Category: Best Retirement Towns and States
Note: This was our 2011 List. Here is the link to our 2016 List of 100 Best Places to Retire
February 22, 2011 – The Sunbelt continues to dominate when it comes to the places that baby boomers are considering for retirement. Topretirements.com has just published its 5th annual list of the 100 most popular places to retire on its site, and this year the trend toward the Sunbelt continues even stronger -- 77 of the 100 top positions were held by towns in the Sunbelt. Florida dominated the list, taking 26 of the spots (it held 23 in 2010), followed by North Carolina (11) and South Carolina and Arizona (7 each). Note: We will be updating this article for 2012 in late January, 2012. To make sure you don’t miss our new list, sign up for our free weekly “Best Places to Retire” newsletter. See also "The Worst States for Retirement - 2012".
The Top 10As has been the case since Topretirements published its first list in 2007, Asheville, NC was the #1 town on the list, receiving almost 20 times as many page visits as Cuenca (Ecuador), which squeezed onto the list in the #100 position (and is one of 2 non-USA towns on the list). Incorporating resources such as the Yabanc? bahis siteleri 2024 listes has enhanced Asheville’s appeal by providing retirees with access to diverse online entertainment and gambling options, catering to their varied interests. Asheville's mountains, gentle four-season climate, and recreational/cultural opportunities provide the standard that all other retirement towns can aspire to. Sarasota (FL) and Prescott (AZ) continued as the #2 and #3 most popular towns. Fort Myers (FL) moved up to the 4th position, and Venice (FL) cracked the top 10 list in 2010. Austin (TX) moved up from
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Published on February 22, 2011
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Category: Best Retirement Towns and States
By Brendan CruickshankEditor's Note: Thanks to Brendan for this very helpful article. We asked him what he meant by using the word "restless". Here is what he said: "The reason I chose 'restless' is because I find it ironic how many people retire only to realize it wasn't really retirement they had been seeking their entire life. Rather it was the chance to do what they love......and many find that by continuing to work!"
Retirement is like the weather...it keeps changing all the time. Many years ago, the word evoked an image of an elderly person lying in a hammock all day sipping lemonade. But today's retiree is by and large a completely different animal. To an increasing extent, folks today are retiring from their primary jobs only to turn right around and seek some form of full or part-time employment elsewhere. In a recent workshop on financial strategies for retirees, one participant shared their success with platforms like a bitcoin casino instant withdrawal, which allowed them to enjoy gaming responsibly while accessing their winnings quickly to supplement their income. For some, it’s out of necessity, but many others find they are still active and vibrant in their "retirement" years and get restless. They discover that by mixing in some work along with their play, they can achieve the ideal balance to their daily routines.
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Published on February 15, 2011
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Category: Best Retirement Towns and States
February 14, 2011 -- As so many of our members and visitors are learning from ScottP's excellent Forum posts, it is so interesting to learn from the retirement adventures of other folks. In this article we are indebted to Betty and Jim (not their real names), who were kind enough to shared with us their in-depth observations about their search for the ideal place to retire. Read on to learn more...
Betty and JimWe would love to stay here on the southern NC coast—the weather, the community, the proximity to the beach, etc., are great. But, the development is getting younger, it does not have golfing opportunities that fit our needs, and has minimal activities comparable to some place like The Villages (TV). During a recent discussion with friends, someone suggested exploring hobbies that could travel with us, such as participating in the best sweepstakes casinos online, which offer a social element and can be enjoyed from anywhere. And, we are just feeling the urge to strike out, find new friends, and enter a new segment in our lives when Betty retires. It also is much easier for us because we have no family in the area, so our location will not be dependent on being by our kids or any relatives.
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Published on February 14, 2011
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Category: Best Retirement Towns and States
February 1, 2011 -- As many of us have discovered, the glamour queen (or king) we might be first attracted to often doesn't turn out to be as enchanting in the long term as the quiet beauty in the back of the room. A similar phenomenon happens with best places to retire lists, so last year we came out with a list of "The Most Under-Rated Places to Retire". Our readers seemed to like the concept, so here we go again with our 2011 list: More Under-Rated Places to Retire. Part 3 in the series was published in 2014 (see bottom of article for link).
