Thinking about moving..

[dubbs]

So I live on Long Island and I make a decent salary, I'm an IT Consultant, basically a windows systems administrator w/ some sales, networking, and management thrown in.

I recently saw a video on how Houston was a really good place to go for IT because of the amount of jobs and the cost of living. Currently I have a 3 bedroom house 1 bath that's only about 1200 square feet w/ 1.5 car garage that cost me 253k. Oil is nuts to heat my house @ 4$ a gallon. So needless to say I'm looking for an area w/o much of a winter, much lower cost of living, and decent place for IT jobs.

I was checking out houses in Houston and saw that you can get some built 3200+ square foot 4 br and 2.5 bath for like 230k. And they're all brick.. Unlike my 70 year old wood house.

I'm 26 and going to finish my bachelors in 2 yrs, which is when I plan to move..

My gf (who will most likely be my wife soon) will be hard to persuade to move, w/ family n all, but I don't really see that as being an issue. That's what skype is for, right!

Just looking for some opinions and options that you know of. Thanks..