Did your RE downsize/home strategy work out as you had hoped?

[aja8888]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Fermion Just signed the closing papers today selling our ~4500sq-ft house with 5 car garage and downsizing to 200sq-ft. Extreme! If you don't hear from me in a few weeks, I got eaten by a brown bear in Montana. Or stomped by a moose in Alaska. Or we are sailing in the Florida Keys and I can't get a cell signal.

200 square feet? Are you in jail?

[kcowan]

Quote:

Originally Posted by aja8888 200 square feet? Are you in jail?

Seems like a motorhome?

[rodi]

Quote:

Originally Posted by aja8888 200 square feet? Are you in jail?

He built that custom motorhome (on a flat bed truck bed) and has a towable trailer. I suspect the trailer is not included in the sf.

Edited to add the link to his custom RV

http://www.early-retirement.org/foru...-rv-77596.html

[NW-Bound]

No, look closely. There's no towable trailer, as he has to tow a sailing boat already. The blocks sitting on the flat bed are built as two separate sections. The front section is the living space, and the rear section is the "garage" for the motorcycles.

[NW-Bound]

Our class C motorhome is also 200 sq.ft. (8' x 25'). We have taken treks as long as 2 months. One time, we parked it and stayed for 1 week in a timeshare unit that was a park model of 400 sq.ft. Man, that park model felt luxurious and roomy.

[Fedup]

No stay in the same house that we bought 3 years before retirement. 3000 sqft and a large kitchen& man cave, and a room downstairs. I'm planing to put ramp in if we get too old and have to use a wheel chair. There is a full bath downstairs. So we can live just downstairs without the upstairs portion. The only thing that could be a problem is that the washer and dryer are upstairs. But I can get some hired help to do the laundry for me.

[Mulligan]

Quote:

Originally Posted by RunningBum I went the other way. After I divorced many years ago, I had a pretty small, simple house that met my needs. As my stock options and personal wealth soared I stayed in the house, knowing I was likely to move to another area when I ER'd. As I approached ER I built a house more than double the size. I only regret going overboard when I pay the heating bill or at cleaning time, but really, the hump to get over in cleaning is getting started. Once I have the vacuum cleaner out it doesn't bother me to be doing it for a longer time. If I was to move again I'd downsize by at least a third. In the meantime I'm going to enjoy the excess.

I keep a clean house and very modest sized 1600 sq ft with partial finished basement. When working I always kept it clean and could do it in short order. Now it takes all day. I am so slow and lazy now, I couldn't even imagine how long it would now take me to clean a bigger house.


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[Souschef]

When we married 8 years ago, we had to downsize from two 1800 sq ft homes into one 1400 sq ft home. We did it, but boy we got rid of a lot of stuff.

[Focus]

I'd be curious to know if anyone moved from a detached home to a condo/townhouse and regretted it. If we moved, our living space would remain about the same (1200 sq ft) or go down slightly, but we'd drop the yard and other home maintenance stuff.

[RunningBum]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mulligan I keep a clean house and very modest sized 1600 sq ft with partial finished basement. When working I always kept it clean and could do it in short order. Now it takes all day. I am so slow and lazy now, I couldn't even imagine how long it would now take me to clean a bigger house.

Having low standards helps. Someone who keeps things cleaner would definitely be spending more time. I'm not a slob, but I don't mind clutter, and some dust and cat hair in between infrequent vacuuming.

[INTJ10]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Focus I'd be curious to know if anyone moved from a detached home to a condo/townhouse and regretted it. If we moved, our living space would remain about the same (1200 sq ft) or go down slightly, but we'd drop the yard and other home maintenance stuff.

We moved from a 2900 sq.ft. old (1890) farmhouse with 3 outbuildings on 40 acres to a brand new 1800 sq.ft. townhouse. We had to do a major, painful downsizing of "stuff".

Life is good. We actually have time on weekends to do stuff other than maintenance and yard work. It is a big change in lifestyle but we found we can be happy without a lot of "stuff".

[Bamaman]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Mulligan I keep a clean house and very modest sized 1600 sq ft with partial finished basement. When working I always kept it clean and could do it in short order. Now it takes all day. I am so slow and lazy now, I couldn't even imagine how long it would now take me to clean a bigger house.

We find it easier to keep a larger house looking cleaner. We use an industrial dust mop on the 4000+ square feet of hardwood floors. We can also close off rooms that we're not using--keeping them clean.

In a small house all our "stuff" would take up all the space on cabinets, kitchen island, tables, etc. In the bigger house, our "stuff" is spread out--diluted. We also try not to use but 3 of our 5 full bathrooms.

[Focus]

Quote:

Originally Posted by INTJ10 We moved from a 2900 sq.ft. old (1890) farmhouse with 3 outbuildings on 40 acres to a brand new 1800 sq.ft. townhouse. We had to do a major, painful downsizing of "stuff". Life is good. We actually have time on weekends to do stuff other than maintenance and yard work. It is a big change in lifestyle but we found we can be happy without a lot of "stuff".

No shared-wall issues? No conflicts with the neighbors? I'm told one of the biggest issues of townhouse living is that you and your neighbors may not agree on when to undertake the maintenance of shared areas (like the roof).

[Souschef]

My late wife and I moved from a 1400 sq ft home to an 1800 sq ft townhouse. We never regretted it. There was no yard pool maintenance to worry about, and when we traveled, we just closed the front door and took off.

[Cheesehead]

I think it's really important to plan for stairs, you don't want them especially if you played a lot of sports.

I'm in great shape at 64 but going up stairs is now painful. I looked into surgery but was informed that half my issue is arthritis so surgery won't really help. Apparently this is quite common. So in sum, the house you age in should not have stairs. Who knew?

[INTJ10]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Focus No shared-wall issues? No conflicts with the neighbors? I'm told one of the biggest issues of townhouse living is that you and your neighbors may not agree on when to undertake the maintenance of shared areas (like the roof).

I can only speak for our townhome but I have never heard the neighbors. The shared wall is a concrete block wall plus studs/drywall on both sides. This is a new house and it is very quiet when the doors/windows are closed. One of my neighbors has kids next door to his unit and he said he has never heard them.

I don't know if it is a Florida thing or it's just the way kids are now, but I rarely see kids outside. When I was young, I was outside all the time.

The HOA is responsible for all exterior elements (roof, painting, lawn). So there are no conflicts between neighbors regarding those decisions. You do need to accept the landscaping decisions of the HOA. There is a community swimming pool. HOA fees are $150/mth.