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My monthly purchases are split between Walmart online and Amazon. Between them there's only a few things I can't buy while watching a movie, and when the total is shown, if I need to lop off a bit, its easy to do. The interesting part is I now have a pile of empty boxes, especially big ones. I'm cutting them up to keep the mud and dirt by the door.
I quit driving as I know I shouldn't, since I can't accurately judge distance. There's not much transportation available and the only problem is milk and meat. But the empty store by my house which used to sell wonderful fresh meat has finally been bought and will soon reopen. Sure, its a bit expensive but you can't buy that kind in Walmart. Actually very little of my food shopping would be returned to in store shopping.
The best part is you really can budget. If the total is twenty dollars over the max, then you can edit your orders and buy neat and easy, no hurridly sorting to see what not to get while your holding up the line.
I may endup taking the senior center bus to get veggies and fruit, but won't end up buying too much for the bus.
Thing is, ten years ago, I couldn't manage this way. The options in shopping with sites like amazon and brick and mortor ones like online walmart or any other store ones choices have grown and made a lot of types of situations quite doable where before they might not.
Have you tried Jet.com? You can get veggies, fruit, and even meat and ice cream. Service is very good.
I agree that it depends on the individuals. What I find unusual is that people gauge their proximity to civilization by how close a Walmart is. I haven't spent a nickel at Walmart in over a decade and I've managed to survive.
I'm guessing you don't live in a rural area.
I never shopped at Wally's when I lived in a city, but for a long time here, it was the only big box in town, with more selection and cheaper prices than the tiny local shops. (It was big news when we got a Target a few years ago.) Proximity to Walmart IS a measure of civilization, just not a measure of elegance.
You can always move back into town when your health fails...you don't have to be near hospitals and Walmart for every minute of your retirement. If you retire in your 60s, why not live where you want and enjoy it for 20 years, then move back to Walmart and hospitals when you become frail.
What we've seen with other seniors is that they buy the rural spread...and that's where all their money goes. When they need to move closer to town they're in a pickle, because their savings are gone and the rural property languishes on the market, sometimes for years.
So, yeah, you can move back into town, IF you plan for it and put money aside for it. Maybe buy the place in town first and rent it out until you need it.
I'm guessing you don't live in a rural area.
I never shopped at Wally's when I lived in a city, but for a long time here, it was the only big box in town, with more selection and cheaper prices than the tiny local shops. (It was big news when we got a Target a few years ago.) Proximity to Walmart IS a measure of civilization, just not a measure of elegance.
Very true. Modern small-town America is anchored by Wal-Mart. The specialty stores - butcher, baker etc. - are a fine thing from a consumer viewpoint, if they're still in existence. Quite often, one finds the "center" of town boarded-up, and the commercial-activity moving to the highway-exit, on the outskirts of town, where there's a Wal-Mart, an Applebee's and a Speedway gas station. These shopping-centers become oases in otherwise unremitting expanses of corn and soybean. Distance to "civilization" is gauged in terms of proximity (curiously, measured by minutes of driving-time, not distance in miles!) to those retail establishments.
In my case, I reside some distance from two Wal-Mart towns, and about twice that distance to the actual city. My mailing-address lists one of said towns, but my shopping is in the city, or its more affluent (by local standards) ring of suburbs. The town - the county seat - was eviscerated by decades of economic decline. That hampers the real-estate market, whether in town, or in the surrounding countryside. And the low (or negative) property appreciation-rate is a contributing factor to why many people are unwilling or unable to relocate.
I'm guessing you don't live in a rural area.
I never shopped at Wally's when I lived in a city, but for a long time here, it was the only big box in town, with more selection and cheaper prices than the tiny local shops. (It was big news when we got a Target a few years ago.) Proximity to Walmart IS a measure of civilization, just not a measure of elegance.
I don't currently reside in a rural area but I have in the past. I saw what happens to 'tiny local shops" when a Walmart opens a small agricultural community and is able to undersell the little guys. Economists call it the "Walmart Virus" when local merchants close and once thriving downtown areas become boarded up ghost towns. I support the free market and I respect the consumers right to chose what is best for their budgets. I prefer to keep my money local when all possible but each to their own.
We have 150 acres, all but one acre is forest [really just our driveway, our house and the area of our garden].
...
