James, I'm assuming you live somewhere in the United States. To be frank, there is no safe place in the U.S., so unless you can find a bunker in the woods and survive there for a year, you are going to live in an area that has some sort of risk to it, whether it be a city, suburbs or rural. The smartest play, IMO is to offer to stay for a 6 month lease at your current rate if you can afford it, or see if you can get free months with a 12 month lease on your current deal.
What was Washington state's issue at the beginning of the year became the North East, then became the Geographically southern states issue, because this virus travels with people, and if people continue to travel without taking the nesscary precautions, than it'll keep on spreading.
If you can really move away from your workplace, or think you can find work easily once you move, and places like Texas or Florida are too much of a risk, then you probably want to move to a state like Hawaii, which even with the increasing cases, is an island state, so can at least restrict travel more easily than a contiguous state like New Mexico or Colorado.
Speaking personally, I expect the Fall and winter to be bad, and there will be no safe state or area and hope I'm wrong.
https://www.covidexitstrategy.org/
Heres my situation.
My bosses had a meeting last week and apparently the consensus is that WFH is going well and there is no reason to return to office until there is a vaccine. That being said, it is not their final decision, it is up to the president. Right now we are WFH until end of August and I would wager theres a 90% chance the big bosses extend until end of year.
I live in northern NJ. My apartment is great. The thing is, I live here because of location (was between my and ex-s jobs) and the amenities. As such, it is also priced fairly high because of those features. But the ameneties have been closed since March 15, and the location is useless now. GF is gone, and it seems like I wont need to commute for a long time. The location is also great for access to NYC, Hoboken etc, but there is also no reason to visit those places.
So why break the bank paying for an apartment that I cant take full advantage of?
And frankly my life sucks right now. I am completely alone. I travel from bedroom to living room and back. Every other day I go out to pick up cheap takeout food. Ive had two social "dates" since March.
So here are the options Im thinking about right now:
-Renew the lease, pray things get better so I can use the amenities and social life of the NYC region
-Stay in state, but move somewhere cheaper/more suburban. Ill still be lonely as fuck, but at least there will be trees, maybe I can buy a hammock. Maybe I can find a 2 bedroom for the same price and have a real home office
- Get the fuck out of this piece of shit country. Put my furniture into storage, grab my computer and clothes, and find a short-term furnished rental in a Caribbean island that is free of the rona and maybe in the fall go to western Europe if theyll let me in. I would tell my bosses Im working from my dads house in MA or whatever.
Honestly Im falling apart. NJ did what we were supposed to do. R is under 1. Hospitals are empty. But the fucking republican neanderthals have made it so life is ruined for the rest of the year.
