Is Your Home in One of the Best Places to Live?

Billings, Montana

I subscribe to Outside magazine. I like the annual Best Places to Live feature and spent some time this morning going through the 2017 list. These towns are great if you want easy access to the adventure and wonder of the Great American Outdoors. Here is a sample from last year’s list, available online for free. Outside’s top pick was Billings, Montana. Here’s why:

When it comes to fitting you for a cowboy hat, the gals at Taubert’s Ranch Outfitters have two ways to go about it. If the hat is a little tight, they’ll point out, your head will stretch it over time. If it’s loose, they’ll advise you to stuff the band with some newspaper. Nothing fancy, problem solved.

Taubert’s, purveyor of hats, cowboy boots, and Pendleton blankets, has been on North Broadway in downtown Billings since 1979. Back then this shopping district was a cen-ter of commerce for ranchers who traveled from hundreds of miles away. In the decades since, Billings’s population has grown from about 67,000 to more than 110,000. But Lou Clayton, 82, who’s been clocking in at Taubert’s since 1989, says Billings is a small town dressed up like a big city. “We used to say, ‘You can tell when you get to Montana, because people wave at you on the two-lane roads,’ and that’s still true today.”

Billings is only a stone’s throw from the Absaroka-Beartooth Wilderness area, one of the largest in the country and home to Granite Peak, Montana’s tallest at 12,807 feet. Anglers enjoy the wide, braided waters of the Bighorn River to the east and the boulder-strewn Stillwater River to the west. The hills to the northwest are a playground for climbers, trail runners, and mountain bikers, and Yellowstone National Park is less than three hours away. Better yet, it’s all substantially more affordable than already discovered Montana adventure hubs like Missoula and Bozeman—the median house price in Billings is still under $200,000.

As an energy and agricultural center known for both its stunning rimrock formations and its oil refineries, Billings was a dark horse in this year’s competition. Locals were pleasantly surprised to see their scrappy city defeat scenic Jackson, Wyoming, in the final round.

E.J. Smith - Your Survival Guy

Preparing your investments and family for when disaster strikes.

E.J. Smith is the Founder of YourSurvivalGuy.com, Managing Director at Richard C. Young & Co., Ltd., a Managing Editor of Richardcyoung.com, and Editor-in-Chief of Youngresearch.com. E.J. graduated from Babson College in Wellesley, Massachusetts, with a B.S. in finance and investments. In 1995, E.J. began his investment career at Fidelity Investments in Boston before joining Richard C. Young & Co., Ltd. in 1998. E.J. has trained at Sig Sauer Academy in Epping, NH, where he completed course-work in Practical and Defensive Handgun, Conceal Carry Pistol, Shotguns, Precision Scope Rifle and Kidnapping Prevention. E.J. plays a Yamaha Recording Custom drum set with Zilldjian cymbals. His first drum set was a 5-piece Slingerland with Zilldjians. He grew-up worshiping Neil Peart of the band Rush, and loves the song Tom Sawyer—the name of his family’s boat, a Grady-White Canyon 306. He grew up in Mattapoisett, MA, an idyllic small town on the water near Cape Cod. He spends time in Newport, RI and Bartlett, NH—both as far away from Wall Street as one could mentally get. The Newport office is on a quiet, tree lined street not far from the harbor and the log cabin in Bartlett, NH, the “Live Free or Die” state, sits on the edge of the White Mountain National Forest. He enjoys spending time in Key West and Paris. Please get in touch with E.J. at ejsmith@youngresearch.com. Sign up here to receive all the best content from Richardcyoung.com each week.