What do you hate about living in Maine?

[Sailor Sam]

Anyone living in Maine, who wants to share what sucks about living in Maine?  Doesn't matter where you live, or how small your gripe. I want to hear it all.

I'm going to be buying property in the Northeast sometime in the next 18 months, and I'm trying to narrow down where. I'm leaning heavily towards Maine. I lived there for about 3 years and absolutely loved it (though, I admit that I lived south of the pike, and therefore wasn't a true Mainer). However, I'm sure there's parts of living in Maine that I missed, especially since I was gone during the summer months.

Anybody want to weight in on why I shouldn't move to Maine?

[trc4897]

While I don't have experience living there, I did a 2 week road trip across Maine last year. Awesome trip, amazing area for sure. Pros/Cons in my opinion below, but probably dependent on specific areas in Maine you go.

Pros:
1. More laid back, friendly atmosphere that in a place with bigger cities
2. Seafood!!
3. Tons of nature to explore, we did a lot of cool hikes. Coastline is awesome. Lots of islands to explore.
4. Perfect summer weather (to me at least).

Cons:
1. Sunset is so early although I'm sure you get used to this eventually and shift your day.
2. Heard stories from people there about their winters. Boy they sound a lot worse than what I have gone through (and I live in the snow belt off of Lake Erie).
3. Entertainment/nightlife can be lacking if that is something you are interested in.

I'm sure you'll get better input from other posters who live/lived in Maine but wanted to throw in my $0.02!

[Omy]

Posting to follow. I need to hear the negatives so I can get over my romantic notions about the state.

[uniwelder]

Posting to follow. I need to hear the negatives so I can get over my romantic notions about the state.

Also posting to follow.  I'd like to know whether black flies are as bad as I hear.

[Glenstache]

A true Maine lobsterman's accent/dialect is effectively a different language. I mean that as no disrespect, I just can't understand what they are saying when they speak. It was often stress inducing for me. YMMV.

Winters are cold. Bodies of water routinely freeze over. At sea level.

Pro: people don't play the Florida Man game for Maine in which they google "Florida Man" and a birthday to see what godawful shit comes up.

Con: You will never be a true Mainer even if you live there until you die. Neiter would any progeny (should that happen by some extremely unlikely scenario). As they say, just because a cat has kittens in an oven doesn't mean you call them biscuits (that was explained to me by a 3rd generation Mainer who still wasn't a True Mainer(TM)).

[nereo]

Con: You will never be a true Mainer even if you live there until you die. Neiter would any progeny (should that happen by some extremely unlikely scenario). As they say, just because a cat has kittens in an oven doesn't mean you call them biscuits (that was explained to me by a 3rd generation Mainer who still wasn't a True Mainer(TM)).

This is probably my biggest (and only) real gripe about living in Maine. Doesn't matter than grandparents lived there and our daughter has lived no where else... we will always be "from away".

Once you move away from Southern Maine / Midcoast region the political leanings turn ruby red real fast (with a healthy dose of "get off my lawn" libertarianism tossed in).  That may nor may not matter to you.

Blackfly season sucks, but thankfully is just 2-3 weeks a year and pretty easy to mitigate with behavioral changes and the right equipment.  Ticks suck too (literally).

It's also a very low-diversity state (outside Portland) and has the highest median age of any state in the union.

...but we really love living here.  Never found a place that's perfect, but this is as close as we've come for us after some extensive traveling.

[rivendale]

How does it actually come into play "not being from there"? Are people holding grudges, less chances at being picked for positions, due to being from away? Good nature ribbing?

[yachi]

4. Perfect summer weather (to me at least).

I'm sure that's a great week...

[SquashingDebt]

I live in Maine!  Moved here about 7 years ago.


Some of these have already been covered, but here's my list:

Blackflies!  Just when it's starting to get nice out.  But they're not much worse than mosquitoes, etc.  Of course, we have those too.  The ticks are also a pain, and have you heard of brown tail moths?  Those are the absolute worst, and getting worse every year since they're spreading more widely.  https://www.maine.gov/dacf/mfs/forest_health/invasive_threats/browntail_moth_info.htm

Low diversity and also the oldest population in the country.  Online dating sucked, but I did meet my now-fiance eventually!

Healthcare is sparse and often not very good.  Expect to have to go to Boston for anything fancy.

