Space Coast
In the early 1960’s, the commencement of the space program at Cape Canaveral helped to shape the Florida we know today. And 60 years later, Brevard County, now known as the “Space Coast”, is considered a hub of technology and innovation more than ever! In addition to an esteemed technical university (Florida Tech), high-tech companies abound in Brevard County including SpaceX, L3 Harris, Northrop Grumman, Lockheed Martin and Blue Origin, just to name a few.
So why should a retiree care about living in a growing, high-tech area? Because along with a strong economy and innovation, comes rich culture, great shopping and a thriving nightlife. And the upside here is that you get the benefits that come with a bustling area without the traffic jams you’ll find in larger Florida cities.
Here are just a few benefits to retiring on the Space Coast of Florida:
- Despite all the job growth and the influx of young professionals, people 65 and older still make up over a quarter of the county’s population. That means that the over 50 social scene is alive and well!
- The Space Coast has 71 miles of coastline which includes 50 miles of sandy beaches that are open to the public. Along those 50 miles you can find a beach that suits your taste no matter what you prefer: great surfing beaches; quiet, empty beaches; good beaches for swimming, and beaches for finding shells and exploring off-shore rocks! And no matter which beach you prefer your beach will include nesting sea turtles!
- Brevard County has an EEL Program (Environmentally Endangered Lands) that consists of 22 sanctuaries and conservation areas. These no-fee public lands provide an incredible opportunity to hike, bike, horse-back ride and bird watch!
- Boating enthusiasts will appreciate that Brevard County includes 160 miles of navigable canals and channels, plus a 70 mile stretch of the Intracoastal Waterway.
- No matter where you live in Brevard County you’ll find attractions nearby to take your family when they visit. Some of the attractions within the county include the Kennedy Space Center, the Brevard Zoo, the Cocoa Beach Pier, the Cape Canaveral Exploration Tower, historic Cocoa Village and Downtown Melbourne. Additionally, Brevard County is an easy day trip (1 hour drive) to the mecca of Orlando attractions.
- Prices for houses located near the ocean, including oceanfront condos for sale, are still lower than most other parts of Florida.
Living in
Melbourne
Melbourne is the most well known city in Brevard County. Although it isn’t a huge city, it offers an abundance of activities to enjoy. At the city’s core is a revitalized, historic downtown with quaint shops, unique restaurants, and a hopping nightlife. If you want to live near this lively area, you have several lifestyle options to choose from. Just steps from downtown, you can opt for a waterfront condo, an older modest home, and a newly built luxury townhome. You may even find that one of a handful of stately homes (on over an acre) will be for sale.
But Melbourne’s downtown is only a small portion of the city. Throughout Melbourne you’ll find homes and condos for sale in a variety of neighborhoods. Some are new and gated, while others are older with attractive, mature landscaping. The newer neighborhoods tend to have small, easy to maintain yards. If you like the feel of a planned community with manicured yards, plentiful sidewalks, lots of ponds and an onsite golf course, then consider living in the conveniently located Suntree area of Melbourne. (Viera is also a great option but we list that planned community separately because it is on its way to becoming its own city.)
Melbourne doesn’t have its own beach, but if you live here you’ll have easy access to at least one of the Space Coast’s many beaches. There are three causeways that will take you from Melbourne, on the mainland, to the barrier island, which the locals refer to as “beachside”.
Living in
Viera
Photo Courtesy of: Viera
Established in the early 1990’s, Viera is a popular and ever-growing master-planned community. It isn’t its own city yet, but lies within the northern boundaries of Melbourne and the southern boundaries of Rockledge.
Viera offers a wide range of neighborhoods and lifestyle options, including the very popular, gated retirement community of Heritage Isles. This community is literally on its own island and includes your choice of condos, townhomes and luxury homes for sale at variety of price-points. Residents enjoy beautiful views, seemingly endless sidewalks and first-class recreational facilities.
In the center of Viera you’ll find the best shopping on the Space Coast. Their shopping area, called “The Avenue“, also offers great dining options, bars and a movie theatre complex. In the center of the shopping area, tucked behind a circle of shops and restaurants, there is a quaint courtyard where live music is frequently offered.
Nature lovers will be happy to know that Viera encourages its residents to embrace and appreciate the natural beauty that Florida has to offer by maintaining conservation areas and trails throughout and around the community. In fact, Viera offers access to two of the largest wetland and trail areas in the county!
Living in
Cocoa Beach & the town of Cape Canaveral
Of all of the beach towns on the Space Coast, Cocoa Beach is the most touristy. But the residents here are happy to welcome tourists to their beautiful wide beaches because the tourists are the reason that Cocoa Beach and the adjacent town of Cape Canaveral have such a variety of unique restaurants, fun attractions and a hopping nightlife. It’s not often you can find a small town with these amenities.
Despite being on a narrow strip of land only ten miles long with a combined population of less than 22,000 residents, Cocoa Beach and Cape Canaveral seem to always have some unique event going on. It’s not everywhere you can watch sky-diving & surfing Santas, an astronaut parade, sea turtle releases, offshore speed boat racing, a dog surfing championship, an “I Dream of Jeanie” marathon, and an airshow while having a day at the beach! Oh, and we’d be remiss not to mention the rocket launches, which are becoming more and more frequent. And on a regular basis locals enjoy listening to a variety of local musicians at the many outdoor pubs and restaurants, including ones right on the beach or overlooking the river.
If you’re thinking that with all the excitement in town that this area must be mainly inhabited by 20 and 30 somethings, well, you’d be wrong! The median age of the residents here is 57.5 years old.
