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Funnily, north / north central Alabama is pretty nice. by WilfordBrimley

If you took everything north of about Calera up through the border with Tennessee, it'd likely be in the top half of the country in things like median income, probably top 10 in growth, probably top 15 or so in innovation per capita, etc. Huntsville (especially), the southern half of Birmingham, Tuscaloosa, Florence / Muscle Shoals, and Madison / Decatur are all nice places to live with a good bit going on. Anniston / Oxford is a shithole, to use the term above, but it's not much than a waystation to Atlanta or a place to sleep after a night at 'Dega for most people.

Central and south central Alabama are...tough. The old Black Belt towns are about as rough as it gets in the U.S. Driving to the Pandhandle beaches from Montgomery is bleak until you get near the coast. Only saving grace in that part of the state are Lake Martin (which is very, very nice - probably among the top handful of lake towns in the Southern U.S.) and Auburn.

On the coastal part, the Mobile side of the bay has some nice parts and some rough parts but overall, I would strongly prefer the Baldwin County side of the bay. Baldwin County, especially Fairhope, is very nice and is among the fastest-growing parts of the country. If I had cash to spare, I would buy property there right now. Gulf Shores and Orange Beach are a lot different than they were 20 years; much more bougie and upscale and trending even more that way.