I have always been a fast eater and could finish a lunch at work in time to do errands and be back at my desk on time. But it was no pleasure and was fast, crowded and many times expensive.
Now that I am retired, at home and flexible, I have discovered a simple pleasure that I frequently look forward to: going out for lunch. No I am not talking about the retirement lunch when you are leaving a company. I am talking about going out for lunch after you have retired.
There are several pleasures / benefits of lunch retirement lifestyle.
It is an opportunity to get out of the house and to socialize, even if it’s only with the waiter. Inviting friends to lunch is a pleasure that I look forward to. Meeting friends who you used to work with is a great way to keep in touch. Meeting other retirees for lunch is especially nice since you can meet any time any where and take as long as you want to really have an extended social visit.
Lunch retirement style is leisurely not rushed nor crowed. You can lunch at after 1 pm when others are returning to their offices.
Lunch at a nice restaurant is often way cheaper than the dinner. In addition, many restaurants offer small plates or you can share an entrée.
Lunch retirement style allows you to try different restaurants. You don’t have to be back at a set time so you can wonder a few miles away without worrying you will be late. You can become a restaurant critic of sorts, advising your working friends of places they should try.
So reclaiming your lunch retirement style is a small but rewarding benefit I have noticed about the retirement lifestyle.
I visited Griffin GA for a couple of days recently and got a feel for what it might be like living there. It seems to be the all American small town, formerly a textile mill town, it is only 40 to 50 miles south of Atlanta but quite a bit more in lifestyle differences.
Griffin has quite a few good amenities that would make it desirable for retirement. It has a lovely downtown with Hill street running down the middle. The City Hall and the Court Courthouse are right there also. Tim’s or Louise’s are southern food restaurants with affordable prices and good food. They are quite packed on Sundays after church lets out. All the chain restaurants are there too.
Griffin also always had a good high school football team. The people are real people who are sincere, hard working and humble. A lot of people do commute to the Atlanta area since there are not a lot of high paying jobs in Griffin. But there are sufficient stores and services, a large regional Griffin Spalding hospital, an experiment station of the University of Georgia, Elk Club, Moose Club and other clubs you would normally find in a small towns.
Prices seems to be very reasonable on services like auto repairs, yard work, handyman services, etc. The housing is very affordable. I called about a 3 bedroom brick ranch with fenced yard in a nice subdivision. It was a HUD foreclosure listing for only $55,000. Anther person was renting a similar 3 bedroom, 2 bath brick ranch with fenced yard for only $650 month.
Getting around is easy. The traffic is light. To get across town takes 5 to 10 minutes.
So what is the catch? Well I think Griffin is a very local place. Many talk about Atlanta as another state even though it is very close. Many people live their whole lives in Griffin, some move to Atlanta and become professionals to move far away, but many stay put and work blue collar jobs. There is nothing wrong with that. There are a lot of people retiring in Griffin, but there have not been many moving to Griffin to retire. Until now.
On the outskirts of Griffin toward I-75 that leads to Atlanta, Del Webb has built an active adult community, Sun City Peachtree it is called. It will have 3400 homes on 1,726 acres, a large golf coarse and a huge activities center that is already built. Last year I attend the Grand Opening and there were some very excited people there, a few from Griffin, and many from all over. As Bob Dylan sang, the times they are a changing.
A good retirement location offers higher education; outdoor recreation; great scenery, fitness/wellness centers; health care facilities, jobs, a good place for new businesses. It would be nice to have a culture and political climate that is somewhat compatible to yours. Available reliable service professionals, a good Publix and Whole Foods nearby would be great. Some fine dining restaurants and a major mall within 6 miles.
Well I got a little carried away, but these are some things to consider.
Getting out and exploring new things is always fun. Exploring retirement home options can fall in to that category. Maybe you have a litle more time to take a few days off. Explore retriement options in your area, your city, your region and far away. Make it your hobby to research and then to travel and experience new options you now have.
Experience the Vacation Getaways at the Active Adult Communities with a trip of 3 or 4 days and see first hand what they are all about. In addition you get to visit the town and area where the community is located. These are positive experiences at very little costs. We posted about Vacation Getaways at Active Adult Communities not too long ago.
