What Will Your Retirement Lifestyle Be?

What Will Your Retirement Lifestyle Be?

We all have different views and opinions on what our perfect retirement lifestyle will be! Most of us have dreamed about it so much that we pretty much have a vision clarified in our minds. If we have a life partner, our discussions about retirement have evoked some wonderful pictures in our minds of what the future will bring!

Many things must occur for us to achieve and enjoy our perfect lifestyle in retirement. Most important among these is our health. Without good health, life can be a real struggle for you and for those near and dear to you. If you are blessed with good health now, be sure to manage your diet and stay active with exercise each day to maintain a healthy body.

Of course, we will need to have a good place to enjoy or retirement. Many retirees are excited by the freedom for having to work each day that they choose to move to some other place to savor their newfound life. Others choose to stay put where they are close to family and friends to complement their lives. Still others find the lure of great weather as a good reason to spend at least part of their year in the sunny climate of the South or West. Whatever place that you choose, if it is not enjoyable, you can always move around or back until you are happy.

I have retired to my dream retirement on two occasions! The first time, I retired rather unexpectedly as my company was bought out and I found myself without a lot to do. I think of this as the time that I retired “From” something. After the exhilaration of freedom from work wore off, my wife and I found ourselves somewhat lost. We had worked so hard in our business that we had few friends and now we found ourselves retired at 50 and having little to do. Neither of us could stand it, so we bought another business and went back to work for something to do.

Now that we have matured and better refined our retirement lifestyle dreams, we have sold that business and have now retired once again. This time, though, we retired “To” something. Over the last few years, we had planned our retirement lifestyle so well that we identified the place where we wanted to be located, had secured the activities and exercise opportunities that we want, found a place with great healthcare resources should we need it, etc, etc, etc.

A critical part of any retirement has to be the financial considerations. You have to be concerned that you have enough in your ‘nest egg’ to provide your with supplemental retirement income to take up where Social Security leaves off and to provide for long term care insurance should either of us need it. While our retirement budget does not provide for a very lavish lifestyle, it does provide for a very comfortable life!

For supplemental retirement income, I have begun to use the Internet to generate some cash flow. I write articles, e-books, and have a website and a blog – each which produce a small income each and every month. I don’t earn a tremendous fortune this way. I could if I wanted to devote more time to it, but I would rather play golf and travel frequently.

Since retiring, I have become interested in the sub prime mortgage problems and have written many articles on reverse mortgages. Many retirees use these as a safety valve in the event of a financial disaster. Having been a boater all of my life, I have written a series of books and articles on boating and have developed quite a following there. All of this I find quite enjoyable. I wish that more retirees would share their life and experiences through the writing of such articles. Being only 500-700 words, they don’t take long to write, provides exercise for the brain, and, oh yes, provide some cash, too!

I have refined my opinion of what constitutes a “great retirement lifestyle”. Simply stated it is what you sincerely want it to be, once you have taken all of the factors into consideration. I’ve learned that it is critical to take your spouse’s needs and wants into consideration, too, if you are really going to enjoy your retirement.

Do more than just plan for the finances of your retirement. Write down a ‘Retirement Plan’ and go over it time and again. I’m convinced that his planning is a whole lot of fun and, through the process, you will figure out what you really ant in your retirement.

Resources: Don Seibert is a retired business executive who, as an Expert Author, writes timely articles, books and blogs on issues concerning sources of extra retirement income, Having retired twice, Don is host of http://www.RoadToEasyStreet.com . Visit the site for a complete discussion of Retirement Income Options