If you happen to love kayaking as much as you love going out, you’re in for a real treat! Just west of the Cocoa Beach there is an area called the Thousand Islands (not to be confused with the 10,000 islands in Southwest Florida). These uninhabited islands are covered in mangroves giving kayakers endless coves and mangrove tunnels to explore. If you own one of the many canal front homes in central Cocoa Beach then you’ll find theses islands practically out your back door. But if you don’t live on the water, you can still put in a kayak at Ramp Road Park where you’ll find marked kayaking trails right in front of you.
There are a wide variety of housing options in Cocoa Beach and Cape Canaveral that cater to retirees. In the condo market, you’ll find small, modest ones starting as low as $150,000 all the way up to luxury, oceanfront condos going for over a million dollars. There are also a variety of options of single-family homes, but prices are on the rise. If you are lucky you might be able to get a small fixer-upper for around $400,000 or so. But expect to pay considerably more if you want a remodeled home or a home on one of Cocoa Beach’s many canals.
Living in
Satellite Beach & Indian Harbour Beach
If you’re retirement dream consists of a laid-back lifestyle with long walks on an empty beach and a quiet neighborhood with friendly neighbors, then you should seriously consider Satellite Beach and Indian Harbour Beach. These towns are the kind where local businesses may close up shop because the “surf’s up”. Many of the homes and condos here are a short walk to the beach, but no matter where you live on this barrier island you’ll be an easy bike ride away from the ocean.
If you love nature, you’ll love the fact that the beaches here are a prime nesting spot for several species of sea turtles. Would you believe that these turtles nest on the cities’ beaches at densities of around one nest per 10 feet of shoreline per year!? Satellite Beach takes its commitment to nature very seriously. The city was the first in Brevard County to establish a Sustainability Board and to implement a Sustainability Action Plan. And if volunteering is something you plan to do in retirement, you’ll find plenty of opportunities to help the environment here. You can participate in beach clean-ups, assist with educational night-time turtle walks, inspect new turtle nests, volunteer with the Restore Our Shores project, or even get certified to rescue baby sea turtles. To learn more, you can visit the Ocean Reef Beach Festival held annually at Pelican Beach Park.
There are a variety of homes and condos in Satellite Beach and Indian Harbour Beach, with the condos being very popular with retirees. Unlike in Cocoa Beach to the north, the strip of land between A1A (the beach road) and the ocean is pretty narrow. Because of this, almost all of the beach condos here have spectacular, direct ocean views, with some still selling for as low as $350,000.
Living in
Melbourne Beach
Photo Courtesy of : Visit Space Coast
Melbourne Beach proper encompasses only 1.4 square miles and has a population of just over 3,000. However, people who live on the barrier island up to 15 miles south of the town limits have Melbourne Beach addresses. Melbourne Beach proper was mostly developed decades ago, but the unincorporated area to the south continues to be developed today.
If you are looking for a quiet, residential beach town, Melbourne Beach might be right for you. There are only a handful of restaurants and businesses here and they are mostly found within or near the town limits. If you live within the town, you’ll enjoy friendly neighbors and find it easy to walk to the local park and restaurants as well as the beach. The thing to be aware of if you are considering living in Melbourne Beach is that the farther south you live, the more difficult it is to get anywhere. This is because the barrier island is narrow with only one 2 lane road that runs north/south, and the two causeways which can take you to the mainland are a whopping 25 miles apart.
But although you won’t find a hopping nightlife in Melbourne Beach, you will find plenty of nature to enjoy. Take a hike on one of several trails in the area, visit the Barrier Island Education Center, and from April to October you can find sea turtles hatchlings emerging from their nests on the empty beaches.
You won’t find the plethora of condos and townhomes in Melbourne Beach that you will find in the other beach towns along the space coast, but most of what is available can be found south of town. Houses that are on the ocean or the river mostly go for between $2M and $3M or sometimes a little less if you go far enough south. Decent homes that aren’t on the water start at about $600,000 in town and about $500,000 in the south.
Living in
Merritt Island
Oddly, Merritt Island isn’t an island, it’s a peninsula that lies between the Indian River and the Banana River with Kennedy Space Center on its’ northern end. The town of Merritt Island encompasses 17 square miles of land and 29 square miles of water. You’ll find a lot of canal front and river front homes here as well as some (but not many) condos.
If you want to live on the Space Coast and your favorite leisure activity is off-shore fishing, then the northern end of the town of Merritt Island is definitely your best bet. The reason for this is its close proximity to Port Canaveral which is the only place that provides ocean access for the 100 mile stretch between the Ponce Inlet to the north and the Sebastian Inlet to the south.
As you drive through Merritt Island, you’ll find that the northern end of the town has a very different feel then the southern end. One reason is that the northern end is quite wide (and split in two by Sykes Creek), while the southern end eventually comes to a point just wide enough for one home. The farther south you go the more exclusive and more expensive the homes are. But, in general, homes in Merritt Island are more affordable than those on the barrier island to the east. Small canal front homes here start at about $400,000, and you might be able to get a decent home that isn’t on the water for as little as $250,000.
If you’re an avid bird watcher, Merritt Island might be on your radar because of the renowned Merritt Island National Wildlife Refuge. The refuge has document 357 different species of birds, which makes it about tied with the Everglades for the area with the most diverse species of birds in Florida. But if birding is your reason for retiring to Merritt Island, take note that the wildlife refuge is at least a 45 minute drive away, and considerably more if you live toward the south end of Merritt Island. If you want to be close to the refuge then consider living in Titusville.
