Home sweet home: the hottest place to retire

By Liz Pulliam Weston

People make a lot of money selling the idea that there's a "best place to retire."

They hawk books listing hundreds of fabulous locales or lead international tours to retirement tax havens or promote the advantages of master-planned "adult" communities.

But the ideal retirement location for you may not be any of those places. The best place to retire is probably right where you are now.

It's certainly the most popular choice. Most seniors stay put after they retire, demographers say, choosing the communities where they've lived for years over tropical paradises, Florida retreats, retirement communities or RV living. Consider:

• Older people are much less likely to move than younger folks. Only one out of 20 people 65 or older typically moves in a given year, according to the Census Bureau, compared to nearly one in five of those under 65.

• Of the 34.7 million people 65 and older who lived in the United States between 1995 and 2000, just 7.9 million (22%) were living in a different residence at the end of that five-year period.

• Those who moved didn't go far. Census records show 59.7% of the seniors who moved remained in the same county, and 81% stayed within the same state.

• Eighty-nine percent of those over 55 interviewed by AARP in 2000 said they would prefer to remain in their current residences as long as possible.

"People become attached to their communities," said Andrew Kochera, a senior policy advisor for AARP.

"If you've stayed in a neighborhood and community a long time, you've formed relationships; you have a comfort level with what the community has to offer."

Hard to leave those who care for you

John Carl Brogdon of Long Beach, Calif., is certainly glad he didn't abandon the area where he helped raise two daughters, worked for the county assessor's office and even served as a city councilman. Staying put since he retired 12 years ago allows him to dote on his granddaughters, who live nearby, as well as hang out with a gang of friends, aged 42 to 88, who meet for coffee every morning.

"I think a lot of people come to harm when they abandon the familiar too quickly," said Brogdon. "It's hard to beat the paradise of people who care if you drop dead in the street."

Those ties tend to tug even at those who leave. Some who move at retirement end up returning to their hometowns. Florida, the most popular retiree destination, experiences a net loss of people 85 and older to other states, while six states that typically lose younger retirees -- Alaska, Colorado, Connecticut, Maryland, Minnesota and Washington -- have a net gain of that older age group.

So what's so wonderful about where you are now?

• You know people -- and they know you. Your friends are here. So are your doctors. You know your mail carrier, your grocery clerk, the best handyman in town. You have a sense of community that's missing when you confront a new place full of strangers.

• Your relatives are probably close. People joke about happiness being "a large, close ethnic family that lives in another city," said author and researcher Ralph Warner. But proximity helps build strong family relationships, and solid family ties are one of the key factors that promote retiree happiness, said Warner, author of "Get a Life: You Don't Need a Million to Retire Well." Having children, siblings or other relatives nearby serves another practical purpose: They may be able to help take care of you as you age.

• Staying put is usually much less stressful than moving. This is no small issue. Moving is so traumatic that many younger people experience stress symptoms, including temporary memory loss, said Gary Small, author of "The Memory Bible" and director of the UCLA Center on Aging. All the hassles of moving, from making new friends to figuring out how to get to the new post office, can be overwhelming for many older folks.

• That tax haven may not be. There are some places overseas where retirees report paying little if any taxes, but the savings may be offset by travel or medical costs. Domestically, there are few true havens. Some states don't have income taxes, but they make up for that with high property or sales taxes.

• No place is perfect. Every location has its drawbacks, a point that's often missed by those dreaming of a brand new life in a new place. Those who move to escape their problems will probably find their issues migrated with them; as the saying goes, "Wherever you go, there you are." Anyway, if there were a real Shangri-la, we'd all move there and wreck it with congestion.

Of course, if where you live is hell, or you think it is, then moving may be the only course to ensure your happiness. You may have always wanted to live in the South, or the West or Belize. You also could decide to move to be closer to your family -- about 20% of those who change residences do so to shorten the distance with relatives, particularly adult children.

Three key questions to decide if staying put works

But if you think you may want to stay where you are, the following steps can help improve the chances your decision will be the right one:

Assess your current home. Staying in the community doesn't mean you have to stay in the house where you live now. Too many stairs, too much yard work or simply too much house may induce you to downsize to a smaller, more accessible place in the same area. If you're determined to stay in the house you've got, you can check AARP's "Universal Design" program, which has ideas for making homes safer and more comfortable at any age. The remodeling you do now could pay off in a more comfortable retirement later.

Sink your roots in deep. The more ties to your community you foster before retirement, Warner said, the happier you're likely to be in retirement. Get to know your neighbors, join social or civic organizations, volunteer, be active in a religious community if that's your bent.

Make younger friends. Friends of all ages will add richness to your social life, but there's a more practical aspect to this advice: You're going to start losing your peers. Santa Monica, Calif., resident Charlotte Dubin, 75, keeps up with two friends in their late 30s as an antidote to losing other friends to death and senility. "The most depressing thing about getting older is having your friends die," Dubin said. "You've got to make younger friends."

Liz Pulliam Weston's column appears every Monday and Thursday, exclusively on MSN Money. She also answers reader questions in the Your Money message board.