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Old 11-05-2016, 12:46 PM
 
Location: Paranoid State
13,044 posts, read 13,790,725 times
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Originally Posted by shamrock4 View Post
Also, many elevators cannot easily be safely retrofitted into an existing house.
Very true. That's why I had it designed into a custom house prior to ground-breaking.
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Old 11-05-2016, 01:38 PM
 
4,522 posts, read 3,716,678 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by reneeh63 View Post
The thing is that yes, you CAN spend millions on long term health issues...but I believe there are ways to "economize" to help your dollars go further, without having to go to what many here seem to think are the hell-holes-of-the-earth nursing homes.

No - they may not be "country clubs" or "spa-like" but they are acceptable. We do seem to be unable to accept anything less than the best in healthcare and sometimes that is just not realistic. Those of us who CAN'T afford LTCi will be forced to economize...we'll make it one way or another but I'll try not to let that fear take over the rest of my life....hmmm....maybe at least a BIT of the fear is fueled by marketers? My guess is that there is quite a niche to be filled with places that are more intermediate in costs than the country clubs.

On a broader note - I won't be upsizing when I retire. For the simple fact that I would consider it EXTREMELY sad to have spent my working years overly depriving myself just so I could live BETTER when retired! If that's what you want, fine - but it seems bass-ackwards. I want to MAINTAIN my life - and I can do that and add travel for the same amount as I'm spending while working because my perfectly acceptable house will be paid off.
I agree with not letting fear take over your life and not needing a country club or spa atmosphere to survive in LTC. Reality though is a cheap nursing home (or whatever the appropriate acronym for them is now) will smell like urine and Lysol. I saw the same thing for daycare when selecting for my son decades ago: clean, open, bright and no urine smell opposed to one painted in yellow and dark brown, many closed doors and the underlying urine/Lysol smell. Conditions reflect management. It takes some money to achieve a level of nice/acceptable on each end of life's spectrum.

Our Mom is going into an assisted living complex with step up units. It's located in rural, central Indiana which is a lower COL area, and the facility has a 4.5 star rating out of 5. For a one bedroom apartment with only an armoire, we furnish bed and anything else, the rates start at $1,800 residential to $6,200 for full medical per month with a one time payment of $20,000 upfront. Mom is going to be assessed for placement. She has dementia and we are guessing she will start out at a mid-level care tier and escalate up.

It's a nice, clean place in a pretty setting. Dad saved for Mom to be taken care of and that money will last 5-7 years at those prices. Those costs include meals, laundry, activities etc., but not doctors, pharmacy etc. We're fortunate Dad saved that money. While there may be "quite a niche to be filled with places with more intermediate costs than country clubs" that niche is nice in theory like affordable housing is and I don't know about your immediate area, but affordable housing is not being built here unless a developer's arm is being twisted. What I am quoting for my Mom is nice, not country club, and intermediate in costs with other facilities in the area.

Last edited by jean_ji; 11-05-2016 at 02:27 PM..
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Old 11-05-2016, 01:44 PM
 
Location: Central IL
20,726 posts, read 16,209,777 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by SportyandMisty View Post
There are many strategies to deal with housing for eventual aging, and I've articulated one.

95% of people are not in the top 5%, and one could extrapolate that roughly 95% (+/-) of C-D posters here are not in the top 5%. I'm not sure why you think it is important for me to somehow be in touch with my affluence. Since this is important to you, let me acknowledge that I am in touch with the fact that I'm affluent.

There. Do you feel better now?



You have a very unusual definition of wealthy.



You have a very unusual definition of being wealthy. I disagree that being in the top 5% translates to being wealthy. When you are in the top 5%, you are affluent - not wealthy.