Compared to the other places I've lived (Ohio, upstate NY), there's a lot more very rundown homes.  And I'm not talking just old - think appliances, actual trash, furniture, mattresses, etc.  On my drive to work, I pass about 5 couches and 2 mattresses, all of which have been in front yards for at least a year.  Within a mile of where I live (pretty rural but near a bigger city) there's at least 4 buildings that have collapsed/burned and haven't been taken down.

Speaking of rundown homes - the vast majority of houses are really old, and not in very good condition.  It's easy to buy a 100 year old house and sink a ton of money into it.

Everything seems to be an hour away.  For someone who doesn't like driving that much, it's a pain.

A lot of roads aren't very well maintained.  There's a lot more patching and other solutions that only kind of help, vs. total resurfacing like I was used to in Ohio.

Too cold for stone fruits like peaches, apricots, and cherries to grow easily.  I miss that from my upstate NY days.  But the blueberries are great!

Fewer options for good ethnic food, Asian grocery stores, etc.  Plan to have to go to Portland for these things.  (I live about 2 hours from Portland.)

More power outages that last longer than the other places I've lived.  But fewer natural disasters overall!

Not much nightlife, if you like that sort of thing.  (I don't.)

Slow-ish internet, and not many options for providers.


Now to be fair to my state, some good things, some of which surprised me when I moved here:

Fantastic local food scene, including wonderful vegetable farmers, cheesemakers, bakers, etc.

Great restaurants, although see my above point about driving an hour to get anywhere.

Great local theater, and more options than I expected.

Plenty of liberal people and at least in my circles, plenty of acceptance for LGBTQ+ folks, etc.

Wonderful nature - mountains and rivers and lakes and the ocean.


Overall, I really like living in Maine.  I'm planning to stay here until I FIRE at least, and if we leave, it'll be to move closer to family, not because we want to get out of Maine.  It doesn't feel like I'm on vacation all the time or anything (maybe if we lived right on the coast?), but there's plenty for us to do, it's nice and quiet, and I've made some great friends and like my coworkers.

[DirtDiva]

We lived an hour north of Portland for 14 years.

Pros:
1.  A beautiful summer day at a clear Maine lake, surrounded by old growth pine trees, is unbeatable
2.  The people - I never had issues with being from “away”. People were friendly, welcoming, and generally decent.
3.  Portland is a fun city to visit.
4.  Most places/activities/venues are not crowded

Cons:
1.  The weather.  I grew to hate winter, especially February, March, and April.  Snow, mud, ice, long nights and short days depressed me
2.  Too many cloudy/rainy/snowy days for me
3.  Did I mention the mud?
4.  Bugs:  ticks, black flies (which are 100x worse than mosquitos), mosquitos, sand flies, and brown tail moths which cause a painful rash.
5.  It was more expensive to live there- higher property/income taxes, heating oil, snow removal, driving everywhere so needed 2 cars (which was specific to our area)
6.  Roads are not bike friendly

Ultimately we moved to Colorado 7 years ago, which is within driving distance to our extended families, and the climate clans culture are a better fit for us.

[pbkmaine]

DH and I owned a house in Brunswick for 4 years and lived there full time for 2. We had a log cabin overlooking the Androscoggin River. In some ways it was idyllic, but it was hard to make friends and the winters were long and very rough. If I had it to do all over again, I would probably rent in Portland for a few years first.

[nereo]

How does it actually come into play "not being from there"? Are people holding grudges, less chances at being picked for positions, due to being from away? Good nature ribbing?

For some people it rarely comes into play, for others it's a constant handicap. 
Speaking from personal experience, my spouse has to work with a lot of local communities and attend town-hall meetings (they are an important thing here!). In many towns there's a very strong and unspoken hierarchy which is based primarily on how long your family has lived there. A fifth-generation lobstermen gets silently listened to while a person who moved there 10 years ago gets silently ignored (or sometimes just cut off if they don't take the hint). There are surnames which mark people as long-time Mainers, and I've seen a number of times when a respected town local is against something and that's enough to keep the newer and younger guys from supporting it (even if they otherwise would).  It's a huge deal among the lobstering community.

[wenchsenior]

How does it actually come into play "not being from there"? Are people holding grudges, less chances at being picked for positions, due to being from away? Good nature ribbing?

For some people it rarely comes into play, for others it's a constant handicap. 
Speaking from personal experience, my spouse has to work with a lot of local communities and attend town-hall meetings (they are an important thing here!). In many towns there's a very strong and unspoken hierarchy which is based primarily on how long your family has lived there. A fifth-generation lobstermen gets silently listened to while a person who moved there 10 years ago gets silently ignored (or sometimes just cut off if they don't take the hint). There are surnames which mark people as long-time Mainers, and I've seen a number of times when a respected town local is against something and that's enough to keep the newer and younger guys from supporting it (even if they otherwise would).  It's a huge deal among the lobstering community.

