matter what profession or career you're in. It just seems like it's just a great opportunity for anyone. Yep. Yes. Yeah. So you mentioned, you mentioned the arts, is there a lot of.

Kind of different, different types of art stuff, kind of going on downtown and we've got like different murals and different museums and that kind of stuff. I assume you have that kind of stuff too, for the artsy fartsy people. Yeah. Yeah. And they have a, the sculpture walk too. So. There's there, you know, you go to the downtown area, which is like the center of the town and it leads  into the falls park, but there is the sculpture walk where you can go and you'll walk around each point and there'll be sculptures, just like very unique pieces, handmade, you know, and they'll tell the backstory and that those are, are all around downtown.

So you get to kind of, you know, experience the downtown feeling. And get you get a go around and see, you know, these unique pieces of art. And then you could also lead into the falls park, you know, as well too, because that's just a walkaway as well, too. So yeah. Yeah, it sounds similar to, you know we've got the presidential statutes, I think there's right now.

I think there's 30 or 40 statues on each corner and downtown. So you can see all the presidents and their, their life size, you know, you can actually sit next to one of them and then take pictures next to all of them. So it's kind of cool too. We'll go down and there's a, president's walk. You can walk all the way downtown and look at all those sculptures and that's kind of a fun thing for people to do that.

It's unique. Yes, we do. So, yeah. So number two in rapid City is my opinion is parks greenspaces. So rapid Creek runs all the way through the center of town. And rapid Creek comes from the black Hills and just rolls right through town. And among around there is all a bunch of green spaces and they made.

Parks. So you, you can go to a park along the river. There's we've got a bike path that follows the river. Like you guys do. Ours is only about nine or 10 miles. It follows the park all the way along, but that's a great. Placed to, you can bike or walk, do whatever you need to down there. But w whether you're going to Kenny Lake park or Sue park or Roosevelt park, there are green spaces.

The trees are big, and, you know, you can picnic, you can play softball, you can do all of these, you know, plenty of spots for the kids to play plenty of playground, equipment, lots of fun and different things you can do at each park. There's even a golf Frisbee golf. That you can play, you know, and different, different parks at different pools, just so many different parks in a nature place to hang out at.

And even if you're in town, my wife and I find a spot where we grow behind some trees a little bit and sitting on a rock right next to the water. So we're watching the water fall. And except for the fact that you could kind of see some, some cars drive by over there. You wouldn't know that you're in town.

So it's really a good, you can, you can find some nature, even in town. And that includes places like Hansen handsome Memorial park,Hansen-Larsen Memorial park, which is a bike trails. And that's just right in town. And you're like in kind of in the Foothill of the Hill foothills, and then just off dinosaur park and skyline Hill.

Our skyline drive. There's a whole bunch of walking trails stuff over there that you can go into too. So you're looking, you know, hiking in nature without even, you know, getting away from rapid city at all. So that was my number two for rapid city is just all the different places you can escape to nature without really good escaping the nature.

So. Awesome. Yeah. All right. So the, the big one coming up, number one, Ramsey. What's number one about Sioux falls. All right. You might laugh at me for this one, but it's the people. You know, I feel like I've been all over, you know the United States and I feel like there's no place like home. It's just, you know, you get here, you feel very welcoming, you know, just, even if you're out of towners, people from holding doors open, when you're walking in To letting you pull out when you're driving your car and you know, you, there's a little bit of traffic and you need to get in, people will let you in parking spots, you know?

So it's just like, you know, people say hello. So I feel like overall, you know, when people think of the Midwest, You just it's South Dakota period. You know, I think that even when you're on the West side, you know, I've been there plenty of times. It's, there's no place that you can find people that are so welcoming that are just you know, just respectable and accept anyone for who they are.

There's no, you know, not judgy. Yeah. So I would have to say my, my number one is the people here. Nice, nice. Yeah. I had a ups guy that wave, you know, one finger wave on the way past him today. So people wouldn't at you, people talking to you. Yeah. It's it's it's Midwest hospitality is definitely here in South Dakota for sure.

Well, my number one has got to be the black Hills. And last time I asked people in town, I said, okay, everybody, what's your favorite thing about rapid city? And of course the black Hills was always number one within 20 minutes, 30 minutes, you can be on any trail in the black Hills. You can be up in an hour.

You could be looking at it, some mountain vistas all by yourself, taking me to amazing pictures. And w besides that, there's just so many different things to do. We went snowshoeing last. A couple of weeks ago you can go snow skiing. You can go ice climbing when some of the waterfalls, I don't know why you would, but you could, if you wanted to do, you know, snowmobiling just, and that's just the winter stuff.

And then of course, you've got the tourist season where you can go to some of the attractions that are, that are in town. One of the ones that I really love by Keystone is a a zip line, but then also you climb on the ropes and you're up high, you know, on that, on the obstacle course. And that's, that's a lot of fun even for.

For us locals. So just so many things to do and to be a part of in the black Hills. It was really nice during the pandemic, when you know trips anywhere, it was kind of like, you know, like that's going to happen. We spent the summer exploring new places. We've never been, and we've been here since 1990.

So it was. Because there's always somewhere new. You can go to see some new roads. You can go travel down some new trail that you haven't been to some new site that you haven't seen yet. Whether it be an old mine or an old car stuck in the middle of the Hills somewhere and a lot, a lot of the history and a lot of the different towns.

So the black Hills for sure is number one reason to be on this other town. This side of the state is all that that's going on in that side. So. Yeah. I was actually over in the Spearfish area and went hiking and ended up on the trail to the devil's bathtub. You hit that one up and you go about a mile and a half.

And, and it doesn't sound far, but when you're going hiking through, you're like, okay, you know, the trail kind of goes through the water and around and yup. Yup. And then you get to go up and you get to slide down a natural slide into a spring in that water is cold. Yes. I have a video of me hitting that up, but there's just some, there's so much beauty over on the West side, over there.

