US News: The 20 cities most boomers will retire in study

[Orchidflower]

Thought some of you might be interested in this from US News & World Report on the 20 cities most boomers will be retiring in that was just released.
Raleigh, NC, comes in first: high taxes, great medical care, lots to do, and, did I say, high taxes? = life is a trade-off.

The 20 Cities Where the Most Baby Boomers Will Retire - Planning to Retire (usnews.com)

 

[kumquat]

I bet mine is about number 3017.

 

[REWahoo]

This isn't a report of where retirees are moving, it shows the cities with the highest growth rate of baby boomers retiring in place, which is different from the typical "best places to retire" article:

"The cities that have gained the most baby boomers so far this decade provide a clue as to which cities will have the most seniors in the next decade... For example, the Urban Institute predicts that Georgia’s senior population will increase by 40 percent between 2010 and 2020 due to the aging in place of baby boomers alone, and only an additional 4 percent will be due to the in-migration of people age 65 and over."

 

[unclemick]

Now are the old folks getting older in place - or are the young folks skipping town in the middle of the night - thus skewing the numbers?

Yep - don't see Kansas City on the list.

heh heh heh -

 

[ejman]

Thought some of you might be interested in this from US News & World Report on the 20 cities most boomers will be retiring in that was just released.
Raleigh, NC, comes in first: high taxes, great medical care, lots to do, and, did I say, high taxes? = life is a trade-off.

The 20 Cities Where the Most Baby Boomers Will Retire - Planning to Retire (usnews.com)

Geeez Louise... I cant find the nearest city to my ranch on the list, I cant find ANY City in my state on the list, I can't even find a frigin state within my region of the country ( Pacific Northwest) in the list. Boy did I choose the wrong place for my ER or what? Sorry, no I am not moving...

 

[ls99]

Now I have a list of 20 cities to avoid, in case we'd want to move.

 

[bank5]

I live in the Raleigh area but am unfortunately a ways from retirement

The growth has definitely slowed a bit in the last few months, but it still pretty remarkable seeing developments popping up all over the place

 

[CuppaJoe]

Didn't see this is the previous quote!

The numbers will grow the most rapidly in the intermountain west, the southeast, and especially in Texas....

 

[NW-Bound]

My home town is 11th on the list. Good! I can sell in a few years to go to the PNW, where no one wants to live.

 

[BunsGettingFirm]

My home town is 11th on the list. Good! I can sell in a few years to go to the PNW, where no one wants to live.

No, the article says that you have to stay to party with all of your Boomer retiree friends!

 

[W2R]

The 20 cities were selected based on this:

The cities that have gained the most baby boomers so far this decade provide a clue as to which cities will have the most seniors in the next decade, say researchers

I suppose that is fair. They looked for the 20 cities with the highest rate of growth for 55-64 year olds during the years 2000-2007. I guess that people who move at age 60, would probably move to the same place at age 65+. This would also favor any city that has a population bump of permanent residents born from 1936-1952. Here are the cities or metro areas:

Raleigh-Cary, N.C.
Austin-Round Rock, Texas
Atlanta-Sandy Springs-Marietta, Ga.
Boise City-Nampa, Idaho
Las Vegas-Paradise, Nev.
Orlando-Kissimmee, Fla.
Houston-Sugar Land-Baytown, Texas
Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, Texas
Colorado Springs, Colo.
McAllen-Edinburg-Mission, Texas
Phoenix-Mesa-Scottsdale, Ariz.
Charleston-North Charleston, S.C.
Albuquerque, N.M.
Tucson, Ariz.
Washington-Arlington-Alexandria, D.C.-Va.
Salt Lake City, Utah
Charlotte-Gastonia-Concord, N.C.-S.C.
Denver-Aurora, Colo.
Nashville-Davidson-Murfreesboro-Franklin, Tenn.
Ogden-Clearfield, Utah

The appeal of many of those cities and metro areas to baby boomers is a bit mysterious. I was ecstatic to see that none of them are in Missouri, where Frank and I plan to retire. So, with any luck there will still be room for us up there once we have sold our houses here and are ready to move.

 

[REWahoo]

The appeal of many of those cities and metro areas to baby boomers is a bit mysterious.

I think you're looking at the article from the wrong perspective. Nothing implies any of these locations has any appeal for boomers, it's just where a growing number of aging boomers currently live (work?) and the article makes the assumption they will retire in place.

You think they won't move to MO with you and Frank (and Unclemick) when they all retire - but ya never know...

 

[W2R]

They looked for the 20 cities with the highest rate of growth for 55-64 year olds during the years 2000-2007. I guess that people who move at age 60, would probably move to the same place at age 65+. This would also favor any city that has a population bump of permanent residents born from 1936-1952. [...]

The appeal of many of those cities and metro areas to baby boomers is a bit mysterious. I was ecstatic to see that none of them are in Missouri, where Frank and I plan to retire. So, with any luck there will still be room for us up there once we have sold our houses here and are ready to move.

I think you're looking at the article from the wrong perspective. Nothing implies any of these locations has any appeal for boomers, it's just where a growing number of aging boomers currently live (work?) and the article makes the assumption they will retire in place.

