As I noted on X, we actually knew a couple who did just that, retiring and moving back to the St. Louis area, where their adult kids still lived, and buying a house in St. Charles County. This was in 2007, and they were eager to get back before their grandchildren grew up.
And my own in-laws did something similar, way back in 1997, moving to the same zip code here in Sugar Land, one of Houston's two prime suburbs (the other being The Woodlands). It was a tremendous help having them close to our big family.
So I wouldn't assume all the demographic effects are negative. And being in a safe, low-crime community is another important factor in choosing a place to retire.
Wealthy seniors are a desirable group for local communities. They pay property taxes yet have no children in schools. Their health care is paid by Medicare.
Not if they have anything to say about it! And indeed, in many localities they already receive substantial relief relative to the rest of us.
I'm surprised Aaron didn't link to his earlier discussions about property taxes and the argument among the old to abolish them, at least for themselves. In one of those, I remember getting into a lengthy argument in the comments with people (presumably older) arguing that property taxes for seniors are unfair, since they could result in getting priced out of one's home.
Which I view as a classic high-class problem. And like all high-class problems, it has multiple solutions that still result in the sufferer in question being better off than people without that particular problem.
Yeah, the idea they seniors pay property taxes without consuming services is not entirely supportable. They will undermine your services because they don't want to fund them, and failing that agitate to be exempted from taxation.
I mentioned this in reply to a tweet you had last week. I have several older relatives, including my parents, who have downsized and live in condominium or townhome communities. The living arrangements are nice. These relatives are in nice communities.
Unfortunately, there’s lots of condo board drama and rules. This is increasingly in reaction to the Surfside tower collapse in Florida. Insurance costs and condo association reserve minimums have increased. State laws are being changed. A shock assessment can destroy the value of a condo and force people to move out. The figure can make a property tax increase look like a drop in the bucket.
The condo board itself is sometimes made up of people without business sense or knowledge in construction and maintenance. Litigation between owners is not uncommon. It’s not uncommon to hear of shady business practices with contracts or management. One relative of mine who lives in a condo, a boomer, told me to not buy a condo and stay in a single family home for as long as possible. It was precisely due to the issues they have dealt with in a condo.
I believe this is an underrated issue with older folks buying single family homes over downsizing to a condo or townhome.
Seconded. I bought a condo when I moved to where I live, but only because I knew I'd be leaving in a couple of years. The fees are ridiculous, the drama insane, and the neighbors vary from good to questionable.
I was not surprised at all when I saw that your city council approved the apartment complex once it was restricted to 55+.
Despite the extreme hypocrisy of Ms. Pullmann's comment (the morals of classic rock do not hold up under any kind of scrutiny, and there is a massive spike in STIs among retirees https://medium.com/@troybreiland/the-secret-epidemic-seniors-and-the-new-std-crisis-4aef444e3473), she A. does reflect the prejudices of a large swath of the American population who bother to vote in local elections, which means the officials will be at least sympathetic to the "concerns" of her ilk, and B. Is correct about the 55+ crowd being less disruptive and disorderly than people in their twenties tend to be, although that's more due to a lack of energy than better morals. Crime and drugs tend to be a young man's game.
1968: the oldest boomers turn 22 and move out on their own. The Civil Rights act is enacted and bans housing discrimination.
1995: the oldest boomers turn 49 and start to plan for retirement. Our first boomer president signs the Housing for Older Persons Act, legalizing housing discrimination for 55+ communities.
The Civil Rights Act of 1968 was the one that outlawed housing discrimination. You must be thinking of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 which outlawed other things like discrimination in voting rights, employment, and public accommodations. There have been multiple Civil Rights acts in American History.
Good point. The so-called "Fair Housing Act" was actually contained within the Civil Rights Act of 1968.
But it is still quite a stretch to connect it to the boomers. The act specifically mentions race, color, religion, and national origin, plus (in one section) sex. It was typical of civil rights legislation. How is that specifically connected to boomers?
By its timing favoring them. Nothing against boomers personally, but I do think they have had lucky timing with a variety of historical events (though not all). The idea here is that when boomers were looking to buy/rent, the laws were changed to empower buyers/renters of housing and limit the power of sellers/landlords to discriminate. But then 27 years later when boomers were older, the laws were changed to allow some discrimination, especially discrimination against the young non-boomers. Every housing policy has winners and losers as it balances power between the buyers and sellers of real estate. But boomers got the best of both policies here. No discrimination against renters/buyers when they were young, and then when they were old discrimination against the young was legalized.
The second part makes sense -- age discrimination being permitted -- but the first part does not. There was no discrimination against the mostly white boomers in 1968 that made the Fair Housing Act particularly relevant to them.
I have come across no reference to age discrimination being targeted by the 1968 act. Have you?
Both the "better school district" and the "age restricted" designations are ALSO non-racist, non-judgmental-sounding labels for "people who behave better/will be better neighbors." It is just a fact that the Boomers grew up in a more cohesive, more religious, (and whiter) America and thus have far more prosocial habits than later generations.
