Where’s your best place to call home in retirement?

Your home is your largest financial and emotional investment, so deciding whether to move or stay put is a difficult decision for retirees. Financial or health and mobility issues, as well as a want or need to be close to family are factors that make this a decision that most retirees eventually face.

Our team will help you evaluate your options and tap into solutions to increase your financial opportunities in retirement—if it is your preference, even help you stay in your home.

We can help, whether you:

• Own a home and would like to stay put for as long as possible
• Are moving or downsizing (to a smaller home, over-55 community, independent living, assisted living, or other)
• Need to review your current real estate investments and properties

Call us to schedule an appointment, evaluate your options and get a handle on this critical piece of your retirement life.

I want to stay in my home, if possible…

Use the equity in your home to pay for in-home care and home modifications and successfully age in place

If you’re like most retirees, you want to continue to live in your home for as long as possible. Unfortunately, physical and financial challenges often make that difficult.

The good news: There are options that can actually enable you to age in place. The problem: Most seniors and their families don’t know where to start. Weeding through the wealth of information and determining what options would be most suitable for them would alleviate making the wrong choice now and down the road.

Our real estate and home equity specialists can provide the guidance you need to help you understand the various options available and discuss the strategies that have helped so many other seniors work through the challenges and anxiety of staying in their own homes.

I am thinking about moving, downsizing or relocating…

Housing and Transition: gracefully moving out and on to your next home

Moving from one’s longtime home can be bittersweet, even painful. It’s a difficult decision to make, despite the fact that a new environment may be better suited to your needs.

Our experts will provide recommendations to help you take charge of your decision-making and offer suggestions to help guide you in your move. The helping hands of our senior relocation specialists can assist you in readying your house for sale and sort out what to keep and what to set free.

We will also help you identify what to consider in determining the most appropriate choice for your next residence (downsizing to a smaller home, over 55 community, independent living, assisted living, and more). Plus, gain insight about ways to de-stress as you plan and prepare for your new life passage—even learn what to expect on the day of the move so that you transition into your new space with grace, style and ease.

Our experts will help you:

• Determine your housing requirements and what to consider in your decision-making process
• Evaluate if the time is right to sell your home
• Understand the options of “where you go from here” (smaller home, over-55 community, independent senior apartment, assisted living facility, and more)
• Discover programs and options that exist to help you cover the costs
• Cope with the emotions of letting go of the memories and cherished possessions
• Explore strategies and ideas that make downsizing easy and stress-free

General Questions about real estate, mortgages and investments (or investment properties)

Before you use real estate to fund your retirement, get answers to these important questions

Is real estate a good investment for retirement? That’s a burning question for some retirees or people who are in or near their mid-fifties and want to retire early.

Many experts answer with a resounding yes and say that they’ve seen many people finance a comfortable retirement lifestyle by building a real estate portfolio. Others will tell you its a high risk and that they’ve seen people enter this market and lose substantial amounts of money at a time when one can’t afford to risk losing money.

When you consider the two important fears that plague retirees—running out of money and something happening to their health – on the surface, real estate becomes an attractive investment because you can use it to build wealth and generate income.

Real Estate, perhaps more than any other investment, requires a combination of knowledge and skills to pick the right types of real estate investments and a knack for picking places in which to invest. There’s also the issue of raising money for initial purchase and securing mortgage money to maintain a property.

One might consider real estate investments to be a nontraditional when helping to fund your retirement—and frankly, that takes guts.

There are certainly many specifics to consider when investing in real estate, and many questions that require answers before staking even a portion of your retirement monies on it. Here are some questions retirees frequently ask about real estate investing:

• Should I invest in commercial or residential properties?
• Should I invest in rental properties or invest in renovation and flipping properties?
• Should I invest exclusively in real estate or allocate my funds among stocks, bonds, annuities and real estate, and if the latter in what percent?
• May I withdraw money from my qualified investments, 401(k) or 403(b), to invest in properties?
• Can I apply for and successfully get a mortgage to purchase a property if I’m retired?

Our mortgage, home equity and real estate professionals can sit with you to review important questions unique to your situation. As with any investment, when entering the real estate investment market as you approach or are in retirement, it’s important to plan, be prepared, and well-thought out.