Passing Thanks: When to Give Your Possessions to Loved Ones

By Anne Gill, guest blogger

We all know Thanksgiving is a time to give thanks and gather with friends and family. For seniors looking to downsize, it’s also a perfect time to pass on meaningful possessions or purge unwanted paraphernalia.

“Many of us live in homes with an attic, basement and one-to-two levels of living space, not to mention a shed in the backyard,” says Margit Novack, president of Moving Solutions, a senior move management company. Tack on 40 years of living in one dwelling, and the thought of excavating these spaces becomes overwhelming.

Moving in Your 70s Doesn’t Have to Be Scary

By Sarah Koons, guest blogger

Moving is intimidating! There’s so much to do — arrangements to make, what to give to children or others, things to pack — and that’s all just to get stuff out the door. When you add arthritis, aging knees, and muscles that just can’t lift as much as they used to, it’s easy to see how putting off moving quickly becomes the simpler option. However, moving in your 70s doesn’t have to be scary, difficult or inconvenient. Thanks to proactive retirement communities and specialized moving companies with compassionate services, moving has never been easier for seniors.

Most of us have been there before: you start the daunting task of packing when suddenly four hours have passed and all you have to show for it is a renewed realization that going through a lifetime of possessions is an enormous job. Fortunately, there are professionals who have made it their career to assist with situations exactly like this. Beth Wenhart from Carolina Relocation and Transition Specialists is one such person. Ms. Wenhart said, “We understand that this is an overwhelming and emotional process. Having an experienced professional to walk through the process with you makes it much less overwhelming.”

Once everything is packed up and ready to go, there is also the physical move that needs to take place. Businesses like Carolina Relocation and Transition Specialists offer turn-key services that make the process painless. Those services include planning what can fit in your new space, helping clients decide what to take with them (plus taking care of the things left behind), packing, moving, unpacking and settling into your new home.

Ms. Wenhart recalls moving a client from her home of 40 years soon after her husband passed away. “They had traveled extensively together and collected many beautiful things in their travels. These ‘beautiful things’ all reminded her of happy times and how much she missed her husband. She was afraid that this relocation was going to force her to give up most of those things. By working with her to learn the items that were the most important to her, and with careful layout of her new space, we were able to incorporate many of her treasures into her new home,” said Ms. Wenhart. “The day before the move she was in tears about leaving her home, but when she walked into her newly set up apartment the next afternoon she gasped and said, ‘Oh, it is so beautiful. It looks like home.'”

While moving can be an intimidating task, it’s encouraging to remember where you are going. Senior communities like Springmoor Life Care Retirement Community boast many exciting amenities and modernizations that can make life more comfortable. Leah Holdren, marketing coordinator at Springmoor, reassures seniors considering moving that there are many advantages in moving to a new home. “You can pick the paint you want for your new apartment and make it look like home. We know it’s stressful, but we work with moving companies and can tell you what will fit and what won’t,” said Ms. Holdren. At Springmoor, they have a hair salon, physical therapy center, movie theater, salt water pool and more for residents to look forward to when they arrive.

While at first thought moving may be upsetting, relocating in your 70s can be delightful! To make the easiest transition, make sure not to wait until the last minute. “Come to us while you are still able, so you can enjoy all that a retirement community has to offer,” recommends Ms. Holdren. Ms. Wenhart agreed by saying, “Don’t allow your apprehension about this type of move to prevent you from going forward. Postponing the relocation until you are a little older tends to make it more difficult.” 

Besides, this could be the opportunity you’ve been looking for to finally have a movie theater in your own backyard … and have someone else do the cooking!

A Quick Temperature Check for Seniors

By: Ann Burnside Love

In the natural climate wherever we’ve lived much of our lives, most of us have developed opinions on which temperatures are comfortable, which are tolerable and what’s miserable. We’re also aware of how these varying climates affect our health and lifestyle. Some of us, me included, have become extra-sensitive to temperature extremes, and therefore try to avoid them.