Right everybody there, we have it. Rapid city versus Sioux falls. Of course you have any further questions, leave comments in the comments below Ramsey, and I'll be happy to answer anything for you. We'll have our, any contact information below as well. So if you want to just pick up the phone and talk to us and we'd love to talk to you what do you think Ramsey any

the last words you want to say. No, I think we covered it all again, if you have any questions about the Sioux falls market my name's Ramsey Salameh. You'll find my contact info in there as well, too. Thanks for having me on the show and I appreciate it. Thanks so much, everybody. We'll talk to you guys later and of course, remember love where you live.

See you guys.

Do you have a dream of owning land in the black Hills stick around for the six things you must know for buying land in the black Hills.

I'm Tristan Emond with mindful living Realty or realtor right here in rapid city, South Dakota. Welcome back to my YouTube channel, where I talk everything about moving to rapid city. And the black Hills and all the wonderful things about rapid city and the black Hills to begin with. Let's look at the black Hills on a map and talk about the different areas in the black Hills and Hills is those areas just off the spear, fish and Sturgis coming down to Deadwood and nemo and Rockford in this area right in here.

Central hills are those areas, just East of rapid city, going down a Hill, city and Custer and Southern Hills are by Custer and down to your hot Springs. You'll notice  the majority of the land opportunities around the lead-deadwood areas. A lot of the mining claims are now being opened up and buyers are coming in and buying those mining

 claims the other area that we'll find more land listings than others is the Southern Hills South of Custer, near hot Springs. As you can imagine the areas right around rapid city, a lot of the people have decided the same thing and said, you know what? I really have to like to have that nice property in the black Hills.

Right close to rapid city. So land parcels within 30 minutes of rapid city are few and far between they're sort of subdivisions. So what happened is the owners of some black Hills parcels decided instead of just selling the parcel, they should subdivide it. Now they're not going to be like your small city, lots of 0.2, five.

Or even half acre, you'll probably have one acre lawn to have three acre, lots, maybe even up to five to 10, even 20 acre lots, but they are still within a subdivision. Now some of the subdivisions are miles away from the nearest town and most of those miles are on Gravel roads. And if you're looking for a black Hills view, don't forget, you have to go up a Hill to get to the view.

So you're not going to have blacktop roads all the way up to your driveway. Point number three, if it says black Hills in the title, The price is going to go up with everything that happened in 2020, a lot of people are escaping their cities, escaping their big areas and looking to find a spot they can call their own.

That's maybe a little bit further away from neighbors and other people. And the black Hills has been a great choice. But what has  happened then in this past year is prices have gone up in 2020, the average price of a five to 10 acre parcel within a black hole area was about $88,000. And most of these parcels were in subdivisions that had covenants of some kind, your average price of your 10 to 20 acre parcel was about $130,000.

And then it is search for land in the black Hills with no covenants, regardless of acreage. And the average price was $206,000. So, if you're looking for that black Hills acreage, that's got a little more space to it. So you can get away from your neighbors, expect to spend over $50,000 just for the lot itself.

And if it's under $50,000, There's probably a reason. I looked at one property of the day that was on the market for over 3000 days. That's eight years. It's on the market. Chances are these properties have either no power. You need a snowmoblie to access it in the winter, or it's just simply built on a hillside.

Last year. I showed some property to some clients of mine that I bought a bus and retrofitted it, and just wanted to go. Take their bus park it on some land. We found one property that sounded amazing. We took a look at it. First of all, you had to drive past another neighbor to get there. And that driveway was small, narrow, muddy the ravine on the one side, by the time you actually got to the lot, it was an angled lot.

It was basically a hillside. There might've been one building spot in that entire lot. They couldn't even get their bus into it. And if they got their bus, they're not even sure how they would turn it around. So I mentioned subdivisions. They've got covenant. And most of the sort of that have covenants.

They're not going to be one of those scary HOA's that you've heard so much about, but these covenants will have stipulations about keeping your property clean, how many animals you can or cannot have when that you can have a mobile home on your property, that type of thing. In addition to that, it's also going to list what size of home they're requiring you to build.

Most have a minimum build size of at least a thousand square feet. Most of also have a timeframe for you to get your building completed in. They want to make sure that you're not building your house for years and years and years and years, they also have a limited timeframe that you can have a temporary structure while you're building a home.

So you could live in your RV for up to six months. While you're building your property, but after that six month time period, you're not allowed to be living in that RV anymore. So for those of you that just want a piece of land to put up your RV and stay in it every once in a while, or you've got a tiny home that falls underneath a thousand square foot.

Square-foot building requirements or any kind of other temporary structure, you will not be allowed to live on your property in that manner. With covenants attached these past couple of months, I did help some of my clients with the tiny home, find your property for them to put their tiny home on before they got here to actually look at land, they were sending me lot after lot had a lot considering what about this one?

This one looks great. What about this one? And I would look at each one and everyone that had a covenant had a building square foot requirement. So their tiny home would work on that property. So we had to look for properties that were only listed as no covenants. Number four, let's talk about utilities, the majority of your properties in the black Hills, you're probably going to need to Drill a well

well, there's not going to be any water on a property. You're going to have to go find that by drilling a well, you also have to install a septic system of some kind. Now, if your light isn't conducive to a normal tank system, there's also mountain type septic systems and other options that we can look at as far as getting that system installed.

Those though. Are more expensive, natural gas won't be available. So you would have to get propane and a propane tank to fire your furnaces, gas, fireplaces, and whatever else you need. Finally, electric service. Most subdivisions will have electricity to the lot, but there are some lots, electricity might be far enough away that you're going to have to get the electric company, come string up the wires and the poles to get electricity to your lot.

Fun fact, if you buy a property in Pennington County with no covenants and you park your RV there for longer than six months, Pennington County is going to require you to install a septic system, to make sure that that sewage goes in the right direction to make sure that whatever county your in you pay attention to the rules and regulations.

Number five, the internet. Now I know we'd all love to have broadband internet with us wherever we go. But when you're in the remote areas of the black Hills, with those lots of granite rocks and all sorts of things, the internet guys don't seem to want to come and dig cable all the way out that way. So your choices at that point for internet is satellite internet.

