Just because you’ve retired doesn’t mean you have to change where you live. In fact, many folks will stay put because they don’t want to leave a lifetime of friends, nearby family members, or their longtime home. But if you’re itching to change locations, lots of “top retirement” lists can help—or confuse—you during the decision-making process.

The hard part is deciding what you’re looking for in a retirement setting. Do you want a place to live and work or to live and relax? Do you want a place that feels familiar or that feels more like starting fresh? A resort area or a college town? What about cultural and recreational activities? Do you prefer being around other retired folks or with a mix of ages? Do you need to be close to good medical care, or would you trade that for a remote, peaceful setting?

That’s a lot to consider. And a lot of cities have much to offer in various categories. So if you love lists, settle in: we’ve got some here for you.

MarketWatch.com offers a list of top cities (by region) that offer a wide range of job choices for those wanting to work beyond retirement but not necessarily in their primary occupation:

Northeast

    • Harrisburg/Lancaster, Pennsylvania
    • Nashua/Manchester, New Hampshire

Mid-Atlantic/Southeast

    • Bethesda, Maryland
    • Leesburg/Winchester, Virginia
    • Fayetteville, Arkansas
    • Raleigh/Durham, North Carolina
    • The Washington, D.C., region
    • Tampa/Saint Petersburg, Florida
    • Sarasota, Florida

Central/Midwest

    • Louisville, Kentucky
    • Columbus, Ohio
    • Knoxville, Tennessee
    • Indianapolis, Indiana

Southwest/Mountain

    • San Antonio, Texas
    • Phoenix, Arizona
    • Las Vegas, Nevada
    • Greeley, Colorado

Upper Midwest/Great Plains

    • Madison, Wisconsin
    • Ann Arbor, Michigan
    • Minneapolis/St. Paul, Minnesota
    • Kansas City, Missouri

Northwest/West Coast

    • Seattle/Bellevue, Washington
    • Medford, Oregon
    • Spokane, Washington
    • Sacramento, California

Senior Magazine Online considered more than 240 American cities and came up with a top 20 list for seniors. Here are the first 10:

1. Portland Oregon
2. Seattle, Washington
3. Milwaukee, Wisconsin
4. Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
5. Raleigh, North Carolina
6. New Orleans, Louisiana
7. San Francisco, California
8. Marshfield Wisconsin
9. Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
10. Salt Lake City–Ogden, Utah

AARP looked at the physical aspects of hundred of cities (clean air and water, for instance) and at the health and habits of the people who live there to come up with its top 10 list of “healthiest hometowns” (with reasons included):

1. Ann Arbor, Michigan
2. Honolulu, Hawaii
3. Madison, Wisconsin
4. Santa Fe, New Mexico
5. Fargo, North Dakota
6. Boulder, Colorado
7. Charlottesville, Virginia
8. Minneapolis–St. Paul, Minnesota
9. The San Francisco Bay area, California
10. Naples–Marco Island, Florida

In a recent series of stories on the best places to retire, U.S. News & World Report offered a number of different choices, depending on interests—such as best cities for golfers, outdoor enthusiasts, brainy folks, and football fans, as well as the greenest and the cheapest places to live. It also asked readers to write about their “healthy retirement havens” and came up with this list:

• Asheville, North Carolina
• Austin and Tyler, Texas
• Fairhope and Huntsville, Alabama
• Pensacola, Florida
• Providence, Rhode Island
• Reno, Nevada
• Seattle, Washington
• Wilmington, Delaware

CNNMoney.com offers several suggestions for places to retire, depending on the category. If you want to live on the water (not just the ocean), it notes six affordable towns:

• Dunedin, Florida
• Sequim, Washington
• St. Joseph, Michigan
• Beaufort, South Carolina
• Durango, Colorado
• Marble Falls, Texas

The same site lists “25 best places for affordable homes” not far from water. Here are the top 10 in that list:

1. Fort Smith, Arkansas
2. Des Moines, Iowa
3. Janesville, Wisconsin
4. Pearl, Mississippi
5. Westerville, Ohio
6. Wadsworth, Ohio
7. North Augusta, South Carolina
8. Benbrook, Texas
9. Evans, Georgia
10. Bettendorf, Iowa

In 2007, Bizjournals.com wrote about America's hottest retirement areas—places where senior citizens had a strong and rapidly growing presence. It found that the top 10 were all in the Sunbelt and were small- to medium-sized communities:

1. Gardnerville Ranchos, Nevada
2. Punta Gorda, Florida
3. Pahrump, Nevada
4. Crossville, Tennessee
5. Homosassa Springs, Florida
6. Sebring, Florida
7. Del Rio, Texas
8. Brevard, North Carolina
9. Georgetown, South Carolina
10. Ocean Pines, Maryland

If your tax burden is a priority in deciding where to move, the Retirement Living Information Center offers a detailed discussion of state income taxes, sales and fuel taxes, taxes on retirement income, property taxes, and inheritance and estate taxes. It notes some of the worst cities for tax burdens.

And finally, if you want to create your own list, look at a 2007 series of stories about the best places to retire in U.S. News & World Report. A tool at the site allows you to find cities that might be a better match, based on your own priorities. You can choose by region, weather, cost of housing, recreational and cultural activities, social environment, health care, and low crime—and the results can be broken down further by your specific interests. The site will rank the results based on your choices, but prepare to be overwhelmed: it gives you more than 1,000 cities to choose from.

P.S. You can also search Google for “best retirement communities” and find a whole other dimension of retirement living: planned communities. And we haven’t even discussed living outside the United States. Another time, perhaps . . .