55+ community living?

[Tetto]

Quote:

Originally Posted by REWahoo My old boss lived in a high-end gated community with manned guards at the entrance. He was awakened late one night by the sound of an intruder removing his car keys from the nightstand beside his bed.

Wow, this is a little nuts!

[ShokWaveRider]

Quote:

Originally Posted by MichaelL My parents community was a Del Web and was well managed from what I saw. It certainly wasn't low end. They place sold for $400,000. I'm not sure what else they could have done. The restaurant needed the business so they let people in. Everyone had a yard maintenance service so how do you keep them out.

Interesting, sounds like a bit of a negative for the Del Web communities IMHO if they let anyone in to eat, sort of defeats the objective. I am not sure whether that is all Del Web properties or just hers. I will have to ask as we have one in Pointe Vedre beach that we were once considering. We have a restaurant in our clubhouse but it is members only and visitors can only come in with guests. I like to call our gate guards the "Gestapo", as they seem over protective, again in my opinion, but that may be a good thing.

That is not to say we live in Nirvana, but almost all issues were related to people being careless and leaving their garage doors open, along with their internal doors when they were away, or leaving their keys in an open car. But that would be the same anywhere I am sure.

Being a private golf club, our bunch may be a bit stricter on access than others.

[audreyh1]

We have an unmanned gate. It is open during the day.

So minimal security from an enclosure and gate, we don’t expect much.

It still does keep out a lot of traffic. Pretty much just residents, delivery services, contractors/construction during the day, and very quit at night.

Some folks are mad that the gate s not closed on weekend days. Doesn’t bother us as we’re not trying to live in a fortress.

We do have an interesting security situation though. We are crawling with border patrol agents and TX DPS. We occasionally do have nighttime “international visitor” wall climbers trying to sneak through the neighborhood to avoid detection. They are quickly apprehended. This heavy surveillance and activity seems to keep away other unwanted visitors such as would be thieves.

[REWahoo]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Tetto Wow, this is a little nuts!

Yep. Apparently prior to searching for the car keys the intruder raided the fridge, then spent some time sitting at the kitchen table to have a snack and a beer.

[audreyh1]

Quote:

Originally Posted by REWahoo Yep. Apparently prior to searching for the car keys the intruder raided the fridge, then spent some time sitting at the kitchen table to have a snack and a beer.

OMG!

[MichaelL]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ShokWaveRider Interesting, sounds like a bit of a negative for the Del Web communities IMHO if they let anyone in to eat, sort of defeats the objective. I am not sure whether that is all Del Web properties or just hers. I will have to ask as we have one in Pointe Vedre beach that we were once considering. We have a restaurant in our clubhouse but it is members only and visitors can only come in with guests. I like to call our gate guards the "Gestapo", as they seem over protective, again in my opinion, but that may be a good thing. That is not to say we live in Nirvana, but almost all issues were related to people being careless and leaving their garage doors open, along with their internal doors when they were away, or leaving their keys in an open car. But that would be the same anywhere I am sure. Being a private golf club, our bunch may be a bit stricter on access than others.

I agree that the restaurant should be members only and people should not be able to drive in uninvited. Apparently the residents are bargain shoppers and they only eat at places where they get a senior discount coupon and the restaurant was losing money, is what my mother told me.

[Kroeran]

If you buy or lease in a new 55 plus, you will get a fresh crop
of active retirees to mine friends from. Age diverse communities with busy families provide a smaller potential partier pool.

One trick is move in early in construction phase and milk builder subsidy, move or sell before handover.

Rinse and repeat in same area collecting new social contacts in each hood, getting in early, leaving before reality
of fees kick in post handover.

Our Florida place is age diverse with a resort orientation. I find the the crazy stuff to be entertaining, so far. Last week someone vandalized the refurbed basketball courts, but kids parents came forward to pay for repairs.

[joeea]

Quote:

Originally Posted by albireo13 The only thing is it is in a 55+ community and we are unsure of that. That would be a new world for us. Would love to hear from other folks who have made such a move. Plusses and minuses? ... things to consider?

When we purchased our weekend/vacation second home 8 years ago it was in a 55+ "active lifestyle" community within walking distance of the beach. The entire HOA is 34 units.

We were concerned that there would be too many rules, that everyone would be old and unfriendly, that having our children and grandchildren at our house would be frowned upon.

After 8 years we are in the process of selling our primary residence and moving to our "retirement" home full time.

We love the neighborhood and the neighbors. While we are still the youngest, we've made great friendships and get together with many of our neighbors frequently.

They all love our children and grandchildren. And they kind of like us too.

It's a safe and fun location, with everything we want in a home.

[meleana]

I would love to move into either a 55+ or 62+ community in New Hampshire but there doesn't seem to be anything available or the homes are too expensive.


We are actually considering a CCRC- Independent living cottages. Yeah- I know we are way young compared to the residents but at least it will just be one move and 15 years goes pretty quickly and at least we will already be "in place". (we are in our 60's).


BUT- they are pricey, so we will see. I want to put our house up for sale this Fall but not sure how we will move because we need the money from the sale to get something else- IF- there is even an opening.



I dread the logistics of the whole thing. I just don't get it. I wish there was a way we could afford to buy something now, but I don't see how we could. Running two homes is just way too expensive.