If there happens to be a phone line out there, there might be a DSL service, or we might be able to use self service for your internet. However, take a look at these maps, both by AT&T and Verizon, you can see then many years as the black Hills. There isn't even service readily available. So if you're looking for black, his land too far away from the city, chances are your internet.

Isn't going to be fantastic and filing number six, money, money, money. As I mentioned, the utility section, there are a lot of things that you need to install prior to you even really getting started building your house. The first thing is a well. That could be $50,000 all by itself. You need to install a septic tank, need to build it a driveway for your property.

What if you need to clear some trees or you need to do some extra, additional groundwork to make a flat spot for your property, all these other things you need to look at to consider when you are putting all the numbers together with how much money is going to actually take to build your property, you could be spending a hundred thousand dollars.

On these pieces and that doesn't include the price of the land or the price that takes to build your home. Now, if you are a home builder and you want to build it yourself, more power to you, I just asked you to do one thing or maybe three things. Number one. Check with the County for their building codes and regulations.

Make sure that you follow those. Number two, you can do your own electric work, but you need to have the South Dakota state guys come by and take a look at it and give them their thumbs up. Same thing with plumbing. They have to have their own South Dakota. State's got their plumbing guys have a plumbing inspection.

Do you please do those three things because if you don't do those and then you go to sell your property, it gets very expensive to get all those things caught back up to code or up to the inspections that are needed before you can sell. You're black whose land dream is possible. Over the past two months, we sold two black Hills properties.

The first buyer found a property inside customers' city limits. It's about half acre, but they wanted the city sewer. They wanted the city water. They wanted the services close by with the city. And in addition to that, They also got a view in the distance of the rocks, uh, coming out of the black Hills.

The second is the family I mentioned before that had the tiny home they wanted to put on a lot. We found them the perfect lot. 14 acres, fully fenced, no covenants, a few miles outside of Custer, but they paid $175,000 for this property. But man, it's got a nice view. I can imagine waking up every morning.

Watching the sun rise over the black Hills. I hope the information I provided you in the city. What has been helpful? If you have any further questions, don't hesitate to email me, call me, let me know what common questions you have in the comments below. I'll be sure to make a video about those comments.

If I see enough of them. Thanks again for watching. Have an amazing day to remember love where you live .

What, why are people moving to South Dakota today? We can talk about the seven reasons people are moving to South Dakota,

Hey  everybody. I'm Tristan Emond with mindful living Realty, a realtor right here in rapid city, South Dakota. Welcome back to my YouTube channel. I talk everything about moving to rapid city and the wonderful things about rapid city and the black Hills. I recently came across an article that listed the top States, people moving into and moving out of South Dakota was number four on the list.

So why are people moving to South Dakota? It's cold. We've got snow. The wind blows. As I've had conversations with many of you and many people across the country. I found seven common reasons, people are loving the idea of moving to South Dakota. So let's start out with number seven, no income taxes.

And cost of living that's right. South Dakota has no state income tax nor any corporate income taxes and a very business friendly state to do business in. If you check out the cost of living comparison to your big city compared to rapid city or Sioux falls or any other state city in the state of South Dakota, you'll notice a significant decrease in the cost.

So living needed to live that life that looking for. I've recently had clients from both sides of the country. Come in and say, you can buy that for that much, that piece of land, where I'm at, that's a million dollars and you only want 200,000 for it here. That's crazy. So while home prices in our area are rising, making home affordability more and more difficult people from bigger cities coming in.

Are seeing great value in rapid city, soiux falls, and the state of South Dakota, number six, Midwestern hospitality here in South Dakota. We say hi to you on the street. We waved to you and through the neighborhood and we let you borrow our snowblower. Last month, I was at the final walkthrough with my clients at the property before closing the next day, as we were walking around the outside, the neighbor came over, introduced himself, told them about his family, talk to them about the deer in the yard.

And continued to just talk all about how wonderful it was here in rapid city. My buyers were so excited about this because they were used to their neighbors coming home, putting the car in the garage and you never see them again. They love the fact that they were in a neighborhood where neighbors got together, they talked and they shared responsibilities of their neighborhood.

South Dakotans are hardworking Americans that love life, love freedom, and respect your right to who you are and your individuality. So while South Dakotans will help you out any pinch and smile to you along the bike path, the philosophy is live and let live. Number five back to nature. South Dakota is a very agricultural state on the West side of the state.

We have lots of ranches, horse ranches, cattle ranches, hayfields on the East side of the state. You'll find lots of farming, corn fields. Soybean fields, or if you go in the fall, you'll see rows and rows of sunflowers, such a beautiful sight to see a lot of people moving into the state of South Dakota.

Love the fact that they're closer to food. Production gardens are common growing food as a way of life. And having beef, chicken and pork nearby is certainly a benefit. We've been buying beef straight from a rancher for a number of years now. But this past year there's been a new Facebook pages established.

Where you as a customer can go straight to the rancher, buy a quarter, half whole beef pay for the beef processing. They're all in your freezer. And you're good to go for a number of months. You can do the same thing with pork producers and chicken farmers. Food is not far away in the state of South Dakota.

Number four. Natural beauty. I know when you think about South Dakota, the only thing you see is the weather channel blizzard updates, whether you love the majestic views of the mountains, the sunsets of the Prairie, we're taking the mode on a Lake. You'll find it all in South Dakota. In Yankton, there's a Lewis and Clark recreation area.

We went there once and had a great time on the Missouri river falls park. And Sioux falls is a great place for tourists and locals and visitors alike. If boating or fishing is your thing, there are so many lakes in South Dakota. You can go to Lake Madison near Madison, South Dakota Lake Kampesca near Watertown and Lake Oahe near Pierre.

And those are just a few of the many lakes in South Dakota. What are the most popular and scenic places? It's the rough steps of the bad lines camp, or walk down one of the many trails in this place. That's almost a different world. And of course, there's the black Hills national forest visit the Buffalo at Custer state park, explore the caves and wind cave national park.

