 A Personal Journey Christine
Dixon Although every study and poll about the best places to retire are subjective, some
of the choices are just silly. Anchorage Alaska where it gets to 30 degrees below zero and 20 hours of darkness in the
winter, and a whopping 60 degree summer weather where you suck in ten bugs for every breath? Really, that's
one of your top choices?
Over the
past week I've looked at many sites, and many studies about where to retire. I've come to the conclusion that I don't always
agree with their results because their choices don't coincide with my own evaluations. Yours could be different
too , based on your own personal criteria.
For example,
when my husband and I were looking for the best places to retire for us, we considered many possibilities, retiring on a boat and
sailing the Caribbean. That was short-lived. Living in cramped quarters was frightening. We both need our own space
to keep sane. And having to pay docking fees every time you want to go in to town gets very expensive.
We then
looked at beach retirement here in the U.S. or somewhere in Mexico or Central America. We actually bought a
ticket and flew to Costa Rica to see what it had to offer because we'd been hearing so many positive things about it. We came
back convinced it wasn't for us. I've lived in third world countries, my husband
lived in Asia for awhile. We've seen poverty, and lived without hot water and put up with sporadic electrical outages.
Now that I'm older, I want some place where I don't have to schedule when I wash clothes or dishes. Someplace with all the
modern conveniences like the internet, good cell coverage, paved roads, clean water. Been there done that. No thanks.
And I don't want to have to worry about safety, or the govt taking my property from me.
Still hoping we could live
on a tropical beach we turned our attention to Belize. Most people speak English and you can own property much like you
can here in the U.S. (which is fee simple). Property in Belize and Costa Rica is not as affordable as we thought for
what we wanted...and we really dislike the high condo fees in most places there. That alone will eat up most retirement budgets.
We took the decision of where to retire very seriously and continued to expand the search for our needs
and wants. After more thought, we decided that Mexico might be the best choice for us because we could drive there
(I hate flying anyway). My good friend Elvia Lopez (EXTRA's Mario Lopez's mother. I am the talent agent that discovered him
and got his career going) said we would be crazy to go to Mexico because it had gotten so dangerous.
We were back
to square one. International retirement was out because it's just too far from our family. It's too expensive to go back and
forth, I'd miss the conveniences, amenities, food, and the American culture. Our search was narrowing. We were down to
finding the best places to retire in the U.S.
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Where Should I Retire? The decision. We have lived in many locations, and had both good and bad experiences everywhere like anyone else, but
now it was crunch time. We had to decide what was most important to us, as you will, and which states and
cities came closest to meeting our preferences. We looked at retirement magazines, and online sites with
information on choosing the best places to retire,
and wrote tips for this site so you could apply some or all of my suggestions to your own search.
We
considered several states including Utah, Texas, California, Arizona, Wyoming and Idaho. We discounted the entire
east coast for a variety of reasons. We lived there for a couple of years and although we really loved its beauty
and history, every state except Virginia left us cold. I'm by nature a positive person but actually became depressed
in the winter because it was always overcast gray. I need a lot of light and sun. Even their summers were overcast.
And drivers are very rude.  We kept going over our
list of where to retire and finally, after careful consideration of all of these places, we realized that we always came back
to the same area over and over because it filled all of our requirements. It had the best climate, tons of activities
and culture, lower cost of living, lots of places to shop and dine.
It also had some of the best over 50 retirement
communities, it was close to the mountains which we love, and family.
The decision was made. We chose Arizona Retirement.
And
not just any place in Arizona. We chose one of the fantastic communities in Sun City for the shopping, dining, low crime rate, educational opportunities, clubs, medical facilities, outdoor activities and
more.
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