For example, the median salary of a firefighter in Menlo Park, CA is $147,000 per year. That's the MEDIAN. Note it is a high COL area, and to encourage employees to live closer to work, the city awards an additional $200 to $2,000 per month per employee as a housing stipend based on longevity and rank. The city did this because they would like first responders to live closer to Menlo Park. For example, one recently retired firefighter has long lived in Reno, Nevada, commuting to Menlo Park for shifts. That commute is (at best) 4.5 hours each way during non-rush-hour traffic, and at worst 10 or 11 hours each way (if there are snowstorms, traffic jams or accidents on I-80).

That median firefighter income, coupled with a spouse working for the fire department or say the police department or in city government in Menlo Park at the median will have a combined income pushing $300K.

By your definition these firefighters are wealthy. I disagree.

Those median firefighters might retire at 50 or 55 with a combined defined benefit pension north of $200K. They would have access to retiree health insurance rather than needing to purchase Obamacare plans in the open market, so their retirement dollars go farther than they otherwise might.

By your definition these firefighters are wealthy. I disagree.

Now, they might live another 35 to 40 years in retirement. The net present value of their combined defined benefit pension is north of $6 Million even without any cost-of-living adjustments. By your definition these firefighters are wealthy. I disagree. They may even be affluent. But they are not wealthy.



You have a very odd definition of being wealthy. By definition, wealthy people can indeed buy Rolls Royces, Ferraris, private jets, vacation homes around the world, fine works of art and the like. Can't afford it? You're not wealthy. You may be affluent. Just making it into the top 5% is not wealthy.

Mariah Carey's net worth is about $500 million. Ms. Carey employs a very large staff that caters to her every whim. The woman has an assistant whose sole job is to carry around sanitary hand wipes to give to Carey after she shakes hands with anyone. It is reported that she even has an assistant who has the responsibility of telling Mariah how beautiful she is every morning and several times throughout the day.

Mariah Carey is wealthy.

Charles Johnson is the San Francisco Giants' principal owner, reportedly with a 25 percent stake in the team. That's believed to be the largest among the team's 32-member ownership group, San Francisco Baseball Associated LP.

Charles Johnson is wealthy.

Stage magician David Copperfield (who pulls in $57 mil a year) owns not one, but a slew of small islands in the Bahamas.

Copperfield is wealthy.
Do tell More extreme examples meant to show just how NOT-wealthy you are. You can quibble with semantics but it doesn't change the fact that someone with two very comfortable homes who can throw around not just the phrase "only $50k" but also the actual dollars is in very good financial shape. So please don't act like "poor little me" when your affluence is questioned - it is insulting and more so when you keep defending yourself in such a boorish manner.
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Old 11-05-2016, 03:07 PM
 
Location: Central IL
20,726 posts, read 16,209,777 times
Reputation: 50367
Quote:
Originally Posted by jean_ji View Post
I agree with not letting fear take over your life and not needing a country club or spa atmosphere to survive in LTC. Reality though is a cheap nursing home (or whatever the appropriate acronym for them is now) will smell like urine and Lysol. I saw the same thing for daycare when selecting for my son decades ago: clean, open, bright and no urine smell opposed to one painted in yellow and dark brown, many closed doors and the underlying urine/Lysol smell. Conditions reflect management. It takes some money to achieve a level of nice/acceptable on each end of life's spectrum.

Our Mom is going into an assisted living complex with step up units. It's located in rural, central Indiana which is a lower COL area, and the facility has a 4.5 star rating out of 5. For a one bedroom apartment with only an armoire, we furnish bed and anything else, the rates start at $1,800 residential to $6,200 for full medical per month with a one time payment of $20,000 upfront. Mom is going to be assessed for placement. She has dementia and we are guessing she will start out at a mid-level care tier and escalate up.