You take the pilgrimage of bear Butte and bear Butte state park. And of course, this just touches the surface of the beauty and the nature in the state of South Dakota. Number three, no traffic. Now of course we have some traffic, but compared to a majority of the people I've talked to the traffic in rapid city and Sioux falls is pretty much nothing.

You won't be sitting for hours on end waiting to get downtown, waiting to get here and wait to get there. You can always be somewhere in rapid city. Close to 20 minutes. And of course, who falls is a larger city, might take you half an hour to get from one side to the other. And you might run into some traffic on 41st and minnesota.

 but compared to your multi Pelton areas, traffic in our area is really. Not very much at all. We also have some amazing South Dakota traffic jams, buffaloes crossing the road and Custer state park, the tractor along the highway in rural South Dakota, the turkeys all gathering in the middle of the road.

Having a grand old time. And of course, downtown two trucks pulled up next to each other, talking about the weather. This is traffic in South Dakota. Number two more space. South Dakota has a population density of 11.3 people per square mile in contrast to Wyoming's 6 and California is 254. And new York's 27,000 people per square mile there's room to grow, spread out and enjoy Midwest, South Dakota, South Dakota.

We love our space. You've got huge yards, big decks and garages for all of our cars. RVs, campers, boats. Utility vehicles and so much more. And although the majority of South Dakota is rural, we do have our cities that we are proud of. Sioux falls is our biggest city with about 185,000 people living there.

Rapid city is next seventy-five thousand people. 11 of our cities are between 10 and 20,000 people. He's had his Aberdeen Watertown, Brookings peer box elder and Spearfish, an initial five or between five and 10,000 people. And the rest of the cities in South Dakota are under 5,000 people. We love our small town living in South Dakota, the community feel.

Living our best life. All right, here we go. The number one reason people are moving into the state of South Dakota. Based on my conversation with people across the country is no lock downs. Now, here in South Dakota, we haven't had any state mandated lockdown during the pandemic. Now city was responsible for their own city.

So we had some lockdowns in certain cities, for instance, here in rapid city, between March 14th, ish, and June. Uh, we had a no restaurants, bars, gatherings, that kind of thing was shut down at that point. But since then we have everything is open. business are conducted for safely as usual. And even now schools were back in session.

So the majority of people that I've talked to that wanted to move to South Dakota, want to get back to work when they send their kids back to school. want to dine out every once in a while, and they want to enjoy the freedom that we have the personal responsibility here in South Dakota. So there you have it.

The seven reasons people are moving to the state of South Dakota. Does this sound interesting to you? Go ahead and download my free 13 reasons why you should move to rapid city relocation guide. That link is below. Go ahead and hit the like button. Watch more videos of mine to get a good feel of rapid city, the black Hills and the area around.

Thanks for watching. Have an amazing day to remember where you live.

2021 Setup

So things are looking a little different around here. Aren't they? Everybody I'm  tristan Emond with mindful living Realty, a realtor right here in rapid city, South Dakota. Welcome back to my YouTube channel. I talk everything about moving to rapid city. And the wonderful things. So we're rapid city and the black Hills.

So here it is. 2021. I got new stuff. I got new glasses. I know if you noticed I got new glasses, I got a new background and I thought I'd spent a time to share the stories of what's in my background. And then also give you a sneak peek of my equipment, the things that I use and provide some links below in case you want to, you know, set up your own studio.

So let's take a look.

All right. So first of all, I'll talk a little bit about the shelf within our office. We've got a lot of this pipe and dark, dark wood atmosphere. So it was perfect. When I saw an Amazon, I said, that's a cool shelf. I want that. And it's not actually supposed to come into the corner like this, but we made this corner like this because a lot of people said do it that way.

Let's cool. So there we go. I found an Amazon. That was really cool. Let's talk about some of the pieces that are on the shelf. Cause they've all kind of got their own, their own story. This is a couple of giraffes here. My mom loved her and she had a giraffe collection. Uh, she died of cancer in 2000. So this is my, my homage to mom.

Uh, one little, little giraffe, mom and mom and baby giraffe.

Uh, this piece is a little toy. It's black. Well, hang on and hold it right now. That's why now it's Black. Now. It's white. When I first started in real estate and I was working with a commercial real estate broker, and she would always go to the commercial real estate shows, I mean somewhere. And then she would bring me back these toys.

And so this is something that I've always had and I enjoy playing with. And usually the kids like to play with it as well. And it's just my remembrance of where I came from and that piece of those as well as well. Uh, this here, sand from when my wife and I, we took our first second honeymoon to Daytona beach, Florida in 2013.

And it was amazing time for us as a first time. I actually get away from the kids for a long period of time. So we enjoyed. it so much that, uh, that it's kind of a very important moment in our lives. So it's some sadness when she sells. So from Daytona beach, Florida, these are just some decorations and they don't really have any meaning.

They were just, they were just there and it looked good. So that's how that went. My grandma was a. Ceramic store owner in Malta, Montana. So whenever we'd go to visit grandma and grandpa in Malta, we would go to the downstairs to their ceramic store and we'd paint something after grandpa died and grandma got old enough to decide that she wanted to go to a retirement facility.

She had had us all over to her house and said, Hey, what do you want? And I've always enjoyed. I've always loved Bald Eagles. And so she had this piece on her mantle and I said, that's the one I want. So this is my, my piece from grandma's house.

And she also painted this. This also is grandma Millie's painting here as well. And I thought it just kinda fit in with the mood and the motif that we had going on here.

This is this little rock, just smooth stone. I pulled this off infalis Island in Ireland, my wife and I and my daughter went to Ireland in the spring of 2019. And this is of, it's kind of a funny story because it was raining that whole week. It was thirties to forties temperature wise. So it was better than better than South Dakota.

But it was raining that day as we were going to go ahead it to this Island. And there was this big boat hanging out in the Lake that we thought we were going to take, because it was a boat with a cover on the top of it kind of a tourist boat. And we thought we were going to get and could get on that.

