Rediscovering a family getaway. Opening a bed and breakfast. Finding a niche for a family business. Three couples, from their 30s to their 60s, have one thing in common: moving to the Blue Ridge.

It’s not just older folks who are relocating to the Blue Ridge, but fresh faces from a more youthful generation.

While generation X-ers are significantly impacting the trends in today’s housing market, echo boomers – children of baby boomers born between 1979 and 1994 – are growing up and have quickly become rivals to baby boomers in numbers and spending power. In the next few years echo boomers will continue leaving home, and by the year 2011 will become the driving demand as first-time homebuyers while the older generation downsizes.

At the same time, baby boomers themselves, more than 70 million strong, are credited with the current rise in the second home and relocation sector. Many of these boomers, possessing stronger financial security than any previous generation, are buying or building second homes in the mountains – a shift that’s apparent along the Blue Ridge.

“It’s never been 80 degrees on our porch,” says Midge Rothermel, “and we don’t have air conditioning.”
Eight years ago, Rothermel and her husband, Jim, a retired obstetrician/gynecologist, packed up their lives in St. Petersburg, Fla., where AC was an essential, and headed for the mountains.