No personal experience, but some close friends lived there for about 5 years. They socialized primarily with other out of state transplants, and did fine in that regard.

Overall, they were initially super excited to move to Maine. They were from the Southwest, and the female partner in particular has bitched for DECADES about how much she hates the heat, wanted water, wasn't enamored of the southwestern deserts/veg communities, wanted seasons, etc. Plus, they are hard core pioneer types...wanted to live off grid, grow most of their own food (down to grinding their own grain), and hugely into outdoor sports like camping, offroad biking, etc.  And they were not 'newbs' to that type of lifestyle...they'd lived off grid before, but not been able to do as much homesteading as they wanted.  They did not want to interact with other people much either (at least, that's what they thought).

They got a working and living situation that fit every single one of their desired criteria: lovely 10 acres off grid, raised all their own food, did tons of hiking/kayaking, option for remote work at times, etc.  But the winters, the mud, the lack of sun, the bugs, and the lack of social outlet (not in terms of people, just in terms of being in a very small town an hour away from any urban center) rapidly killed their enthusiasm.  Also, they found it much more crowded with people than they expected, given the small amount of 'culture' and/or urban areas and the male partner was simply never comfortable in a place where he felt like he had to look over his shoulder for 'company' even when out in the remotest areas they could find.

Within a few years they moved straight back to the Southwest again and are much happier now (though she sometimes still bitches about the heat LOL).

***

I myself grew up in far northern WI, and most of their complaints would apply to me, as well.  I'm still considering moving back, but ONLY if my family's property ends up available in the next few years. As much as I adore many beautiful aspects of the northern Great Lakes (which are similar in many ways to the positives of Maine), there are very limited circumstances under which I'd submit myself to those dark gray months again. Life is too short.

[nereo]

Agree with what @spartana said, and I’ll add this:

Within Maine there’s the Portland-metro area, the largely summer communities of southern Maine (Kittery/Kennebunkport/York, which I view as largely extensions of MA’s north shore/NH’s Portsmouth) and “everywhere else”. About half the state’s population lives in about ~5% of the state area which stretches  from Portsmouth to Portland and within 10 miles of the ocean.  Maine has two congressional districts - district 1 is fairly “blue” whereas district 2 voted strongly for Trump. District 2 composes 80% of the entire state but has just under half it’s population, and is the second-most rural and second-most white district in the entire country. 

People in Maine even refer to the Portland area as the “other Maine” - vastly different in terms of population density, political leanings, household income, housing costs, education and access to services (everything from advanced medical care at Portland MaineMed to public transit options to Boston).  In a manner similar to how many rural states snub the coastal “blue” states (and vice versa) there’s a microcosm of that in Maine for/against the Portland area.   

OP - definitely check out the different parts of Maine to find which appeals most to you. I’ve lived in four different places within the state and I can’t stress how wildly different the human aspects can be between places just an hour apart.

[KYFIRE]

As a transplant from NY to ME for 12 years and now having lived away from there for 16 years there's a lot I still miss.  I don't know about the hostility from "True Mainers"  we lived for 6 years in tiny Milbridge and had no problems though as mentioned before, way up Downeast suffers from a poor socio-economic conditions.  Our parents got us out of that town and to South Portland so we could have more opportunities and avoid risks from that kind of area.  Portland area definitely has a lot more to offer but thw north parts, especially on the coast have their own charm.  Still though, there are many fond memories growing up there and having finally gotten my wife who hasn't lived outside a 30 mile radius in KY, she loved it.  For sure for us the social leanings there are better than the Bluegrass for us.

I know everyone mentions the winters being bad, and they can be.  I miss them though because where I'm at now, winter is just cold and dead.   In Maine or the north in general at least in the winter there's snow.   And while it can be harsh, it's another entire season that you can do things in.  Ski, sled, etc.  To me it's far less depressing than the alternative.

[pdxvandal]

I lived in Southern Maine for about a year. Coming from the PNW, it was a tough transition. You asked for the negatives ... here are mine:

* Too buggy
* Too muggy from June-August
* Awful Mexican food
* Long winters, short summers
* Horrible I-95 tourist traffic from Memorial Day to Labor Day
* No real mountains
* Expensive lobster (no resident discount)
* Expensive beer, limited selection
* Short growing season, lack of fresh fruits and vegetables for much of the year
* Very little diversity
* Few good white-collar jobs (if you're FIRE, won't matter)
* Expensive real estate on Southern Coast
* Lack of good campsites or hiking trails within an hour's drive

For me personally, I am much happier back in the PNW. 

