Category: Best Retirement Towns and States
This article is part of a series. See "For Further Reading" section at end for links to the rest of the articles Updated February 17, 2020 with current prices
Originally published June 15, 2010 -- What's not to like about retiring to a place on or near the water - except maybe the price that usually comes with that lifestyle. Until the polar icecaps melt some more, no one is making any more ocean front property, which means that as a rule only wealthy people can afford to pay for the privilege of watching the sun come up and down over the water from their front porches. Fortunately for the careful shopper though, there are different kinds of waterfront, some some of them affordable. To get helpful articles like this on a regular basis, sign up for our Free weekly "Best Places" newsletter.The first place we started when researching this article was our own Retirement Ranger. When we took our free, 10 question quiz we tried to keep it simple - we specified only 2 environmental selections - "coastal" and "lakefront" and "lower than average" cost of living. The Ranger came back with 100 choices in the USA, from which we chose 11 for this article.
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Published on June 14, 2010
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Category: Baby Boomer Retirement Issues
June 8 -- A few baby boomers know exactly what they want to do when they retire. These folks are lucky in many ways, because they have probably been busy planning where and when they are going to achieve all of their plans. But far more boomers probably only have a loose idea, at best, for how they are going to spend their lives, once they don't have a regular job that gets them out of bed and to a workplace 5 days a week. In this article we will explore some of the best and more common retirement lifestyles. Of course many people never intend to retire, which includes those who continue to do their old jobs as well as many who change careers.
Possible Retirement Lifestyles
To our way of thinking just about every kind of non-working retirement fits under
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Published on June 8, 2010
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Category: Active adult communities
June 1 - Conducting your due diligence before you bought into a development used to be a lot simpler. Not that it was always easy, but at least the basics were fairly straightforward:
- Research the reputation and track record of the developer
- Check to see if reserve (sinking) funds are adequate
- Examine Home Owners (Community) Association rules and finances to see if
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Published on June 1, 2010
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Category: Financial and taxes in retirement
May 25, 2010 -- Social Security recipients born in certain years have been notched before - notably those born in 1917-1921. Those unlucky souls didn't receive social security benefits quite as generous as those born in 1916 and before. Individuals in both groups, however, if they lived long enough, probably received far more in benefits than they ever paid into the system.
Now, according to the Boston College Center for Retirement Research, a new notch has been created - one affecting people born in 1947. The Center calculates that
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Published on May 25, 2010
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Category: Best Retirement Towns and States
May 25, 2010 -- You've probably been at a party where you discovered you didn't know a soul. Remember the feeling you got when a total stranger came up to you with a friendly smile and welcomed you? With that one warm greeting your anxiety probably went down, you stopped second-guessing your decision to come, and you started to enjoy the party. When it comes to retiring to a strange place, states and towns that seek out retirees might give you that same warm feeling. This article will explore what we think makes for retirement-friendly states, cities, and towns.
Types of friendliness
States (and towns and cities) have several types of friendliness that they could offer:
- Economic. This is mostly available in the form of tax relief, of which
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Published on May 24, 2010
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Category: Best Retirement Towns and States
May 18, 2010 -- Nobody loves a good list more than we do. To that end we decided to come out with our own 10 Best of the Best List. Our goal here is to assemble the best of Topretirements in one place, making it easier for our visitors to find our best stuff, quickly and easily. In this list you will find:
- The best places (towns and cities) to retire
- The best places in the world to retire
- The best under-rated places to retire
- The best active adult and 55+ communities
- The best retirement feature articles
- The best retirement blog stories
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Published on May 18, 2010
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Category: Retirement Real Estate
May 11, 2011 -- The sky is falling in Greece and Europe, the stock market went so crazy last week that blue chips went from $30/share to 1 cent in 15 minutes, the Gulf of Mexico continues to spout millions of gallons of crude oil - and amidst this encouraging backdrop you have to decide what to do about your retirement. You might be excused to be a bit uncertain about whether you should you buy...rent...or stay. This article will discuss some of the important factors you should consider in making your decision.
Buy?
Buying a place for retirement is a dream and a plan for many baby boomers. Here are some of the factors
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Published on May 11, 2010
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Category: Best Retirement Towns and States
May 4, 2010 and updated April 6, 2015 -- Florida and Arizona have long been the favorite 2 states for retirement migration. A study from Del Webb, however, finds that the Carolinas, North and South, might have usurped FL and AZ's traditional positions as the favorite retirement destination states. This article will concentrate on how and why North Carolina overcame Florida to become the number 1 retirement destination in some people's eyes. In addition to trying to explain how this important shift has come about, we will also review some of the top places to retire in this diverse state. We encourage you to read all of the articles in our Dueling Retirement series (listed at the end of this article), including: Dueling Carolinas: NC vs. SC
North Carolina's Secret Sauce
A warm winter climate has traditionally been the most important reason
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Published on May 4, 2010
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Category: Baby Boomer Retirement Issues
April 28, 2010 -- The "coming of age" movie and TV show has just taken on a new dimension for us baby boomers. "Sunset Daze", a TV show that debuts today on WE TV, shows just how far (and how low) we are about to go as a generation. Once we were celebrated for our youth in movies like "The Graduate" and events like "Woodstock". Now, the age group just a few years older than us oldest baby boomers is starring in what the New York Times calls a "boozy, oversexed reality TV genre". The Times has given the new show unusually full coverage with a front page article yesterday and a generally very positive review in today's television section. Yesterday's article was "Boozy, Bawdy Reality TV, With a Few Wrinkles", today's is "The Golden Years: Feisty, Fit, and Flirty"
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Published on April 27, 2010
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Category: Baby Boomer Retirement Issues
Younger baby boomers, those aged 50 years old in 2010, foresee a vastly different retirement world than 50 year-olds who were surveyed in 1996. According to a pair of surveys by active adult community developer Del Webb, today’s 50 year-old plans to retire four years later, at a median age of 67 versus age 63 nearly fifteen years ago. Fully 73% of baby boomers plan on continuing to work in retirement. That contrasts with current retirees living in Del Webb communities, of whom just 40% have actually worked since retirement. The conclusion drawn by Del Webb is that today's younger boomers don't see retirement as necessarily the end of their working life, but possibly something pushed out further or which includes work in some form
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Published on April 27, 2010
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