And I, I saw these guys and they were low. They were getting these smaller dinghy type boats ready to go. And I was kind of like Boyce, Soo bad for those people have to go on this little boat. It turns out those boats were the ones we were going on. So here we are boating across this little. To this Island.

It wasn't very far, but there's a couple of minutes in the rain when the wind was kind of blowing. It was just kind of funny watching everybody just kind of cuddle up and get, try and find protection from the rain their Island. But the other one that we went to had this very etheric, other worldly feel to it.

I mean, there were, it just had this. Feel of another planet and the energy and the feel that it was, was just amazing. And so this is my tribute to that trip, going back there and remembering what it felt like to be on the Island that day.

I first got started in real estate. When I finally got myself, my own office, my kids for Christmas wanted to get me something. Actually I asked for something for Christmas. I wanted to decorate my office. So they got me an alarm clock. I'm not sure why, but this is what they chose when they were 10 years old, whatever they were at the time, they got me an alarm clock.

So I've always appreciated this little alarm clock cause it's, you know, an old fashioned alarm clock.

And finally, for this decoration over here is a star trek pizza cutter. This is. The clothes, the gift for my first YouTube close deal. And so it was very, it was very special to me, not only the fact that they decided to get me something, but as you, if you've watched any of my videos, you know, I referenced star Trek, I've referenced star Wars.

So the fact that they, they liked me enough to say, Hey, Tristan, like start star Trek. Let's, let's get him up. Let's get him a star Trek pizza cutter. So I keep this back here as well as a reminder of how great all you guys are and how amazing this a YouTube journey has been. And I know that you all, you've all seen this flag before, and I want to tell you the story behind this flag.

Cause it's not just something that I went and bought back in 2012, I had a client who was a military member and he was going to be deployed on January 1st of our six months. To go to Iraq and Afghanistan. Now we couldn't find him property that he really enjoyed that was already built. So we decided to build something.

So we got it put together before he left. And then I kind of watched over things during the construction while he was gone on to deploy here in South Dakota, we have Ellsworth air force base, which is one of two squadrons that have the B-1 bomber. So he went out there too. Iraq Afghanistan were wherever he, wherever he actually got deployed to my client was a weapons systems operator, which they also call themselves wizzos.

And he just got that sat in the back, uh, behind the pilots and they controlled where the bombs went on a few of their missions. They flew flags in honor of certain people. So this flag was flown for me, the real estate agent. You know, I was thinking most people  probably with flow from their, their parents or their children or whatever, but no, it was flown from me.

On, where was it? It wasn't as there's a, on June 30th, 2013 can really see that. But the certificate shows that this was flown for me and it shows the different who was the pilots and who was the service operators. And even the payload of the bombs that was listed at the time. So that was certainly a great honor to receive that when he came back to the States, shout out to puffy.

Thank you so much for that honor, man. I I'm always hanging it back behind the, behind my desk in honor of who you are and what you've done. And thank you for what you've done. All right. A switch to my phone now to kind of give you a feel, we'll turn it around so you can get a feel of what it looks like behind the scenes.

And I'll talk to you a little bit about the fun things that I got and, uh, how I  do to make the video. So here we are exciting, exciting. Here's our office space. Obviously you can see the camera right up there. That's a Sony s6400 and I've got a microphone there attached to it. I just bought this MSI computer that I really enjoy.

It's really helping out with the speed of the processing for the, um, editing. I've got my lights over there. Soft box up there, and another light, like the one over there.

few other things to kind of show off here. This is my selfie stick that I really enjoy. It's a Fuji tech. It really is extends out far, really can be used for real. I like that one. And then this is just my, when you have a normal, sometimes you need just to cheap, lightweight. Tripod to take it with you whenever you go traveling places.

So I got us a cheapo Walmart, one from 15 bucks, and of course we got the camera bags, put everything in there. That's where I've got my Canon camera that we use that for our real estate photography. Uh, this is my gimbal for the phone to make some smooth shots. Of course the cleaning stuff, all that kind of stuff.

And the additional bag for the Sony camera as well.

One of my other new features is my green screen.

I haven't had the chance to really have a lot of fun with this, but don't worry. I will. And that's all there is to it. Or you enjoyed this little story time and showcasing what I do and how else? Thank you so much for watching my videos, hitting that like button subscribing, all those other things that helps YouTube know that Tristan must be kind of cool.

The links to all my fun video equipment. There'll be below, take a look at them and check them out. Of course, if you buy something, hug a little piece of the action too. Thanks again for watching. Have an amazing day and remember, love real live. Scooby Scooby doo wa uh, you, we got some work to do now.

Are you thinking about moving from your populated area to a more rural one? If so, is South Dakota on your shortlist? With more and more companies allowing employees to work remotely, South Dakota might get great option for you. Let's talk about the four reasons you should move to South Dakota to work remotely, and three reasons you shouldn't.

Hi everybody. This is Tristan Emond with mindful living Realty. A realtor working right here in rapid city, South Dakota. Welcome to my YouTube channel, where I talk everything about moving to South Dakota, rapid city, the black Hills, and the wonderful things about our area. Be sure to hit that subscribe button hit that little bell.

be sure to See all of my rapid city and the surrounding area videos. Right. So before we talk about the reasons why you should or should not move to South Dakota, let's talk about South Dakota itself. South Dakota is a Northern Midwest state just below surprise, surprise North Dakota, but we don't talk much about North Dakota.

Now, when you think of South Dakota, you probably see this now of course, that does happen, but there's so much more to our state Prairie vista's, rugged Badlands, beautiful lakes, scenic mountains, South Dakota, split in half by the Missouri river. Which does create West river and East river, which in itself is another whole rivalry.

East river is primarily Prairie land farms of corn beans and sunflowers. West river is generally more rugged country making way for horse and cattle, ranches and hayfields. Sioux falls is the largest city in South Dakota. It's population being around 190,000 people. Rapid city is second with its population.

About 75,000 people. The capital is Pierre South Dakota. No, it's not Pierre. It is Pierre at 14,000. The next largest cities are Aberdeen Brookings in Watertown between 20 and 30,000 people and Mitchell Yankton here in Pierre, Spearfish rebellion, Brandon and boxelder are between 10 and 20,000 people. Now don't let the size of this community scare you.

