Moving away from kids in retirement

[RetiredAndFree]

Our DH and SIL are just about 100 miles distance from us currently. A distance of 100 miles is to far for drop bys, but plenty close enough to allow for a long, one day visit.

Sometimes we meet halfway to hang out or have a meal, sometimes we go there, sometimes they come here. We're seeing them once a month on average, which seems about perfect given that about 75% of those visits are sleepovers.

I hope that helps.

 

[kz]

Our older son, wife and two grandsons live approx. 2 hrs from us. Fortunately we see them at least two times a month for 2-3 days at a time. Our younger son lives about 1500 miles away. We were lucky enough to visit him twice in the last 6 months and hoped to see him at our home for Thanksgiving, as usual, but not going to happen this year due to other commitments he has.
All that being said we now find out that older son and family are moving 2000+ miles away in the next six months. I am extremely close to two grandsons (ages 2 and 5) so this is going to be difficult for this ol' nana. DH and I will be planning a few long vacations over the next few years where we will visit younger son, continue on to visit older son and then return home. We will then rinse and repeat. These vacations were not on our bucket list a few months ago but now they are the priority vacations. Go figure! And hopefully the older son and family will be back near us once his three year gig is up. Younger son I think will be remaining 1500+ miles away for our lifetime since he married a warm-weather CA girl.
Of course all this gives us a chance to purchase a vacation home wherever we want to which isn't a bad thing at all.

 

[Live Free]

A bit late to the thread...

I'm not retired - have a long ways to go, unfortunately. But I have thought about this a lot. I have wanted to move near my parents (they are mid-70s now), my sibling, and his 4 children (grown) for several years. They all live near each other and I think we miss out on so much family stuff being 7+ hours away.

My MIL, 80 y.o., is recently widowed living in a trailer park over 55 community in FL.
There is no family in FL with her. The pros are that she has a lot of activity around her. Swimming, biking, cards, dances, etc. Lots of other widows and old folk to pal around with. When she visits us, DH and I are at work, one kid is away at college, the other is in HS and busy. We try to take off time when she is in town, but only get so many vacation days a year and so we budget them carefully. We also reserve vacation days to go down to make fixes to her home and such.

My parents, OTOH, are not in a retirement community, but they have lots of church related activities and my dad is an avid golfer and has golf buddies he is out and about with a lot. Mom takes salsa and line dancing and other classes that interest her. They also are always attending family events - birthday parties with the great grandkids, football sundays with my brother and their (grown) grandsons, NASCAR tailgating, etc. My brother goes golfing or plays tennis regularly with Dad.

Having seen both options - I hope to have my parents set-up. My parents were lucky. Of there two kids, one of them moved from a high cost living area to a lower cost of living city in southern NC. They cashed out their large home equity and paid cash for a great house near my brother and his family. I hope we make it there, to. And that my kids follow. Ultimately, I'm not sure I want to be far from my kids (or one day - grandkids!)

 

[MovingtotheCove]

Not an easy answer...many good write ups.

In our case we are within 10 minutes of my parents and 5 hours of my wife's parents. We are lucky to have a close, but small families. We are staying in our current home due to help we need to offer to all 4 parents....still living on their own between 85 and 92 years old!

We have put down future "roots" on a temporary basis to test out a community. We own a home in central FL in a 55+ active communitiy and use it today as a vacation home. We love it. We think we will move full time. For now needing to stay closer to elderly parents is our plan.

Our only child lives 1500 miles away from us and is 3 years into post graduate school work/career. Our take is come and meet at the FL house if you want to see us and come "home" if you want to see the grandparents. Seems to be working so far.

We chose a central FL location with good access to 4 major airports. This offers our future location as an attractive meeting point hopefully for our family of the future.

Again, if someday grandkids we hope to still be on the map to come and visit vs. us trying to outguess the locations/needs of a future family and their locations.

Who knows....each day offers a new twist and staying in touch does not today need to be face to face at all.