Next visit small towns in your area and region. This would be as short as a day trip, an overnight trip or spent 2 or 3 days and visit several small towns. Do you research first on the web and plan your visit. Visit during a festival or town event would be interesting as well. There are many advantages to retiring in a small town but just visiting can be fun too.
Next travel to a resort area and combine a vacation and a retirement research trip. Go to Hilton Head for a week. While there explore some of the communities in the area. Warning: don’t buy any timeshares while there. Enjoy your vacation and learn something too. You have a legitimate reason for visiting the communities, you are not wasting anyone’s time. You are the prime prospect, but most communities are helpful and low pressure. If you really did fall in love with the place, maybe renting for a season would be a good idea first.
Finally explore your own city. Research first then go downtown and experience the mixed use, high rise, loft, town centers and other interesting concepts in your very own metro downtown or midtown. What would it be like to walk to restaurants and museums from your very own condo. Urban life is not for everyone but there are some boomers moving downtown to experience the advanatages of retirement city living style.
But the main to remember is to have fun! There are no deadlines and you don’t have to do anything. Take your time during your visit to take it all in.
AAHSA’s director of assisted living and continuing care, Stephen J. Maag, talks about the impact of the Erickson bankruptcy on its communities and the impact of the overall economic downturn on CCRCs. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Phoy1zwJnMY
Studies have shown that most people will age in place. And that was even before the financial crisis, which probably will defer people from moving now and for the foreseeable future. But aging in place is now bad. in fact, if you retire in your current home, you may find many advantages.
If you stay in your current home, you won’t have to buy a new one, nor to sell the current one. Buying and selling real estate is always an expensive transaction and now in this uncertain time with real estate taken a major blow, it could be risky. Also when you consider moving expenses and expenses setting up another house, you could be saving substantial money staying where you are. However you may think about making your home more livable. There are things that make a home more livable, that is more comfortable, easier and safer for independent living and will fun doing.
When you retire in your current home, you may find new ways to enjoy it. For example you may try a square foot garden which will get you outside more and you can enjoy the home grown vegetables that taste so much better. You may landscape your yard, grow new plants and try something different. Barbecuing is a fun thing to do the in back yard and many people start grilling out just about every day. Building a fire pit or retaining wall, deck or gazebo are other projects.
Since you are not moving to a active adult community with all their social activities they brag about, join meetup.com and try out several groups of interest close by in your area. I have done this and am a member of two meetup groups that I look forward to attending. You meet new friends this way also. Your local YMCA or health club can offer anything and more than the active adult communities. Your local park has walking trails and green ways and green spaces which are the best deal to get you outside. Many people walk in the neighborhood.
Aging in place will allow you to continue meeting your friends for lunch, shopping trips and to see movies (does anyone still do that?). And staying close to relatives. Being in a familiar area where you know where everything is certainly has it’s benefits.
Retiring probably has more to do with what you do than where you do it. There is nothing magical about moving to a far off location. In fact that could be disruptive and take away the time you gained by retiring in the first place. There are more advantages to aging in place which I am sure I will think of as soon as I press “Publish” but you get the idea.
Rather than aging in place, the boomer (me & you) could sell our large suburban home and move to a smaller, maybe more efficient livable home nearby. I doubt we could make any money from our equity swap if we are paying cash for the new retirement home, but at least we would be in position to enjoy life without the larger property taxes, insurance and property maintenance expenses.
We would still meet with our friends and associates since we would be nearby. We could still frequent the restaurants, stores and other places where we shop and live day to day. Maybe the new place would be in a 55+ community so we could meet some new friends who would be happy to also meet us. We are not relocating and starting all over, just making a life change for the better. The new community could be a little further out or nearby. Most of the active adult communities seem to be a littler further out on the edge of metro areas, but close enough to keep in contact with friends and relatives. But more and more I see 55+ communities nearby in the suburbs, not the large communities but maybe large enough. Later if we want to get a second home in the mountains or at the beach where we could spend some time, that is an option. Actually I think renting the second home or vacation home is the best option for many of us. What do you think?