It's a nice, clean place in a pretty setting. Dad saved for Mom to be taken care of and that money will last 5-7 years at those prices. Those costs include meals, laundry, activities etc., but not doctors, pharmacy etc. We're fortunate Dad saved that money. While there may be "quite a niche to be filled with places with more intermediate costs than country clubs" that niche is nice in theory like affordable housing is and I don't know about your immediate area, but affordable housing is not being built here unless a developer's arm is being twisted. What I am quoting for my Mom is nice, not country club, and intermediate in costs with other facilities in the area.
Yes - I agree....$6,200 a month does not sound outlandishly crazy - probably not far off from what I have budgeted for "regular living" in retirement. Part of my point that I kind of made in another post is that some people would consider that outrageous because they don't consider LTC as a 'regular living cost" but if you are not living in your home and not traveling and not eating out and paying very minimally for clothing, and don't have many expenses beyond that then....you're just not having your cake and eating it too...you're "eating it".
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Old 11-05-2016, 04:10 PM
 
Location: Ponte Vedra Beach FL
14,617 posts, read 21,391,729 times
Reputation: 6793
Quote:
Originally Posted by jean_ji View Post
I agree with not letting fear take over your life and not needing a country club or spa atmosphere to survive in LTC. Reality though is a cheap nursing home (or whatever the appropriate acronym for them is now) will smell like urine and Lysol. I saw the same thing for daycare when selecting for my son decades ago: clean, open, bright and no urine smell opposed to one painted in yellow and dark brown, many closed doors and the underlying urine/Lysol smell. Conditions reflect management. It takes some money to achieve a level of nice/acceptable on each end of life's spectrum.

Our Mom is going into an assisted living complex with step up units. It's located in rural, central Indiana which is a lower COL area, and the facility has a 4.5 star rating out of 5. For a one bedroom apartment with only an armoire, we furnish bed and anything else, the rates start at $1,800 residential to $6,200 for full medical per month with a one time payment of $20,000 upfront. Mom is going to be assessed for placement. She has dementia and we are guessing she will start out at a mid-level care tier and escalate up.

It's a nice, clean place in a pretty setting. Dad saved for Mom to be taken care of and that money will last 5-7 years at those prices. Those costs include meals, laundry, activities etc., but not doctors, pharmacy etc. We're fortunate Dad saved that money. While there may be "quite a niche to be filled with places with more intermediate costs than country clubs" that niche is nice in theory like affordable housing is and I don't know about your immediate area, but affordable housing is not being built here unless a developer's arm is being twisted. What I am quoting for my Mom is nice, not country club, and intermediate in costs with other facilities in the area.
Just FWIW - assisted living can only deal with so much in terms of patient needs. Then you need a skilled nursing facility - SNF (that's what nursing homes are called now).

I've seen some pretty lousy SNFs over the years - but even the best aren't "country clubs". The residents simply aren't healthy enough to live in a country club. At most - you're looking at places that don't smell bad - and that give their residents high quality care. Robyn
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Old 11-05-2016, 04:30 PM
 
10,599 posts, read 17,802,444 times
Reputation: 17349
Quote:
Originally Posted by Robyn55 View Post
We have 2800 sf under HVAC (also additional sf under covered front and back porches). One story. And I think it's just about right. For us. At least the way we set it up. Main living area (living room/kitchen/dining room). Separate laundry room. Four bedrooms - three baths. We use one bedroom as the master - two as "home offices" - and the fourth as a guest room. Lots of storage (including a great walk-in pantry). Guess we could do without the third bathroom and the guest room bedroom now (we don't have many guests these days) - but it's not too much "extra". And we could possibly use those rooms for "live in help" down the road if we needed that kind of help.

Note that we don't have a basement or usable attic space. So we don't have areas to accumulate unused "out of sight out of mind" stuff. We do have a 3 car garage - but it is relatively empty (especially empty since we got a little water intrusion in the garage during Hurricane Matthew - and used it as an opportunity to get rid of things we knew we'd never use again).

The only thing we do have too much of is land - about 3/4 acre. Could do with less. Especially now that we're older (69/71) and can't take care of it ourselves. For that matter - it would be tough for us to take care of the house 100% by ourselves (we do have a once a week housekeeper and an occasional home handyman). I think the bigger you go - the more you have to anticipate relying on outside help as you get older (paying for it too). Robyn
No shade intended but what do you two do with separate OFFICES?