Compared to first-and second-generation immigrants/lower classes/later generations, Boomers generally keep their yards well-manicured, do not smoke cigarettes or weed (and let the smell billow outside where the kids play), do not fill public airspace with demonic, filthy, irritating music about raping women, and volunteer for local activities. I as a mom of school-age children would love more neighbors like this and less neighbors like the increasingly antisocial younger generations they are displacing, even though it would drive up property taxes.
Property taxes and home values are a proxy for "non-shit neighbors." I think one of the factors driving both up that nobody wants to talk about is the increase in foreign-born people who don't share basic American habits like not dumping trash into the street (now the norm in Chicago and elsewhere) and younger generations who were not parented by the boomers now using their purchasing power to escape the societal results of their collectively absent parenting.
I'm early Generation X, empty nested. I feel the draw to buying the bigger house in the nice suburb, too. We actually did upsize last year, from a 3BR 2.5BA spec house in a nice suburb with great schools, to a 4BR 3BA condo in the city, albeit in a very nice area. One reason we did that was because we both work from home and wanted nice home offices. But the other reason we did it was that only one of our 7 adult children, ranging in age from 25 to 40, has done well enough to be able to buy a house. It's not for lack of effort, either. The one successful child is in a distant state, so it's not like we're gathering over there on Christmas. The family gatherings are still in our home, and we need space for that. I don't know about everyone else but in my family as the kids bought homes and started to raise families, they took over responsibility for family gatherings. The grandparents could very much downsize because they didn't need to host anymore.
If people want to live close to their children (and other kin) in retirement that's a wholesome trend-- for too long the trend was for older people to move to retirement "paradises" (Florida, Arizona...) and far from family, though the kids and grandkids would have a place to stay if they chose to do a Sunbelt vacation. But why on earth would older people want a four bedroom house? The older I get the less house and yard I want to take care of. The size lots these McMansions are on is not mentioned here but I suspect they may be on mega-lots too, which has also been a (lamentable, IMO) trend. I would think a two or maybe three bedroom house would make a lot more sense with enough of a backyard for a garden and a dog or cat to ramble in. And ideally on one floor so cheaper to heat and cool, and less difficult for aging bodies to get around in.
Interesting observation. Multi-household extended families. All of it depends on a declining sense of home being fixed in time and place. People are increasingly disconnected from the idea of being 'from' somewhere. Home is where the heart is and the heart is usually with our family.
As I noted on X, we actually knew a couple who did just that, retiring and moving back to the St. Louis area, where their adult kids still lived, and buying a house in St. Charles County. This was in 2007, and they were eager to get back before their grandchildren grew up.
And my own in-laws did something similar, way back in 1997, moving to the same zip code here in Sugar Land, one of Houston's two prime suburbs (the other being The Woodlands). It was a tremendous help having them close to our big family.
So I wouldn't assume all the demographic effects are negative. And being in a safe, low-crime community is another important factor in choosing a place to retire.
Wealthy seniors are a desirable group for local communities. They pay property taxes yet have no children in schools. Their health care is paid by Medicare.
"They pay property taxes"
Not if they have anything to say about it! And indeed, in many localities they already receive substantial relief relative to the rest of us.
I'm surprised Aaron didn't link to his earlier discussions about property taxes and the argument among the old to abolish them, at least for themselves. In one of those, I remember getting into a lengthy argument in the comments with people (presumably older) arguing that property taxes for seniors are unfair, since they could result in getting priced out of one's home.
Which I view as a classic high-class problem. And like all high-class problems, it has multiple solutions that still result in the sufferer in question being better off than people without that particular problem.
Yeah, the idea they seniors pay property taxes without consuming services is not entirely supportable. They will undermine your services because they don't want to fund them, and failing that agitate to be exempted from taxation.
Short-term, sure, but what happens when they die?
I mentioned this in reply to a tweet you had last week. I have several older relatives, including my parents, who have downsized and live in condominium or townhome communities. The living arrangements are nice. These relatives are in nice communities.
Unfortunately, there’s lots of condo board drama and rules. This is increasingly in reaction to the Surfside tower collapse in Florida. Insurance costs and condo association reserve minimums have increased. State laws are being changed. A shock assessment can destroy the value of a condo and force people to move out. The figure can make a property tax increase look like a drop in the bucket.
The condo board itself is sometimes made up of people without business sense or knowledge in construction and maintenance. Litigation between owners is not uncommon. It’s not uncommon to hear of shady business practices with contracts or management. One relative of mine who lives in a condo, a boomer, told me to not buy a condo and stay in a single family home for as long as possible. It was precisely due to the issues they have dealt with in a condo.
I believe this is an underrated issue with older folks buying single family homes over downsizing to a condo or townhome.
Seconded. I bought a condo when I moved to where I live, but only because I knew I'd be leaving in a couple of years. The fees are ridiculous, the drama insane, and the neighbors vary from good to questionable.
