Active Adult Communities

Picking out active adult retirement communities is pretty difficult. After all, the active adult community you choose is probably where you're going to spend the rest of your life. When I was helping my mother retire, things were a lot different. There were not the same number of choices for active adult communities. Assisted living had not really been well developed back them. Basically, you either lived on your own, lived with family members, hired someone to take care of you, or stayed in a nursing home.

Fortunately, as I reach the age of retirement, I can take comfort in the fact that things really have changed. Active adult community resources in this country and around the world are better than they have ever been before. There are more options for retirement in more places than ever before. The key is to figure out what your needs are and what kind of community you are looking for.

There are some kinds of active adult communities that try to model themselves on a vacation resort as much as possible. These retirement communities are good for people who want to enjoy a lot of privacy and live basically the way they've always been living except with more luxury. They have groundskeepers, pools, private apartments, and a minimum of shared resources. Many of them have recreation rooms and events where different people can get together, but the emphasis is on individual living.

There are other active adult communities, however, that take a much more communal approach. In these communities, the goal is to help each other and work together. Many of these have communal dining areas as well as small personal kitchens, so that people can take most of their meals in the company of others but have the luxury of cooking at home when it suits them. They tend to be run in a much more hands-on sort of way. Retirees themselves make most of the decisions about how these communities are run. As a result, many people get to experience true democracy for the first time as part of their retirement.

Another thing to consider with active adult communities is where you want to live. A lot of people like to go to Florida for retirement. It is nice and warm and it rains every evening. For me, however, colder places have always held a certain appeal. That is why I chose to stay right on the east coast in my retirement. I wouldn't give up those icy storms for all the world.