Each one has its own claim to fame, its own community feel. And with Midcontinent communications, providing broadband internet services to most of these cities, you should be able to get the connection you need to work remotely, wherever you're at all right. Now that I've learned more about South Dakota, let's go into the four reasons you should consider remote working in the state of South Dakota.

Reason. Number one, the space, the final frontier, the population of South Dakota is about 880,000 people. In 77,184 square miles to put this into perspective, the Denver Metro area has about 3 million people in 60 square miles. That's over three times the entire state of South Dakota in 60 square miles.

If you're looking for a little more space for that neighbor, we got it. You could even settle on some acreage just outside of town. We'll have to make sure though you have that internet connection. Do you believe there are parts of South Dakota that have a limited cell service number? Two, no state income Taxes.

Yep. You heard that right? File your federal income tax forms and be done with it. South Dakota also is a business friendly state. It's in the top five of CNN monies, best States to start businesses. There are no corporate income taxes. There are no corporate gap or gains taxes and our energy costs are relatively low.

With no state income tax, we do get hit on a few other areas, sales taxes on almost everything with the state tax of 4.5%. You can expect to spend 5 to 6% on sale it tax  in most cities plus property taxes. They're not the cheapest in the world. However, even with these taxes, the cost of living in South Dakota, significantly lower than many other metropolitan areas in the United States.

Number three a stable economy. Remember the housing crisis in 2008 home values across the country were dropping 40%, 50%, 60% in rapid city. We dropped 10%. I just started my real estate career back then and was working with Prudential real estate. We had a corporate person come up and say, Hey, this is like heaven up here while everyone else across the country is doing more foreclosures and short sales.

We were still working with buyers and sellers for whatever reason, South Dakota seems to remain steady economically through the tough times even during this pandemic of 2020, we were concerned about the tourist season being really low in the black Hills, but it actually turned out to be a huge year with travelers coming from all over the United States, spending more time in the States and camping and finding ways to have social distance in our area.

Number four. Freedom South Dakota has always had a very strong approach to personal freedom and responsibility. During this COVID pandemic, South Dakota has remained open. There've been no forced closures on the state level, no mass requirements or restrictions. The governor put the responsibility in the hands of the South Dakota people giving us the freedom to decide while encouraging to follow the procedures and guidelines.

Of course, depending on what side you're on, this is either heralded as greatness or condemned as foolishness, but it shows the resolve of the state of South Dakota towards personal freedom and responsibility. South Dakotans are proud Americans with a strong work ethic and a willingness to get things done.

So let's talk about the three reasons why it might not be the best place for you to work remotely. Reason number one, the snow. Yes, that's right. We get winter here as part of the toughness of South Dakota. Did you get the car started yet? How long has it been running? It better be warm by the time I get in there.

The severeness of the winter depends greatly upon that area of the state your planning on moving to check out this video to learn more about the weather in the rapid city area. If you can't stand cold, if you don't want to trade in your real wheel drive fancy car for at least a front wheel drive car. And if you don't like building snowman then South Dakota.

It's probably not the place for you. Do you want to build a snowman? Reason? Number two is rural. We're a bit remote out here. It's a five-hour drive across the state. In fact, a three-hour drive that's just to start to get somewhere from rapid city it's five hours to Sioux falls, it's five hours to Bismarck and it's five hours to billings, Montana.

It's six to seven hours to Denver. There are times along the state highways. You might only pass half a dozen cars. South Dakota is small town living at its finest. Now. This might drive you crazy. You might need to hear the traffic to fall asleep. You might need to go see people every night, go through a different concert, a different venue, a different event.

Now, there are certainly activities and events in south Dakota cities, but they won't rival the hustle and bustle of many metropolitan areas. You measure properties and acres and distances and hours. If this sounds scary to you, South Dakota might not be the place for you. Reason. Number three, if you plan to change things.

So I've left the most important one for last, please hear me out. So South Dakotan are very strong-willed. Determined, mostly genuine people. We like our freedoms. We liked the way things are We like the way things are built. We're not interested in people coming from out of state and changing the way things are.

Now. Don't take me out of context here. There are plenty of things that need some help. There are plenty of issues that we have that need to be addressed. If you come into one of our South Dakota cities and join governments and clubs, the express purpose causing radical change. You're not going to be very well welcomed or appreciated.

We love what we have there's room for you. If you appreciate what you're moving here for join the South Dakota side, my friends. The force strong with us. All right, everybody there, you have it. The four yeses and the three nos. Although I live and work in rapid city, I have contacts all over the state that I love to refer you to real estate agents across the state, that do business like we do with heart and a smile.

Of course, I am kind of partial to the rapid city and black Hills area so much so that I put together about 13 reasons why you should move to rapid city the download link. is Below. Thank you so much for watching. We've got great information out of this video. Take a look at some of my other videos  either here or here?

Have an awesome day. Everybody. Remember love where you live.

So what's the weather like in rapid city?

Yeah.

Hi I'm Tristan Emond with mindful living Realty. One of the most frequently asked questions we get is so how's the weather up there. Being a Northern state. There's lots of questions. Like how cold is it? How much snow do you get? Does it even get warm in the summer? Do you live in igloos and have horse-drawn sleighs?

I'm here to answer all those questions for you. Stick around to the end, to find out my favorite weather stat for our area. Let's begin with the one that you're asking the most questions about Winter. Now, whenever you've seen South Dakota on the weather channel, you see sideways blowing snow people standing on a five foot drifts.

And while this does happen some times it's not the whole story. What's the matter you guys cold. It's not so much the heat its humidity that will kill you. Winter usually sets in about November and last through February, the coldest temps are in January averaging about 35 and the warmest in November about 47.

Average snowfall in these four months is about six inches per month, but here's the thing. Thanks to the black Hills to the West. We have banana belt weather. So while we do get the snow, usually what happens is it snows? And then the next weeks it's thirties or forties and even fifties, and the snow melts, the snow we get at the beginning of the year, usually does not last through the entire winter on those days it is 50 degrees.

