You’re used to the “big league” city perks, or you’d like to be—your own pro football, hockey and baseball teams, golf tournaments on both the Champions and regular PGA Tours, the cultural amenities of a Top-20 city. But you still want to play golf just about any day you choose. Welcome to the area known as Tampa Bay.

Host to millions of tourists every year and now home to nearly 2-million residents smitten with the mild winters, tropical summers, spectacular sunsets and white sand beaches. And golf? The Tampa/St. Petersburg/Clearwater area boasts nearly 2,700 holes of golf, nearly 1,700 of them public.

Golf communities were a little later in coming to the Tampa area than some other places in Florida, meaning the ones you’ll be looking at are newer, with the latest bells-and-whistles. Tampa also boasts of a lower cost of living than other major southern cities, including Atlanta, Orlando, Charlotte and Charleston.

Every community has its trade-offs. Yes, there’s a little more traffic and a few more high-rises than other Florida golf communities. But that size also supports amenities you don’t think of, until you really want them. World-class healthcare facilities, the largest performing arts center in the southeast, the largest science museum in the south, the #1 ranked airport in the country. And something you might not find in the more homogenized boom-towns of the Sunbelt, ethnic diversity that’s celebrated and used as the basis for unique entertainment opportunities.

The advantages of Florida- the weather, the tax climate, a pro-business mentality yet with a laid-back lifestyle. And the benefits of a true “city”- the night life, restaurants, support services and higher education. It’s all here in Tampa Bay. It’s good enough for that quintessential Yankee George Steinbrenner. And he doesn’t even play golf.