Category: Financial and taxes in retirement
July 5, 2007 -- Most older baby boomers remember John Beresford Tipton, the "Millionaire" who discreetly awarded a million dollar check to some worthy individual every week on TV during the late 1950's. While people old enough to remember the show (over 55) would still be thrilled at such a gift, being a millionaire just ain't what it used to be.
One problem is that Inflation has deflated the significance of a million dollars, which has only 54% of the purchasing power it had in 1987 (source: Wall Street Journal). There are a whole lot more millionaires today thanks to inflation and prosperity. Another issue is that real estate prices have soared and become a significant source of illiquid wealth - for boomers fortunate enough to have significant home equity in hot real estate markets.
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Published on July 5, 2007
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Category: Active adult communities
July 13 -- To any hobbyist the convenience of living near one's avocation is obvious. For most of us it just involves stepping out to the garage, or down the cart path to the 1st tee. But when one's hobby is an airplane, hanging out near your wings gets tougher. Airports and hangars don't grow on trees, and who wants to drive a long way to indulge one's passion.
Enter the airpark, a surprisingly (to us anyway) prevalent phenomenon. Topretirements.com just ran across a nice blog for plane owners - Living With Your Plane - that specializes in airparks - airstrips with adjacent houses on the property. LWYP has published some helpful research studies and lists on its site.
Research from Living With Your Plane indicates that about 20% of existing airparks have 50 or more attached homes, so some of these communities are substantial properties. Demographically, about 15% of people who live in airparks are over 66 years of age - the predominant owner is between 45 - 65 with no children living at home.
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Published on July 12, 2007
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Category: Financial and taxes in retirement
July 20 - The embedded knowledge base and skills that baby boomers have accumulated over decades of experience are key to the successful running of America's corporations and institutions. Yet a recent survey by Manpower revealed that only 21 percent have implemented retention strategies to keep them participating in the workforce.
If you are nearing retirement but want to keep on working - either because you want to or because of economic necessity - this phenomenon is something you might be able to capitalize on.
"Older workers have different needs than younger workers, and in order to meet those needs, their job preferences, personal interests and preferred work-styles must be assessed," said Sharon Birkman-Fink, President and CEO of Birkman International.
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Published on July 20, 2007
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Category: Retirement Real Estate
July 29 -- Countrywide Financial advised yesterday that more mortgages from people with good credit were having trouble making payments, news which sent the financial markets into a tailspin. Countrywide is the largest mortgage lender in the country. Hardest hit markets were the some of the strongest and biggest ones - California, Florida, Arizona, and Nevada.
Up to now the bad news in mortgages has mostly had to do with so-called sub-prime mortgages, those underwritten to borrowers with lower quality credit. The news that more mainstream borrowers on prime second-liens (a line of credit or second mortgage backed by a primary mortgage) are defaulting hit the stock market hard, sending the S & P 500 index down 2 percent, or just more than 30 points.
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Published on July 25, 2007
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Category: Active adult communities
July 27 -- Every publisher likes to issue "best lists" for the simple reason that all of us like reading them. This week the AARP got in the act, joining Money Magazine and others, with a list of "5 Great Places to Retire". Somewhat surprising was the fact that 4 out of the 5 communities were cities, with the 5th being a suburb of a big city.
Making the top 5 were: (if available, the Topretirements.com review is linked below):
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Published on July 27, 2007
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