U S Mail

[sreigle]

Art, you're correct we have to use a service but keep in mind that service also provides us with a legal address in South Dakota. We pay no state income tax. We pay not property tax on vehicles, just registration fees totaling around $200 for a 2007 Dodge, 2007 Montana and 2004 Ford Focus. And we pay no sales tax on vehicle purchases, just a 3% excise tax on the trade difference. So, we do ok. Those with Florida and Texas residences have some of those same benefits as probably do some other states. Almost forgot, SD also has the third lowest insurance rates in the U.S.

On edit -- our registration fees are due in August each year and I just paid it online. The total was a bit more than I said above. It was $279.

[Art-n-Marge]

Good to know Steve and it figures. SD is only one of the 7 U.S. states I have not been to and it would have good benefits.

Some very good friends of ours also claim residence in S.D. even thought they spend about 80% of their time in Southern California because her clients are here. They use S.D. as their address for many of the reasons you mention. NOW I know all their secrets on why they do that and have SD plates on everything. All they said was it's because that's where their daughter lived. But her daughter moved back some time ago.

[richfaa]

We now spend @ 6 months in Florida and @ 6 months out of our home base. It is no problem what so ever using the USPS under those circumstances.

[adelmoll]

Like Steve and Vicki, we enjoy the benefits of South Dakota as our address. Even in the winter when we are at our place in Florida our mail goes to South Dakota and then forwarded to us weekly. We continue to use the priority service because they also e-mail us a tracking message as soon as the mail is sent. Since we do everything on line we do not get a ton of mail so sometimes we wait two or three weeks to have them send it out. If we are going to have it sent to a general delivery address we always call the post office first to be sure they will accept it. That is getting more and more important lately for some reason and one post office in New Mexico even had us sign a little pink slip telling them who the mail would be addressed to and where it was coming from...

I love the on line tracking. It tells exactly when it has been delivered to the address and saves us a lot of trips to the post office or campground looking for it.

Helen

[ols1932]

I agree with Steve. Only difference is we selected Texas. I don't call it a "service" because it's an extension of the Postal Service. Sure, we pay a little, but we don't have to be concerned about a relative losing any of our mail. We tried this with my brother and found that it left a lot to be desired.

Orv