Category: Retirement Real Estate
October 30, 2014 -- Our member Louise recently started an interesting conversation about time shares on another of our posts. Then Caps suggested that we begin a Blog post on that topic. Seems like a fine idea, since we know that many retirees rely on time shares, aka Interval Ownership units, as a way to make their retirement life more enjoyable.
Time Shares - Different Strokes
Many folks have 1 or 2 time shares that they look forward to using every year. Some have additional weeks in different locales and time periods. Others we know have consecutive weeks in the same locale/complex, which allows them to stay in a favorite place for a long period of time. And then we know others who not only have consecutive weeks, but have multiple units at the same time so their children/grandchilden can visit.
How time shares get used also varies. Some folks stay
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Published on October 30, 2014
Comments 34
Category: Best Retirement Towns and States
October 28, 2014 -- (Note: See our 2016 version with even more beautiful places to retire) Your editor was at a family wedding a few weeks ago when one of our smart young nephews surprised us with a question. Daeson, who was curious about Topretirements.com, queried: "What is the prettiest town you know about?" The unexpected question stunned me, maybe because there are so many choices. I didn't have a good answer.
Eventually I managed to stutter out Naples, Florida (to which the good wife said, Naples?), and Lucca, Italy. In the days afterwards I came up with many more, better possibilities. The exercise made me realize that it might be a really good idea to go further afield and ask you, our esteemed Topretirements members, what you think are the prettiest towns. In the interest of keeping on
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Published on October 28, 2014
Comments 35
Category: Financial and taxes in retirement
October 23,2014 -- Monthly Social Security retirement benefits will increase 1.7 percent in 2015. The cost-of-living adjustment (COLA) begins in January 2015 and affects benefits received by more than 58 million Social Security beneficiaries. The Social Security Act ties the annual COLA to the increase in the Consumer Price Index as determined by the Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics. To read more, please visit www.socialsecurity.gov/cola.
More Changes
The amount that beneficiaries under age 66 can receive before having
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Published on October 23, 2014
Comments 4
Category: Best Retirement Towns and States
October 21, 2014 -- Recently one of our members asked a very helpful question: "Why don't you get people who have actually retired someplace to tell us where and why". The request makes a good addition to other articles we have written about where people are thinking about retiring. Sorry we can't find who it was who made this suggestion, but whoever you are - thanks for the great idea to get feedback from people who have actually retired somewhere.
In preparing for this article we found that we already have received some
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Published on October 21, 2014
Comments 89
Category: Financial and taxes in retirement
October 13, 2014 -- Their are plenty of theories for the perfect amount to take from your retirement assets like 401(k)s and IRAs. They all try to solve the problem that if you take out too much too soon you will run out of money late in retirement, but if you are too cautious you miss out on a richer life, leaving too much of your assets to someone else, possibly the government. In contrast to some of the more complex theories, some experts suggest using a simpler measure and one that is widely in use. Their idea is to use the Required Minimum Distribution (RMD) that the federal government requires retirees to take from their retirement assets beginning in the year
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Published on October 12, 2014
Comments 14
Category: Financial and taxes in retirement
October 6, 2014 -- According to the EBRI only 55% of retirees are very or somewhat confident about their ability to live comfortably in retirement. That leaves a lot of people worried, most of whom have very little savings and no pension to fall back on.
There is good news though
Fortunately, even if you have minimal retirement savings and no pension other than Social Security, all is not lost. You probably have a retirement piggy bank that you never even thought about - your home! Indeed for most people, the value of their homes is greater than all their other assets combined.
My home is a plus, you scoff?
After all, housing expenses consume more than half of the household income of 1 in 3 Americans over 50, according to a study by Harvard's Joint Center for Housing Studies and the AARP. The average person over 65 spends 30% of their income on housing. While the fact that
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Published on October 6, 2014
Comments 44
Category: Best Retirement Towns and States
October 3, 2014 -- Among the hundreds of "Best Places to Retire" lists we come across every year, once in a while we see one that has some merit to the way the list was developed. When we saw WalletHub's recent list of the Best and Worst Places to Retire, we were impressed.
The website analyzed the 150 largest cities in the U.S. against 25 different criteria. Those included health care, affordability, weather, ability to find a job, activities, quality of life... among others. Most of the top cities were in the Southeast, Texas, and Midwest. Most you will be familiar with, but a few you might not, such as 2 of the Texas cities: Grand Prairie (a large suburb between Dallas and Fort Worth), and Plano (city just north of Dallas). Overland Park, Kansas is a suburban city south
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Published on October 3, 2014
Comments 9
Category: Health and Wellness Issues
September 30, 2014 and Updated Feb. 18, 2017 - Note: A lot has happened in the health insurance world since this article was written the implementation of the Affordable Care Act (aka Obamacare). With the new Trump Administration in place and its promise to repeal Obamacare, much of what is written in this article is completely up in the air. What is not up for grabs is the need for baby boomers to be able to have some kind of quality and affordable health care! This is Part 3 in our Health Care Insurance series - see links to Parts 1 and 2 in Further Reading below
Congratulations on your retirement before the age of 65. Now, what the heck are you going to do about health insurance?
Millions of baby boomers are finding themselves retired before the traditional retirement age of 65. Whether your retirement is the fulfillment of a dream or an unwanted outcome, it usually comes with a huge question - what to do about health insurance? This article will help you understand your options, particularly if you find yourself retired before Medicare takes care of most of
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Published on September 30, 2014
Comments 99
Category: Financial and taxes in retirement
September 26, 2014 -- Most people understand that some areas of the U.S. are cheaper to live in than others. For the majority of retiring baby boomers who are concerned about maintaining their pre-retirement standard of living, it make a lot of sense to act on those differences. This is highlighted by a recent study by Harvard’s Joint Center for Housing Studies and AARP that showed that an increasing number of America's retirement age citizens are stressed by their cost of housing. The study also warned that "the nation is unprepared for both the financial and non-financial housing challenges that will accompany the coming explosion in the elderly population."
The Tax Foundation has developed some extremely interesting maps - by state, town, and part of the country - that shows relative differences in purchasing power. The scale is based on an a purchasing scale of $100: if you have $100 to spend, how much value will you get in different locations. Based on the difference in local prices, in some you can buy
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Published on September 25, 2014
Comments 52
Category: General Retirement Issues
September 23, 2014 -- We recently had a suggestion from Charlene, who wrote that she "...would love to see some comments about people who have retired in place, why they made that decision, and how they are handling retirement without moving". We think that is a great suggestion, so this article is part 3 of a series on that subject. Part 1 profiled "The Snowbirding Innkeepers", while Part 2 took a look at the busy lives of a "Jane and Jack: Staying in Place and Very Busy".
Rather than focus on just a few people, this article takes a different
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Published on September 23, 2014
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