Marlene Pedersen, 57, and her husband, Lars, 58, are taking
their time choosing a retirement destination. With their two children
grown and out of the house, the couple plans to retire in about 10
years. They intend to sell their house in suburban Manalapan, N.J., and
move to a condo in a midsize city with a warmer climate and lower
property taxes.
They're already visiting prospective retirement
communities, weighing the pros and cons of North Carolina's Wilmington
and Raleigh-Durham metro area. Next on their research list is
Charleston, S.C. "We're not sold on a new city yet," Pedersen says.
Other items on their checklist include proximity to an airport so their
kids can visit often and convenient shopping. Once they choose a spot,
they will buy a condo and rent it out until they move.
Most
baby boomers intend to stay put or downsize in or near their current
community during retirement. Still, a fair number are looking for a new
adventure or at least a cheaper locale. Moira McGarvey, founder of
GangsAway.com,
estimates that more than 30% of visitors to her retirement-planning Web
site are researching new destinations. And Bert Sperling, who runs
Sperling's Best Places (
www.bestplaces.net),
which ranks 370 metro areas on various factors including quality of
life in retirement, says that about 15% of people in households with
incomes of more than $100,000 move to new destinations when they retire.
Yet
many new retirees fail to do the necessary research and planning before
they embark on this major life transition. They may focus too much on
the climate, for example. "Weather alone is not as meaningful as how you
want to engage in your life in your golden years," says Paul Irving,
chairman of the Milken Institute Center for the Future of Aging, a think
tank in Santa Monica, Cal., that rates 352 metro areas on "successful
aging" issues. "People live longer, and they want their lives to be
filled with meaning and purpose."
Another common mistake is to
plan for retirement as one life stage, rather than as several, with each
stage requiring adjustments. With longer life spans, moving to Florida
or Arizona and staying there may no longer be practical. "Often people
don't account for inevitable changes in their mobility and health
because it's not fun to think about," Sperling says. Retirees who move
away from family members may need to expect that at some point they will
return, he says.
What works at age 60, such as moving with a
spouse to a rural area, may be a disaster at age 80, or whenever one
spouse dies. "You have to think about living in that place alone, 365
days a year, under three feet of snow," says Steve Vernon, a consulting
research scholar at the Stanford Center on Longevity at Stanford
University.
Retirees also must realize that intangibles such as
fitting in socially and politically may be even more important in
choosing a destination than a place's lower cost of living and a state's
favorable tax structure, Vernon says. He recalls one couple who moved
from the pricey San Francisco area to the Tennessee Bible Belt, only to
find that they didn't have much in common with their politically
conservative, church-oriented neighbors. "They moved again after a year,
but they lost a lot of money in real estate transactions in both
places," he says. (BestPlaces.net provides political party registration
breakdowns for thousands of communities.) Vernon's advice: Keep your
options open by renting out your current house and renting in the
prospective retirement locale for a year.
If
you're at the beginning of your search, you can get some ideas by
looking at some of the best-places-to-retire lists on the Internet, such
as
TopRetirements.com. Milken's "Best Cities for Successful Aging" index (
http://successfulaging.milkeninstitute.org)
examines 84 factors that it determined are important to retirees.
Criteria include job opportunities for older residents, housing options,
crime rates, hospitals offering geriatric services, levels of senior
volunteerism, access to fitness centers, investment in public
transportation, and the availability of arts and education institutions.
Topping
Milken's 2014 list were two college towns. Madison, Wis., which is the
home of the University of Wisconsin, led the large-metro list; and Iowa
City, Iowa, which is the home of the University of Iowa, led the
small-metro list. "College towns often offer vibrant health care
systems, good cultural opportunities and good public transit," says
Milken's Irving.
Meanwhile,
FindYourSpot.com
will conduct a customized search for you. You answer dozens of
questions on your preferences for climate, recreation, community size
and more, and the tool suggests possible destinations. With
NeighborhoodScout.com,
you can zero in on individual neighborhoods and find the percentage of
residents who are 65 and older, the educational attainment of neighbors,
housing types and other data.
Experts
agree it's crucial to spend at least a week at a prospective
destination, and preferably two or three weeks there, on multiple trips
in different seasons. "You should go when the weather is worst, to
Vermont in the winter and Florida in the summer," says travel writer
Clark Norton, who writes a boomer travel blog (
www.clarknorton.com). Scouting should begin a year or two before retirement, in case you decide you will need more money and have to work longer.
Norton
and his wife, who are in their mid sixties, are planning to move soon
from upstate New York to Tucson, Ariz., where their son lives. They have
found that as they age, their needs have changed. "We live on a
four-acre property with beautiful views," Norton says. "But we have too
much lawn, and too much property maintenance, and we have to drive three
miles into town if we need milk."
Once you arrive at a place you
are checking out, live like a local. Walk around, eat in restaurants,
visit the farmer's market and the senior center, and talk to as many
people as possible. Web sites and local newspapers list cultural and
sporting events, and they provide a snapshot of recreational activities.
Check in with a local real estate agent, even if you're not ready to
buy.
Pedersen and her husband recently spent a few hours at an
agent's office in Wilmington. Using a map on her laptop, the agent
showed them many details about various neighborhoods, as well as the
cost of houses. "It gave us a solid overview, and then we drove around
on our own," she says.
Be clear about your priorities. If you want
to work part time, explore job opportunities for people your age on Web
sites and local newspapers, and move to an area where the local economy
is thriving. Attend a service at a church or synagogue you might join,
and a lecture at the town library. If you have a hobby such as
do-it-yourself building projects, visit the hardware stores.
You
should get some sense of the cost of groceries, utilities,
transportation and other common expenses. You can find this information
on Sperling's Web site. If you envision a retirement filled with
cultural events but don't want to shell out big bucks on theater
productions, for example, check local listings for free activities. The
same goes for golf green fees.
You may be considering a move from a
state that taxes income to one that doesn't. But keep in mind that
sales and property taxes can take a big bite as well -- and can differ
from one part of a state to another. While Florida, for example, does
not tax income, it ranks relatively high when it comes to property and
sales taxes. (Check out Kiplinger's
Access
to good health care is a must. You may be in perfect shape now, but
that is likely to change. If you already have a medical condition that
requires regular treatment, be sure a highly regarded specialist is
available and taking on new patients. "Wherever we go, we want quality
medical care within a 20- or 30-minute drive," says Pedersen.
Also
consider the community's proximity to friends and family. "Don't
underestimate the importance of having friends within an hour's drive,"
says GangsAway.com's McGarvey, who says she hopes to persuade some
friends to retire within driving distance of wherever she goes.
If
that's not possible, be sure that you can easily visit friends and
family by plane. Look at the number of connections you'll need to make.
Travel facilities also will be important if you're planning a lot of
overseas trips.
It is
probably impossible to check off every item on your list, and your
spouse's list may contain different items. "At some point, we will have
to decide what we're willing to give up," Pedersen says. She and her
husband are already making compromises. "I'm not going too far north,
and he's not going too far south. Florida is too hot for him, and Maine
is too cold for me." For now, that still gives the Pedersens plenty of
territory to investigate.
Culled from Kiplinger