I have a business and haven't stepped foot into my spare bedroom since I bought the condo.

Working in other people's houses, I have to say that every single one in a new construction home have two bedrooms they NEVER EVER use. OR the "office" ends up being where one cruises the internet but it looks like an "office".

But it's a good way to have your own private space away from the spouse and just do whatever you want in there I guess.

Except for MAYBE they have a guest once a year. But they love the rest of the house so that's how they end up with so much extra sq footage.

Last edited by runswithscissors; 11-05-2016 at 04:49 PM..
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Old 11-05-2016, 04:41 PM
 
10,599 posts, read 17,802,444 times
Reputation: 17349
Quote:
Originally Posted by jean_ji View Post
I agree with not letting fear take over your life and not needing a country club or spa atmosphere to survive in LTC. Reality though is a cheap nursing home (or whatever the appropriate acronym for them is now) will smell like urine and Lysol. I saw the same thing for daycare when selecting for my son decades ago: clean, open, bright and no urine smell opposed to one painted in yellow and dark brown, many closed doors and the underlying urine/Lysol smell. Conditions reflect management. It takes some money to achieve a level of nice/acceptable on each end of life's spectrum.

Our Mom is going into an assisted living complex with step up units. It's located in rural, central Indiana which is a lower COL area, and the facility has a 4.5 star rating out of 5. For a one bedroom apartment with only an armoire, we furnish bed and anything else, the rates start at $1,800 residential to $6,200 for full medical per month with a one time payment of $20,000 upfront. Mom is going to be assessed for placement. She has dementia and we are guessing she will start out at a mid-level care tier and escalate up.

It's a nice, clean place in a pretty setting. Dad saved for Mom to be taken care of and that money will last 5-7 years at those prices. Those costs include meals, laundry, activities etc., but not doctors, pharmacy etc. We're fortunate Dad saved that money. While there may be "quite a niche to be filled with places with more intermediate costs than country clubs" that niche is nice in theory like affordable housing is and I don't know about your immediate area, but affordable housing is not being built here unless a developer's arm is being twisted. What I am quoting for my Mom is nice, not country club, and intermediate in costs with other facilities in the area.
Awesome. I work in continuing care communities like that every day dog walking. They're fantastic. God bless your dad.

They have Independent, then Assisted, then Skilled and the Memory Care is located in the Skilled building. Very important to have Memory Care not just Assisted and Skilled.

It's important for your mom to develop a relationship with the caregivers and she will. But you CAN pay a separate agency to augment her care a bit if you've been using one now with whom she has a relationship. Moves can be tricky with dementia (see Caregiving Forum). You want everything CALM and not too many people in the room at once and very little talking. Especially nervous chatter. LOL I have one client 92 y.o with "hardening of the artieries" type of dementia NOT the anxious combative dementia and she LOVES it there. SO HAPPY.

I'm young for it but I GUARANTEE you it's my first choice for my next move. I'm always promoting that here.

Maybe I'll move to Indiana.

That equity payment is good. I think here in my area of FL it starts at $80K for a small condo sized unit. And the monthly starts at around $2200. But most people start out in Independent so they're there longer, overall.

Maybe your place is different but where I work, they accept you for lifetime care not 5-7 years. Then if you suffer an unforeseeable inability to pay, their charitable arm kicks in and pays for you.

Developers are at the mercy of growth restrictions, zoning, impact fees and other government created expenses so they can't really just decide to build "affordable housing". Another one of my rants. AFFORDABLE housing is at the root of MOST of our societal and financial problems. Not EASY MORTGAGE MONEY - which is the devil.

Last edited by runswithscissors; 11-05-2016 at 04:51 PM..
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Old 11-05-2016, 05:03 PM
 
Location: Foothills of Maryland Blue Ridge mountains
993 posts, read 761,099 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by Serious Conversation View Post
I'm back in small town Tennessee and it's a different world than the affluent Indiana suburb I resided in. Back here with my parents generation, there seems to be a lot of priority placed on having a large home on a large lot, no matter how practical that actually is for the owners.