We run outside, leave our coats behind pretend its spring, and the next week we get another snow system and it starts all over again. Well, we have discovered is that winter is the time to be enjoyed, not endured. We've discovered the amazing views of winter hikes. We've seen ice caves. If you love snow skiing and snowboarding, Terry peak is open for the season.

And even when it's too cold to go out, we love to snuggle in watch movies and play games. Now don't get me wrong here. We get snow. It gets cold. Some weeks are below zero with stupid, crazy cold wind chills. So if this is something that's a hard, no for you. Rapid city might not be the place for you then comes March.

March is this tug of war between winter and spring. Sometimes it's winter. Sometimes it's spring many times. It's multiple spring snowstorms that melt the next week. with Temperatures in the fifties it's sprinter. The average temperature in March is 47 degrees, but it's also got the highest average snowfall amount of 11.6 inches.

Take a look at these videos that I put together at the end of March of this year. Really showcase what it's like. It's March 31st sun is shining. The birds are singing 60 degrees outside. It's beautiful. It's April 1st 30 degrees. It's snowing and we're supposed to get eight inches tomorrow. Finally in April may come spring.

With average temperatures are 55 degrees and 65 degrees. We can start to go outside without coats. I love the spring the smells. The birds come back, the green start coming out. The daffodils start blooming. It's an amazing time to be in the black Hills, but don't be surprised if having snowball fights is in your spring to-do list.

Check out this mother's day, where we were making snow chairs and Snowman and had a fun time. These Springs nose drop deep wet snow, which is amazing to play in. but usually. They're gone the next week, June through August, spring are summer months. The average temps in June are 76 in July and August are right around 85.

Once summer hits, we hit the road running and enjoy all the wonderful activities in the black Hills and the Rapid City area. What's amazing about summer in rapid city in the black Hills is our low humidity. Our 90 degree days don't feel like 110 and you can still open the windows at night and let in some cool air.

Yes, it does get hot. There are weeks of 95 to a hundred degree temperatures. You're going to want your AC in your house and in your cars. We thought we could tough it out without AC in our house. But first week in June, my wife handed me the credit card and said, get some AC. Now we love summer in the black Hills.

We were lake people. We love to go out on a path to the Lake. Angostura lake, go kayaking, go water skiing. So many trails to go hiking, campfires, camping so much to do in summertime in the black Hills, September and October, we're bringing the glorious fall months. We usually hope for a warm September to continue our Lake days, but it's certainly great to open up the windows at night and really get that cool air in the house.

September temperatures are perfect. 74 degrees on average and October cools down to a 60 degrees. With the changes in the leaves comes more great smells, leisurely walks and scenic drives in the black Hills. You notice them using the word. Usually a lot. South Dakota is known for its crazy weather patterns Spearfish South Dakota holds the world's record for the fastest temperature change.

It changed 49 degrees in two minutes after a Chinook wind came and warmed up the atmosphere. We've raked leaves. And our jackets on Thanksgiving day in 2013 when snowstorm. Atlas came by, that was on October 3rd. We had a long winter that year. But into January, 2020. It was 50 degrees. I was running around town with my windows.

Open. The weather in South Dakota is never normal. The weather patterns I described happen more often than not. Now for my favorite rapid city weather stat, rapid city enjoys 225 days of full or partial sunny a year. That's a lot of nice sunshine that makes life a lot easier on those cold winter days and those beautiful summer mornings sunshine.

We have lots of sunshine. So for a quick recap, snow. Yes, igloos. Not so much sunshine, lots summer check four distinct seasons. You bet. If you've enjoyed this video and it's provided you valuable insight of the rapid city weather patterns, please hit subscribe and hit the notification bell. Each video is packed with Rapid city information to help you make your decision on moving to rapid city.

Check out this fun video I made about winter and rapid city. And remember, love where you live.

It was the most money I've ever held in my hand. You're like, I've never had a check that big, like ever everybody Tristan Emond here, mindful living Realty in rapid city, South Dakota. I got a chance to sell a home for a client early this year. Not for the normal reasons, but because they were going to sell everything out and move into a van.

And I got a chance to talk with Vinny and Elise. In their van, check it out. Let's start with the story of how you got into van life. So I remember Vinny back in like 2015. I believe your job was going pretty good. You were always out vacationing and, uh, it seemed like you were like, okay, I need to grow up now and get myself a house.

And I think he knew, at least at that time kind of go with me from your thought forms at that point. So I was traveling, uh, took a couple cruises to the Caribbean. Um, really liked traveling a lot, decided I should get a nice house. I was dating Elise at the time. So I've looked for a bigger house. I went for a three bedroom, two bath, think this was going to be our house.

This was going to be the one we were going to build a family. And, you know, I have people over entertain, stuff like that. And then, uh, we went to Hawaii. Couple of years ago and we're like, man, we would really like to have a life full of vacation, a life that we don't need a vacation from. And, uh, so we got to brainstorming.

And Elise kind of found this thing. A van life went on YouTube. So I followed a few couples that were doing the van life already. And one of them was really big and, they had like millions of followers and they were down in South America and I'd been following them for a while and saw how they were like living in the sedan.

And I kind of showed Vinny and been like, I don't know how they're affording to do this. And so we just kind of looked into it a little bit more and more found more people that were doing it and how they budgeted everything. And then kind of decided that we could probably do that. Yeah. So, uh, we got to talking and we got engaged and then it was like, do we do this van?

Do we not? And then, uh, there was one night we had a conversation on how bad do you want to do this? And so. She took a sticky note. I took a sticky note on, it was like from scale of one to 10. How bad do you want to van life 10 being like, let's do it right now. One being like, not at all. And I think I had a, an eight and you had a seven.

Yeah. And so then we started the process of buying the van. Um, And then working on it. Uh, we got married in the process, so it took us a while, but then we decided we're just going to sell everything, save up as much money as we can, and then take off at the end of, uh, 2020. Well, that's really cool. I remember you coming to my office, you know, like, Hey, I want to, I want to talk to you.

