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Retirees Head to Unconventional Destinations
By Clarke Canfield
CAMDEN,
Maine (AP) — When Peg Davis was ready to find a retirement
community to move to, she looked north — not south — for
a place to spend her later years.
Rather than set her sights on Florida, Arizona or some other warm-weather locale,
she packed up and moved from Big Flats, N.Y., to the small coastal Maine town
of Camden.
Davis, 73, was in search of the slow pace of a small town with natural beauty,
cultural opportunities and “a sense of place.” She hasn't been disappointed
since arriving in 2010.
“I wouldn't go south of Pennsylvania,” said Davis, who vacationed
here for years before making the move. “My mind operates like a Mainer.
It doesn't operate like people who escape to Southern comfort.”
The idea of people who uproot and move when they retire conjures up images of
warm, sunny Florida or Arizona. But some of the older members of the baby boom
generation, the 78 million Americans born between 1946 and 1964, are looking
elsewhere, and a number of towns in cooler climates from Maine to Washington
have become popular retirement destinations.
Camden is frequently cited in lists of best places for retirees. Others that
have merited mention include Asheville, N.C.; Ruidoso, N.M.; Durango, Colo.;
the San Juan Islands in Washington's Puget Sound; St. George, Utah; Medford,
Ore.; Coeur d'Alene, Idaho; Kalispell, Mont.; and towns along lakes Superior
and Michigan in northern Michigan.
“Boomers and retirees these days are considering a much wider range of
destinations for retirement, often choosing states that don't commonly come to
mind, such as Maine and Montana,” said Mary Lu Abbott, editor of Where
to Retire magazine. “Yes, the Sun Belt remains popular, but many people
prefer a four-season climate and enjoy the changing of seasons. They seek towns
that are safe and have active, appealing downtowns and good hospitals nearby,
and increasingly they're looking for places with a lower cost of living and lower
overall tax rate.”
Maine doesn't have a low income tax rate and housing prices are high in Camden.
But the town fits the bill in most other regards, drawing more and more retirees
over the years, many of whom have some previous connection to the town, spending
summers or vacations in the area.
Smaller, far-flung places aren't for all retirees, of course.
They can have long, cold, snowy winters and high housing costs. Many are remote,
even isolated. Public transportation often isn't available, and doctors can be
in short supply in the more rural locales.
Some have a shortage of cultural opportunities, good restaurants and part-time
jobs.
Different people have different ideas of retirement, said Leigh Smith, who moved
to a Camden retirement community with her husband, Ron, from the Boston area
in 2003. While Smith and her husband moved to Maine for retirement, a cousin
of hers wasted no time moving away from Maine, to Florida, when he stopped working.
“You think, my goodness, why would you retire to Maine? It's snowy, icy,” she
said. “But the winters here, I have found, are better and milder than Boston.”
The idea of going to Florida didn't appeal to the 66-year-old Smith because of
the humidity, crowds and hurricanes. She likes that life here has a slower pace
but that there's still plenty to do.
“It's like the 1950s here,” she said. “People trust each other.
People don't lock their homes or cars, although we do because we're from Boston
and it's ingrained.”
She and her husband like that they can walk to downtown, that performance centers
and museums are nearby, and that people are active around here — be it
walking, biking, kayaking, boating, hiking or volunteering their time for community
groups. It's also important that a hospital is located nearby and there's bus
service from town when they want to go to Portland, Boston or New York.
With baby boomers now reaching retirement age, they're looking for places that
are walkable with good restaurants, volunteer opportunities and perhaps college
courses they might be able to take, said David Savageau, author of “Retirement
Places Rated,” now in its seventh printing. They're also looking for places
with familiarity, where they've visited on vacation or perhaps spent summers
as a child.
For many retirees nowadays, the idea of a “golf kind of idle recreation” retirement
associated with Florida isn't appealing, he said.
“That's the old view of retirement,” Savageau said. “And it's
kind of dying out, the desert Southwest and South Florida. That was for our parents;
for us it might be somewhere closer to home, a college town, a ski resort or
a historical area that gets some kind of tourism in season.”
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Metropolitan News Company, Inc.
