If you're planning to move to Minnesota, then here are the things that you might want to know before you take the decision. These are my experience that I've had in which some are positive and negative experience.
1. Weather: The first thing you'll hear when you say Minnesota to people around is, 'Brutal cold weather'. Yep, since I come from Colorado, which is a snowy place, I felt it might be as usual decent and beautiful snow weather. But, I was wrong, here you would find huge bulk and mountains of snow mixed with salt which would lie on the road all the time for around 6 months, thus making it more congested,dirty and difficult to drive on the broken road. To make it worst, your car would get rusted due to salt on the road when parked for long time outside. Though there are many parks around, you would not be able to take the family out due to the extreme cold weather conditions for around 6 months.
2.Cost of living: If you're moving from expensive place like California, you might find the rent cost very inexpensive. However, most of the apartments that I've known are bit costly.You can find a nice, decent 1 BR for around $800-$900/month. However, be aware that regardless of the lease length like 6 months or 1 year, 2 months notice period needs to be given, if you wish to end the lease. I find this really annoying because this becomes tough to search for the apartment without this criteria.
3. Lakes & Shores: Though there are 10,000 lakes in Minnesota, you would only able to see the fountain lake when there is summer time. Plus, it becomes so humid and hot on summer, there are lot of flies, bugs around the house. Oh yes, you can see the shiny, greenery summer for only 3 to 4 months!
4. Driving license- Beware that if you apply for license ID, you would be asked to write the test again, and once you pass it, it would take more than 3 weeks to get the driving ID through mail. This is a bit complicated when compared to other state.