I too have found that large rural lots tend to have small areas that are tended, with the remainder of the lots left natural. In Maine, we had 12 acres, but only 2 were 'tamed' around the house. Those were a pain to maintain due to the amount of rain we got- it was like living in a Chia Pet!. Nearly all the land we owned in Colorado was raw with only a driveway to maintain, and now with our current 10 acre retirement place, we will not have formal landscaping. We do plan to put in a garden and a small group of fruit trees, but much of the remainder of the land will stay as we found it. It was a Christmas tree farm, but it was cleared maybe 8-9 years ago, and though it has a lot of new conifer 'starts', they generally don't need much tending, except for an the occasional replant to prevent collisions. In reality, the latest 10 acre place will be less maintenance than our current suburb house with 1 acre of lawn which has to be made 'pristine' every week to meet HOA rules. Fortunately, it is going on sale in the next couple of months, then we can finally relax and start to enjoy retirement.
We currently live on 1 acre and are about 20 minutes from most amenities. There is one convenience store about 12 minutes away. We are about 25 minutes from a hospital. I am 63 and DH is 70. And...we are about to put our house on the market and plan to move closer to amenities.
Right now, it is fine in a sense. We are in good health and find driving easy. Neither of us having any chronic health conditions that require frequent doctor's visits. We could stay here for a time. But, we are bailing now.
We talked about staying until it was hard to get around and we had to move. We decided against that for a couple of reasons. First, if we wait until we have to move we will lack flexibility. We will have to take what we can get then immediately for the house and will have to quickly move somewhere. We won't have much choice because we will be in a situation where an immediate move was required. I don't want to have to make those decisions and do that when one of us is suddenly needing medical care on an ongoing basis. Or, one of us suddenly can no longer drive.
The second factor is that getting a house ready to sell, going through the selling process, finding a new house, moving into that house and getting everything set up at the new abode is exhausting. It is tiring for most people. We moved several years ago. I can already see that it is more tiring and harder now than it was then. I can't pack as much stuff in a day as I could then. We have to hire out some work that we would have done ourselves 10 years ago. But, we are relatively "young" and we are healthy so it is fine.
I can't imagine doing this 10 or 15 years from now when DH is in his 80s and I'm in my 70s. Better to do it now.
Some have mentioned that, well, it doesn't matter if you are 40 minutes from a doctor out in the boonies versus being 40 minutes from doctors in town. Well, for many it does very much matter. We have no public transportation where we are. Yes, an ambulance would come. But, other than that we don't public transportation. My mother is 93 and lives in town. She is able to still do some local driving (grocery store), but she can't drive to doctors across town. But, because she lives in the city this is not a big deal. The city has a transport service for the elderly that will come and pick her up and take her where she needs to go and then bring her home. She uses it for doctor's appointments but can use it for anything really (has to schedule a couple of days in advance. It costs money but it is way less than a cab or Uber).
The point is that being closer into town if someone is older and can't drive at all or as much or it is hard for them -- there are a lot of options. There may be public transportation or a transport service like my mom uses. Or, a cab or Uber. There may be delivery from grocery stores or restaurants, etc. Many of these supports can allow those who can no longer drive to stay at home. My mom is able to live on her own because she lives in a city where there are a lot of supports available. If she lived where we live she would have to move.
I suppose some parts of the country -- by default -- are rural, "country" or wilderness. And of course whether someone lives there is his or her own choice.
At any age -- you could live across the street from a hospital -- and still die if the wrong condition strikes
But I do think if you choose to live an hour from any medical care that's on you. Sort of like: you know what you signed up for.
Would I want my parents, if they were still alive, to live an hour away from a hospital -- uh, "no."
There is very little out that way. The nearest Walmart and community hospital are probably about thirty minutes away. No grocery stores. The nearest gas station is probably ten miles away. Road plowing in the winter and any other sort of maintenance is going to be minimal at best. There's virtually no one out there and it is essentially unspoiled wilderness.
Those are not serious issues. When you're retired and don't have to go to work every morning, you don't care if the roads are plowed. If it snows, wait until the roads are cleared. People in big city traffic live more than a half hour away from their hospital. If it's ten miles to the gas station, but you never drive that far, you only have to fill up once a month. If you do drive that far, fill up when you go by. How often are you inconvenienced by "any other sort of maintenance"?
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