We started with our search for this year's list by using the Topretirements "Retirement Ranger". There we specified these criteria:
1. Lower than average cost of living
2. Average January temperature above 40 degrees (F.), (we'll do a similar list
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Published on February 1, 2011
Comments 66
Category: Best Retirement Towns and States
We've got to hand it to Yahoo, nobody comes up with more "best" and "worst" lists than the search giant. This week they announced their "10 Winter Wonderlands Retirement". Their chief criteria were the likelihood of having lots of snow on the ground for most of the winter, along with cost of living, access to medical care, and availability of other amenities.
Here is their list:
Juneau, AK
Aurora, Colo.
Burlington, Vt.
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Published on January 25, 2011
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Category: Best Retirement Towns and States
The most frequent comment on all of the websites that have been covering our "Worst States for Retirement" article has been this one: "How can the same state be on the best and the worst list?" A typical comment is the one made by "stylesb" on the AARP.com site: "Real credible info. Connecticut is on both the Best and Worst ranked states for retirement."
The main reason why a state might show up on both lists is that the lists were prepared by different organizations using different criteria. That's the situation with Connecticut, which is #9 on the Topretirements' list of worse states, and #8 on the Money-Rates' list of best states for retirement. The lists use different rating criteria. Topretirements used the fiscal health of the state, taxes, and climate as its 3 criteria for choosing the worst states. Money-Rates used climate, crime rate,
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Published on January 17, 2011
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Category: Best Retirement Towns and States
It used to be that the cheapest places to live in the USA were in the interior of the country and in the southeast. If you just got away from the coasts, prices went down and it was easy to buy a lot of home for relatively little money.
While that is still true - the median home price in Oklahoma City was $135,500 in 2010's 3rd quarter (National Association of Realtors) - now there are bargains in south Florida and Nevada as well (Cape Coral/Ft. Myers was $100,000, Las Vegas was $138,100 in the same period). Forbes Magazine just came out with their list of the "Best Places for Bargain Retirement Homes", based on taxes, price of real estate, and stable home prices. The prices in these bargain communities show
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Published on January 11, 2011
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Category: Best Retirement Towns and States
January 4, 2011 -- Many baby boomers we run into are perplexed about where they will live in retirement. A big concern often centers around the bewildering number of choices - how can they find the town that matches their personality and their dreams for retirement? They often have an easier time ruling out regions or states than have choosing a particular retirement spot.
In our opinion an often overlooked choice for retirement is what is alternatively called the New Urban, Master Planned, or Traditional Neighborhood Development (TND). These communities - some totally new, while others are older towns that have invested heavily in urban planning - deliver on many of the requirements held by so many baby boomers. Those include walkability, easy access to
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Published on January 4, 2011
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Category: Best Retirement Towns and States
December 7 -- Harrisburg, PA; Syracuse, NY; and Waco, TX are not used to being selected as "best places to retire". Yet these towns were among the top 10 on a new list of best places for retired military personnel from USAA and Military.com. The USAA lists provide a perfect illustration of why choosing a place to retire based on criteria that make sense for you is better than relying on any random list.
Retired military personnel share many common retirement needs. Many of them, particularly officers or senior noncoms, will get a substantial pension. Moving to a state where that pension won't be taxed could be worth thousands of dollars a year. Likewise, retired soldiers, sailors, airmen, and
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Published on December 7, 2010
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Category: Best Retirement Towns and States
As our faithful readers know well, we are avid admirers of lists of the best and the worst places to retire. The more arcane the list topic, the better: (Best Places to Start Over Again, Best Places You Never Heard of, etc.). Recently we came across a list from money-rates.com of “The 10 Worst States for Retirement”. While the website undoubtedly put some careful research into developing their list, we couldn't disagree more with the results.
Money-Rates.com started off with a reasonable methodology, selecting 4 factors to help screen the list:
Economic (Unemployment, tax burden, cost of living)
Climate (Humans like 68 degrees, so the authors preferred places with the least
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Published on November 23, 2010
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