Over the last few months I've been back, I've noticed that most of these ~60 year old couples have way too much house! Many raised their kids in the homes they still live in, with many rooms of those large homes sitting mostly unused. They're still trying to care for these homes - often in failing health going into their 60s and those without failing health often carp on about wanting to downsize, but no serious effort is made to do it. These people are going to own far, far more house than they can reasonably take care of as they age, and many have been unwilling to consider downsizing so far!

Do you own too much house? Can you reasonably take care of what you have? If not, do you have plans to downsize? What are you downsizing from and to?
An odd observation...."failing health going into their 60s." I'm 58 and know very few people my age in failing health. Why are your 60s parents and friends in poor health? As you mentioned previously having lived in an affluent area of Indiana, I'm assuming you are now residing in a more impoverished area in Tennessee? Does that account for the poor health amongst your parent's generation?

At any rate....I'm 58, my husband is 64. We downsized last year from 3000 sq ft. in the city to 2900 sq ft in the country. But we primarily live in 1600 sq. ft on the upper level of the the two level rancher we bought.

Although we have a beautiful walk out basement family room/fireplace and MIL suite on the bottom level, we do most of our living on the upper level. This gives us all kinds of flexibility for visiting family.

As far as upkeep.....it's minimal. It is a 65 year old home with solid brick exterior, new roof, vinyl trim, newish mechanical systems. The yard is larger but landscaping services charge less here. We had several overgrown gardens and shrubs removed and had grass planted to ease yard maintenance.

Big two car garage with an entrance directly into the kitchen with only one small step.

Our utilities are half of what they were in the city. All in all, it's much less expensive than many HOA fees. So, square footage isn't much different but we feel we've downsized in a big way.
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Old 11-05-2016, 05:30 PM
 
Location: TN/NC
34,847 posts, read 30,914,378 times
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Quote:
Originally Posted by runswithscissors View Post
I'm young for it but I GUARANTEE you it's my first choice for my next move. I'm always promoting that here.

Maybe I'll move to Indiana.

Developers are at the mercy of growth restrictions, zoning, impact fees and other government created expenses so they can't really just decide to build "affordable housing". Another one of my rants. AFFORDABLE housing is at the root of MOST of our societal and financial problems. Not EASY MORTGAGE MONEY - which is the devil.
I don't know about what town this person is in but central Indiana is among the cheapest housing markets out there. There are plenty of depressed Rust Belt towns where very livable homes can be found for under $50k. It makes sense that nursing care would also be cheap, as the provider's expenses should be lower.

Quote:
Originally Posted by homeonthelittlemountain View Post
An odd observation...."failing health going into their 60s." I'm 58 and know very few people my age in failing health. Why are your 60s parents and friends in poor health? As you mentioned previously having lived in an affluent area of Indiana, I'm assuming you are now residing in a more impoverished area in Tennessee? Does that account for the poor health amongst your parent's generation?

At any rate....I'm 58, my husband is 64. We downsized last year from 3000 sq ft. in the city to 2900 sq ft in the country. But we primarily live in 1600 sq. ft on the upper level of the the two level rancher we bought.

Last edited by Serious Conversation; 11-05-2016 at 06:12 PM..
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Old 11-05-2016, 05:38 PM
 
Location: Lakewood OH
21,695 posts, read 28,324,149 times
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I was discussing this with a friend who has just done a remodel in her house. She pointed out that it isn't the size of the house that matters so much as the configuration of the space and rooms.

As an example, having bedrooms and bathroom on the ground floor would make it easy for someone with a mobility problem no matter how large the house is.

Just saying there is too much house for older years is silly. Anyone of any age can live comfortably in any house as long as the house is configured to meet their needs.

Last edited by Minervah; 11-05-2016 at 06:59 PM..
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