So you, we got to my office, we sat on the couch and he said, you know what? We're going to sell everything and live in avan. And I want. Well, I've seen people do that, but what and you were just like, yep, we've got ourselves a van we're going to retrofit it. And then next thing you know, we're putting home on the market, go through about how that would be.

Were you guys through the process of the house when we contacted Trisan and I told him, Hey, well, let's get this thing going. We wanted to move really fast. But the housing market at the time was really hot. So we knew once it got on the market would probably sell quick. So I contacted Tristan and. We got to talking and he's like, all right, let's make it happen.

And then he came over to the house, he took a look and he's like, how soon do you want this on the market? I was like tomorrow. So we just want to make things happen. So went through the process. Um, we got it sold. We went with an aggressive price and we got, we wanted, which was really awesome. Um, then after they went under contract, it was like, it kind of got real, like, okay, we're about to get rid of this house.

So then we kept trying to downsize. We kept. Getting rid of stuff, selling things, they had some stipulations they wanted in the contract and we got all those taken care of. Um, and then cleaning up the house. It was slowly getting more and more real that, you know, we're about to live in a van and it's like, okay, Then we moved everything out.

It turns out we had way more stuff than we thought. We ended up filling her parents and basement full of stuff. And we're still going through it to this day, but we're slowly getting rid of stuff, but now it's like, okay, so let's, we're going to live in a van. It's pretty cool. You know, we've been in a van for a little over two weeks now and uh, so, so far it's been going great, but it's.

Very less stressful. I don't want to worry about mowing the grass or fixing stuff around the house. You know, it takes like five minutes to clean this whole van. So yeah, doing the dishes takes like 10 minutes and it's super simple. So it's just a simpler way of life. Closing the house. Papers are signed.

You go to the title company, you pick up the check last check for the place that you were in forever or the past few years, the place that you got married in. And at that moment, what did you, what did you think, what did you feel? Did you have a huge celebration? Was like, Holy crap. What, what was your emotion at the time when you, when you grab that check?

When actually when we went to pick up the check, we walked in the check, wasn't even ready. The lady was walking down the aisle or the hallway and she's like, you're Vince Herman. I was like, yes, sir. Or yes ma'am. And she's like, here's your check? I was like, yes, I got it. And I looked. It was the most money I've ever held in my hand.

Like, I've never had a check that vague, like ever. So I looked at it showed Elise and she's like, I was like, we're going to the bank right now taking it to the bank. So we hopped in the truck, drove to the bank, cash, the check. And then, uh, we looked at it and I was like, instantly, we just paid off the van.

So we have no debt whatsoever. We just paid everything off and then live in these next few months, you know, still working full time. It's just saving up more to travel longer. At least I know that you spent a lot of time with the upgrades, with the fixing, with the, the painting, all these other things.

Tell me more about how you went through that process and what you were doing in the interim, taking it from a, basically a panel van to creating your home. COVID actually sped up that process quite a bit. So I was serving tables prior to COVID and so March kind of hit and we went into kind of a shutdown.

So Vinny was still working full time. So I ended up just taking all of my extra time and throwing it into the van. So we insulated the whole thing. We built everything from the ground up everything's made of like plywood, like half inch Birch plywood. And so we bought none of it. Already manufactured. So it took a lot more time than I think we anticipated.

And we have no carpentry experience whatsoever prior to this or electrical or plumbing or electrical or plumbing. So we just kind of taught ourselves as we went and kind of bought things as the money became available. And so. Um, we spent so much time, just even like trying to figure out where we were going to put stuff much less building it, getting the electrical figured out, teaching ourselves how to do all of that.

So it was challenging, but it was fun. Everything's done and get things paid off. Where's your first trip plan? So our first stop is actually a Bismark North Dakota watch out. Um, the reason we had to go to Bismark is most of my family lives up there. And before we take off on this long journey, we want to say goodbye to all of our family and tell him we won't be around for a while, but after that we're going to head West.

Right. And then we're gonna head over into, uh, our goal is to do every. National park and every state. So I'm about through Montana and over into Oregon, California and down. And then, and if we get lost in like a ski resort, so yeah. Well, guys, that sounds incredible. So I, I wanted to follow you if I wanted to check up on your adventures, are you planning on documenting that?

Like a lot of other people are, so if you want her to find us, we're going to be documenting our trip. Uh, our Instagram is freedomoffthegrid. All one word, our Facebook is Freedom off the Grid and then our YouTube channel. That's, we're going to start here eventually is also going to be Freedom off the Grid, and we're going to document all of our travels, be blogging.

Um, Elise is going to do some pictures along the way. And, uh, so if you guys want to follow us, then we'd more than appreciate that. Yes, there we have it everybody Vinny and Elise going from three bedroom, two bath to van life, going to check out all the national parks in the nation. As long as I got a fun to me, I'm not sure I could do it though.

Thanks for watching. Have a great day. and remember love where you live.

Welcome back to Tristan around town its September 20th. So we're right on the edge of great fall leaves and black Hills today we're going down my favorite spot, vanocker Canyon to check out the leaves.

Hey Everybody I am Tristan Emond with mindful living Realty, a realtor right here in rapid city, South Dakota. Welcome to my YouTube channel where we talk everything about moving to rapid city and the black Hills area and all the wonderful things about rapid city and these black Hills. And now. Let's go for a drive.

Now it is a little smoky today due to all the fires in the West coast, but we still should be able to see the leaves in the trees. Even though, maybe not be able to see quite the blue sky that we usually see in the distance.

Sometimes you got to climb the Hill to get the shot. Thanks for coming along with me today. I think we timed it about perfect. Next weekend might be used a little bit too late vanocker canyon is just one of the many roads that you can take to the Hills to check out the leaves during fall. Don't forget to check out Spearfish Canyon by far the most popular Nemo road is a great choice as well.

Love it out here in the black Hills, we think you will too. Have an amazing day. and remember love where you live.