Many retirees are aware of the benefits of a residential living community — where you no longer have to shovel snow, clean snow off your car, drive through ice and storms to the doctors’ offices, grocery stores or on shopping errands.

Myth-Busting: “It’s less expensive and more financially secure for me to stay in my current home.”

One concern that never seems to go away, no matter our age, is saving money. We worry about saving to buy a house, saving to send our children to college, saving for the dream vacation, and eventually, we worry about having enough in our savings to carry us through retirement.

According to a survey of older Americans done by Age Wave, a research and consulting company, it may seem like moving to a continuing care retirement community isn’t a fiscally sound decision.

Seasonal residents: Now they’re here, now they’re away

By Ann Burnside Love

The new lady in the apartment next door moved in, then disappeared. Six months later she returned. Seems she owns a summer home in Maine where the community requires residents to be there for six months a year. Her brood is large, and each family loves to come there for a couple of weeks every summer. But there would be gaps if no one were in residence continuously.

Actually, she’s due back from her second and what she said would be her last summer away for six months, because she’s too tired to keep it up. So when she sold her house in our area, she established her new home in our senior residential community so it would be ready and waiting for her at all times. This is her permanent home.

The Dumbest Thing I Actually Worried About Before Moving

By Ann Burnside Love

It had to do with something I’d never lacked before and truly valued above much else. Actually, I felt guilty that I was even thinking about this possibility, but so it was.

Separately, I was happy and excited about the apartment I’d chosen. I was practical enough not to really worry about the actual moving process, once my daughter and I planned it down to the tiniest detail. A lot of the important-to-me worry stuff was being taken care of — having to do with possessions I was passing along to the next generations.

My oversize recliners, comfortable and beloved by all, went to No. 2 Son and his family, my piano to No. 3 Son whose young family loved music. The round dining room table and chairs, with carpet, went to No. 1 Son’s family. And the capacious mahogany buffet from my late husband’s family went to my daughter, along with a selection of the china, silver and linens that lived within. Then the whole family, including grown grandchildren, got to choose a share of the lovely things left throughout the house — bargaining with each other so politely I was stunned. My concern about fairness was resolved.

But when all that was settled, I was still left with inside-the-churning-brain worry, the dark kind: I was entering a group of a couple hundred people. Would I be comfortable with the established residents and they with me? I knew a few, but just acquaintances. Would there be people with whom to converse, think aloud, learn from … and laugh?

Like Living on a Cruise--Only Better!

By Ann Burnside Love

This attitude I can understand: Many people liken living in a senior living community to being on a cruise ship. Your meals are provided in a beautiful dining room, there’s an array of entertainment from concerts and shows to speakers on all sorts of subjects, and holiday celebrations, all of which — differently from a cruise — you may invite family and friends without also arranging for their travel!

What's it really like, those first days?

By Ann Burnside Love

For weeks I‘d imagined the scene: On my first full day as a new retirement community resident, I would leave my pile of boxes and go down in the elevator for lunch, and walk the curving hall, with big windows overlooking the lovely pond with fountains and water lilies, to the dining room entrance. Study the lunch menu in the lighted case for the first time, then walk into the dining room and find a seat. By myself. Surrounded by examining eyes.

I’ve been on my own for a lot of years: Decades ago, as a young widow, I founded a little marketing company that grew way beyond anyone’s expectations. Traveled the country to clients alone, been in professional meetings with total strangers. Circulated and made new acquaintances in crowded rooms. Eaten in lots of restaurants alone. Confident and independent, you bet. But now it would be different. I would be a newcomer, no longer in charge. This entrance …

Do I Stay, or Do I Go?

By Ann Burnside Love

One might have thought that I, of all people, would not have hesitated when it was time to move into a retirement community. As the founder of a senior living marketing company, I’d visited scores of communities, led the planning and fulfillment of their marketing needs, and along the way written tens of thousands of words about them.

So I knew very well how to recognize when it was decision-making time for myself. That didn’t mean I would decide, of course. (“I’m not ready yet!”) Oh yes, I knew the decision-making and moving drills very well — and how to advise others! However, my whole background had made me, shall we say, very independent.