[nereo]

I lived in Southern Maine for about a year. Coming from the PNW, it was a tough transition. You asked for the negatives ... here are mine:

* Too buggy
* Too muggy from June-August
* Awful Mexican food
* Long winters, short summers
* Horrible I-95 tourist traffic from Memorial Day to Labor Day
* No real mountains
* Expensive lobster (no resident discount)
* Expensive beer, limited selection
* Short growing season, lack of fresh fruits and vegetables for much of the year
* Very little diversity
* Few good white-collar jobs (if you're FIRE, won't matter)
* Expensive real estate on Southern Coast

For me personally, I am much happier back in the PNW.

I’m curious when exactly you lived in Southern Maine.
I ask because in the last several years Maine has been on an absolute economic tear with a lot of infrastructure expansion, and several of the things you listed (bolded, above) I would have agreed with 15 years ago but now think aren’t the case.

There’s been a craft brewery explosion in the last few years, and a bunch of them are really, really good. There was 22 at last count in Portland proper alone (population of just 60k), one of the densest anywhere. (See here)

The state has done a lot to attract STEM jobs in/around Portland, and there’s a number of biotech companies and computer-gaming companies now that relocated from the Boston area along with a few tech incubators which simply didn’t exist five years ago. Unemployment has remained stupidly low (I think Portland was around 2.5% pre-pandemic and sits around 3.5% now) which has triggered a jobs bidding war for people with degrees in many fields. BIW’s been on a hiring frenzy for anyone that’s got an engineering background. The salaries are still quite a bit less than what we saw in Seattle, but the housing and living costs are way lower too (as in, you can still buy a nice home here in the $400k range)

Lobster you just need to go to the co-ops to get dockside prices. Last I checked a few weeks ago it was $7.25/lb which is historically high, but reflects what the lobstermen are getting. It usually goes down under $6/lb during the summer when the bulk of the catch is.

I-95 has much improved in the last few years as they’ve added lanes, finally completed the ‘fly-over’ toll lanes and increased rail capacity from Boston. I used to hate driving anywhere near Portland on a Friday afternoon but last year wasn’t bad at all, even with a record high number of cars coming up the Maine Pike.

Mexican - it’s certainly not as ubiquitous as when I lived in California, but as with the craft-beer boom a number of legit taquerias and cantinas run by real Mexicans have opened up, and while they might not be as plentiful I can get as good Mexican here as I could when I lived in the Bay Area. But it’s not like there’s one on every corner, and choices disappear as soon as you move away from the metro areas (though oddly Damariscotta and Milbridge both have great places despite being tiny towns of ~1k people).

[pdxvandal]

I was there summer 2016 until summer 2017. I wasn't willing to commute far distances for work, i.e., Portland (1:30 hours RT) or Boston (2.5+ hours RT) . Just not much employment in a 30-minute radius in any direction. Maybe it's better now. I found some really good beer in Portland, but distribution was weak and never made it down to the Seacoast area. Plus it was 10-20% more expensive than PNW microbrews which are as good/better and more plentiful to find. Portsmouth has improved its brewery scene since I've been gone. Honestly, I would've been happier in Portland, ME, with its better arts and culture scene, cheaper cost of living, more jobs, better restaurants/breweries, slightly more diversity, minor league sports, etc.

[BikeFanatic]

I live in Massachusetts but vacation in Maine every chance I get. I love it there, especially inland north remote Baxter state park area. I have family in Cumberland near Portland and they just love it. Portland is a great city and I would as Pbkmaine says rent for a year.  Someone said there are no real mountains? Are they for real? There are mountains, there are bears, moose, deer, great places to hunt, camp, so many lakes and a beautiful coast. It is Canada cold in winter, but still with the snow you get it is beautiful and Sunday river is the best ace to ski in New England. 
Also the breweries are plentiful and amazing. I mean I found breweries even in remote places like the forks. One place I went had 5 Belgium beers, can't get that even in Boston.
Still it could get too isolating if you are not able to make friends with the standoffish new England's folks so Portland area you may find more acceptance. I never had an issue being an obvious Leabian in Maine, but I did have black friends who felt a little uncomfortable about the place being very white. But no issues at all when we camped there.