[Kim451]

I was looking at the ones around Florida too, especially the 'Latitude Margaritaville' in Daytona Beach. I'm a little hesitant about moving into a retirees' neighborhood since they seemed like mostly couples and I'm single, with no kids or grandkids to discuss, and have lived outside the U.S. half my life so tend to be a little different... lol.

[RPHDOC1]

I would never move into a 55 plus community. I like the mixture of young and old . Too many old grouches in these places. I am 59 and would never move into a 55 and above pre-nursing home community.

[Scuba]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kroeran If you buy or lease in a new 55 plus, you will get a fresh crop of active retirees to mine friends from. Age diverse communities with busy families provide a smaller potential partier pool. One trick is move in early in construction phase and milk builder subsidy, move or sell before handover. Rinse and repeat in same area collecting new social contacts in each hood, getting in early, leaving before reality of fees kick in post handover. Our Florida place is age diverse with a resort orientation. I find the the crazy stuff to be entertaining, so far. Last week someone vandalized the refurbed basketball courts, but kids parents came forward to pay for repairs.

What do you mean by “handover?”

[MichaelL]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Scuba What do you mean by “handover?”

I think he's referring to when these properties are first built the builder chairs the HOA but after enough units are sold they handover to the elected HOA board.

[Midpack]

Quote:

Originally Posted by RPHDOC1 I would never move into a 55 plus community. I like the mixture of young and old . Too many old grouches in these places. I am 59 and would never move into a 55 and above pre-nursing home community.

Different strokes for different folks. I know people who are very happy in their 55+ communities, and others who'd never live in one - we're in the latter group. We looked very seriously at several 55+ communities in several cities/states for years because they had the homes/layouts we wanted, but fortunately for us we never bought. We kinda liked the smaller Epcon communities, you couldn't pay me to live in either of the monster Del Webb communities we considered - beyond depressing to us.

Rather than belabor a dissenting POV, from the other thread http://www.early-retirement.org/foru...ml#post2201892

[kgtest]

Quote:

Originally Posted by MichaelL I think he's referring to when these properties are first built the builder chairs the HOA but after enough units are sold they handover to the elected HOA board.

Some of them (builders) don't develop the common places and grounds until the build-out is X% completed. So if you are new, you might wait a year or two for that pickelball court or dog park.

[zinger1457]

Quote:

Originally Posted by ShokWaveRider Interesting, sounds like a bit of a negative for the Del Web communities IMHO if they let anyone in to eat, sort of defeats the objective. I am not sure whether that is all Del Web properties or just hers.

I've been in a couple Del Webb communities to play golf. As I recall just told the guy at the front gate I was playing golf and he waived me through. Didn't seem to be an issue with the residents, all the people I met that lived there really liked it.

[Kroeran]

Quote:

Originally Posted by MichaelL I think he's referring to when these properties are first built the builder chairs the HOA but after enough units are sold they handover to the elected HOA board.

Democracy is oh so messy. When the builder is around
problems just get solved and the drama is minimized.

Our area has a condo portion living among single family HOAs all under a Master that runs the amenities and a separate CDD that runs the roads, lakes and guardhouse.

But, the builder is making decisions on a short timeline and
issues come out of the woodwork during handover.

A risk averse time to get out is at handover or buy well past handover when the dust settles. Would not buy if amenities were not already operating in case of another 2008 and the hood going zombie.

A good time to buy for the brave is when handover panic is peaking and prices are tanking.

Never ever never buy when real estate is being sold as a lottery as back in 2006 2007.

The smartest play might be to lease from a speculator at the cheapest price you can get, so that DW can furnish and
decorate.

If the lease becomes too expensive or whatever, there will be ten other identical units available to leverage against each other for the best lease.

[audreyh1]

So what is wrong with the Del Webb communities?

[mexexpat]

Quote:

Originally Posted by RPHDOC1 I would never move into a 55 plus community. I like the mixture of young and old . Too many old grouches in these places. I am 59 and would never move into a 55 and above pre-nursing home community.

+2

Have a wide range of friends and co-workers and business associates. Maybe it's a coincidence but the only ones who moved and stayed in a 55+ community are all overweight and spend more time in front of TV than using any of the community's facilities.

Personally I think 55+ are discriminatory.

[Midpack]

Quote:

Originally Posted by audreyh1 So what is wrong with the Del Webb communities?

BRIEFLY and not complete:

• The houses all look too much alike.
• Their home sales practices are despicable IMO. They avoid giving specific pricing info beyond "starts at." And they even hide much of what's standard and not, until you've already signed a starts at contract - buying a house is a two step process, but you're stuck after the first step without knowing what step two will cost IF you let them. It took about 2 weeks to get pricing without signing a contract but when the $250K house we priced hit $425K without all the bells and whistles, we pulled the plug. What's standard was a joke, no one would buy such a house.
• A small 55+ community like Epcon with a small clubhouse/community might be OK, since there's life outside. The Del Webb communities we visited were 1000-1200 homes, with a huge clubhouse - just an overwhelming number of blue hairs everywhere we went. We looked online at some of the 55+ communities that are 30-50 years old, they looked awful! Might start out as a nice, vibrant community but we don't want to end up in a community where the median age is 80+ even if we're 80+. Some might like that, no problem.
• Lots of activities, many of them really lame IMO.
• One had a golf course, included in HOA - I play golf but I don't want to be forced to pay ongoing for a home course, I like to play a variety of courses.
• I could go on and on, but enough.