You think they won't move to MO with you and Frank (and Unclemick) when they all retire - but ya never know...

I don't know if I would use the word "currently" but I think we are saying the same thing. The majority of Americans do retire in place, so I think that is a reasonable assumption. Now if a city had an unusually marked baby boom between 1936-1952, it would show up on this list even without high inmigration from 2000-2007. Interesting.

As far as migration, I don't have my links here but a 5 minute search yielded this on the census.gov website which shows net migration of seniors from 1995-2000, by state (maybe later I can dig up the link to more recent info which would be more relevant.). The top 10 states for net influx of those 65+ were Nevada, Arizona, Florida, S. Carolina, Delaware, N. Carolina, Idaho, Georgia, Tennessee, and New Mexico, in that order (note the absence of both Texas and Missouri, here). It also indicated that 78% did not move to another state.

And yeah, they better not all move to MO!! Otherwise we might have to move a second time.

 

[bank5]

The appeal of many of those cities and metro areas to baby boomers is a bit mysterious. I was ecstatic to see that none of them are in Missouri, where Frank and I plan to retire.

Raleigh is currently the fastest growing area in the country so it appeals not just to retires but working professionals too.

Why would it be bad if baby boomers were moving to Missouri?

 

[ziggy29]

Why would it be bad if baby boomers were moving to Missouri?

Well, if I were going to move to Missouri, I could think of at least two reasons:

First, many people want to "get away" from the crowds when they retire, and they want to find a quiet, less populated area. The last thing they want is for the place they chose to retire to become more and more like they place they wanted to get away from.

Second of all, a huge influx of retirees in an area put a major strain on social services. After a lifetime of being net tax *payers* rather than net tax consumers, many people begin to become net tax consumers in their senior years -- particularly in the area of health care. This puts a hurt on many local budgets and could, when taken to an extreme, cause tax increases and deep cuts in other budgetary items.

 

[REWahoo]

Well, if I were going to move to Missouri, I could think of at least two reasons:

You left out the obvious: many of us old pharts don't want to live with a bunch of other old pharts...

 

[unclemick]

You left out the obvious: many of us old pharts don't want to live with a bunch of other old pharts...

Yep - the dirty old man in me has noticed Spring Break is a tad nippy in parts of the country this year - if you watch the weather channel.

heh heh heh -

 

[unclemick]

And while I was posting that easy softball - the local tornado siren cut loose - practice I hope.

Come on spring - I need some warm weather!

heh heh heh -

 

[FinallyRetired]

The 20 cities were selected based on this:

Raleigh-Cary, N.C.
Austin-Round Rock, Texas
Atlanta-Sandy Springs-Marietta, Ga.
Boise City-Nampa, Idaho
Las Vegas-Paradise, Nev.
Orlando-Kissimmee, Fla.
Houston-Sugar Land-Baytown, Texas
Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, Texas
Colorado Springs, Colo.
McAllen-Edinburg-Mission, Texas
Phoenix-Mesa-Scottsdale, Ariz.
Charleston-North Charleston, S.C.
Albuquerque, N.M.
Tucson, Ariz.
Washington-Arlington-Alexandria, D.C.-Va.
Salt Lake City, Utah
Charlotte-Gastonia-Concord, N.C.-S.C.
Denver-Aurora, Colo.
Nashville-Davidson-Murfreesboro-Franklin, Tenn.
Ogden-Clearfield, Utah

I've been to, or lived in, all of those places except for Boise. Don't think I would choose any of them.

 

[Orchidflower]

If geezers are moving to the Dallas-Ft. Worth area, I have no idea where they are. I'm not finding any amazing numbers to support that theory myself. Maybe someone here has better knowledge than I do on the DFW area.

However, I've done some homework on the area from Charleston, South Carolina, down to Jacksonville, Florida (3-1/2 hour drive total I'm guessing). That coastal area is just LOADED with seniors, so, hurricanes or not, they seem to live there aplenty.

 

[ziggy29]

If geezers are moving to the Dallas-Ft. Worth area, I have no idea where they are. I'm not finding any amazing numbers to support that theory myself. Maybe someone here has better knowledge than I do on the DFW area.

I suspect that if they are staying in the area, they're probably moving out to exurban areas -- close enough for a day trip into the city, but far enough away from the crowds and the traffic when commuting for w*rk isn't a concern.

 

[W2R]

Why would it be bad if baby boomers were moving to Missouri?

Ziggy29 and REWahoo beat me to the punch. I plan to move to Missouri when I retire, and their answers in posts #15 and #16 above express exactly what I was thinking.

 

[Westernskies]

And while I was posting that easy softball ...heh heh heh -

remember, some of us already have two strikes...

 

[bank5]

If geezers are moving to the Dallas-Ft. Worth area, I have no idea where they are. I'm not finding any amazing numbers to support that theory myself. Maybe someone here has better knowledge than I do on the DFW area.

The median age for DFW and Raleigh are both around 32 (a few years younger than the national average). However both areas have had tremendous growth so that is probably the biggest contributing factor to study. It would be interesting to see a study on which cities are getting "older" and "younger".