It displays videos of retirement communities and 55 communities. I am creating a Playlist for each state and so far have Georgia, TN, NC and Florida. I am picking the best videos I find plus adding a couple of videos I produced. Please check it out. If you know of a quality video I don’t have, please let me know. You can subcribe to the channel and get easy access for the future.
We are compiling a YouTube channel of retirement communities and active adult communities and will create a play list for each state. Here is our YouTube channel for retirement communities in Georgia. Check it out and subscribe to keep updated.
I have been surprised that the prices on many new homes in active adult communities have not dropped that much. Same for resales. But there may be a opportunity for a deal on homes being finished at Seaons on Lake Lanier in Gainesville Georgia north of Atlanta.
Seasons on Lake Lanier in on beautiful lake lanier in North Georgia was started by Levitt & Sons as developer. My wife and I went up and previewed this community on July 6, 2007. See our blog post. Then Levitt & Sons the developer went bankrupt.
That was then this is now. We spoke with a on site person who says 30 homes that were presales are being finished. I saw that John Wieland doing so of the building. The homes are being finished as ordered originally and will contain the extras like hardwood floors, paint colors, etc as ordered. However these homes are offered at true saving of $30 to $60 thousand off the original Levitt & Sons price. So if you find a home that has what you want or can live with, then you may get a very good price.
The plan is at the first of the year to select a developer to pick up Seasons at Lake Lake and continue the built off of 700 plus homes and the amenities. At that time prices could go up. This may be worth checking out if you are currently in the market for a home in an active adult community. Their web site is seasonsonlakelanier.com.
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We used to go on vacation to Bar Harbor Maine around Labor Day. We would fly from Atlanta up to Boston, take a rental car for the drive up. It was always exciting. We would usually stay just outside of town towards Acadia National Park. Acadia Park has camping and cottages and just wonderful walking trails. Cadillac Mountain is there and you can see forever from the top. Take Ocean Drive along Maine rugged coastline that runs along that area and you can see the “blow holes” shoots water up in the sky when it hits the rocks with a mighty force at Thunder Hole. In Bar Harbor you have a quaint town with shops and restaurants and more cottage type homes, and even a park with a band stand. My wife always said she would like to live in Maine at least for some period of time when we retire.
Booth Bay Harbor is another nice small town in Maine further South on the coast. We were booked to visit on Sept 12th, 2001. The planes got ground and Delta had to give our money back. We never had made that trip, but it is on our list to check out.
Some of the most popular small towns in Maine are Bar Harbor, Booth Bay Harbor, Camden, Castine, Ellsworth, Falmouth, Hampden, Newry, Old Orchard Beach, York County ME. Of coarse the bigger cites Portland, Bangor, Portsmouth. Maine’s coast is beautiful Kittery to Eastport, Western Maine has lots of small towns. Southern Maine is doing well.
A visit to check out Maine’s small towns would be a wonderful vacation. Vacations sometiime turn in to a “let’s move here” decision. Of coarse Northern Maine has long
Winters so many people have seasonal homes for the Summer and head to other places like Florida for the Summer.
Photo courtesy of the Asheville Convention & Visitors Bureau
Southern Living Magazine’s October issue just came out and has a great Southern Cities Review section which reviews Asheville, Louisville, Austin and Pensacola. If you can pick up a copy I think you will find it interesting like I did, if you are a fan of city reviews.
Asheville NC is well know as a great retirement town. It is a college and trendy downtown with boutiques, art galleries, organic markets, bookstores, and is walkable. You are surrounded by majestic mountains that offer sightseeing, hiking and day trips. Sounds good to me.
Austin TX is well know as a young person place with it’s music, urban loft living and a lot to see and do. But these same traits are attractive to seniors.
Louisville Kentucky’s downtown is right on the river and is a well keep secret of a really neat place to visit (and live). Art galleries, shops and entertainment. In May Derby week is really something to behold (I have been twice!).
Pensacola FL downtown has a rich and long history evident with it’s brick streets and Art Deco buildings. Very walkable downtown square.