I was not surprised at all when I saw that your city council approved the apartment complex once it was restricted to 55+.
Despite the extreme hypocrisy of Ms. Pullmann's comment (the morals of classic rock do not hold up under any kind of scrutiny, and there is a massive spike in STIs among retirees https://medium.com/@troybreiland/the-secret-epidemic-seniors-and-the-new-std-crisis-4aef444e3473), she A. does reflect the prejudices of a large swath of the American population who bother to vote in local elections, which means the officials will be at least sympathetic to the "concerns" of her ilk, and B. Is correct about the 55+ crowd being less disruptive and disorderly than people in their twenties tend to be, although that's more due to a lack of energy than better morals. Crime and drugs tend to be a young man's game.
1968: the oldest boomers turn 22 and move out on their own. The Civil Rights act is enacted and bans housing discrimination.
1995: the oldest boomers turn 49 and start to plan for retirement. Our first boomer president signs the Housing for Older Persons Act, legalizing housing discrimination for 55+ communities.
You can't make this stuff up.
The Civil Rights Act was in 1964. So, yes indeed you can make this stuff up.
The Civil Rights Act of 1968 was the one that outlawed housing discrimination. You must be thinking of the Civil Rights Act of 1964 which outlawed other things like discrimination in voting rights, employment, and public accommodations. There have been multiple Civil Rights acts in American History.
Good point. The so-called "Fair Housing Act" was actually contained within the Civil Rights Act of 1968.
But it is still quite a stretch to connect it to the boomers. The act specifically mentions race, color, religion, and national origin, plus (in one section) sex. It was typical of civil rights legislation. How is that specifically connected to boomers?
By its timing favoring them. Nothing against boomers personally, but I do think they have had lucky timing with a variety of historical events (though not all). The idea here is that when boomers were looking to buy/rent, the laws were changed to empower buyers/renters of housing and limit the power of sellers/landlords to discriminate. But then 27 years later when boomers were older, the laws were changed to allow some discrimination, especially discrimination against the young non-boomers. Every housing policy has winners and losers as it balances power between the buyers and sellers of real estate. But boomers got the best of both policies here. No discrimination against renters/buyers when they were young, and then when they were old discrimination against the young was legalized.
The second part makes sense -- age discrimination being permitted -- but the first part does not. There was no discrimination against the mostly white boomers in 1968 that made the Fair Housing Act particularly relevant to them.
I have come across no reference to age discrimination being targeted by the 1968 act. Have you?
Hopefully, this will be good for birthrates. Grandparents = free, trustworthy childcare.
Both the "better school district" and the "age restricted" designations are ALSO non-racist, non-judgmental-sounding labels for "people who behave better/will be better neighbors." It is just a fact that the Boomers grew up in a more cohesive, more religious, (and whiter) America and thus have far more prosocial habits than later generations.
Compared to first-and second-generation immigrants/lower classes/later generations, Boomers generally keep their yards well-manicured, do not smoke cigarettes or weed (and let the smell billow outside where the kids play), do not fill public airspace with demonic, filthy, irritating music about raping women, and volunteer for local activities. I as a mom of school-age children would love more neighbors like this and less neighbors like the increasingly antisocial younger generations they are displacing, even though it would drive up property taxes.
Property taxes and home values are a proxy for "non-shit neighbors." I think one of the factors driving both up that nobody wants to talk about is the increase in foreign-born people who don't share basic American habits like not dumping trash into the street (now the norm in Chicago and elsewhere) and younger generations who were not parented by the boomers now using their purchasing power to escape the societal results of their collectively absent parenting.
I know more boomers who smoke (tobacco or weed) than I do people my age (58) or younger.
I'm early Generation X, empty nested. I feel the draw to buying the bigger house in the nice suburb, too. We actually did upsize last year, from a 3BR 2.5BA spec house in a nice suburb with great schools, to a 4BR 3BA condo in the city, albeit in a very nice area. One reason we did that was because we both work from home and wanted nice home offices. But the other reason we did it was that only one of our 7 adult children, ranging in age from 25 to 40, has done well enough to be able to buy a house. It's not for lack of effort, either. The one successful child is in a distant state, so it's not like we're gathering over there on Christmas. The family gatherings are still in our home, and we need space for that. I don't know about everyone else but in my family as the kids bought homes and started to raise families, they took over responsibility for family gatherings. The grandparents could very much downsize because they didn't need to host anymore.
If people want to live close to their children (and other kin) in retirement that's a wholesome trend-- for too long the trend was for older people to move to retirement "paradises" (Florida, Arizona...) and far from family, though the kids and grandkids would have a place to stay if they chose to do a Sunbelt vacation. But why on earth would older people want a four bedroom house? The older I get the less house and yard I want to take care of. The size lots these McMansions are on is not mentioned here but I suspect they may be on mega-lots too, which has also been a (lamentable, IMO) trend. I would think a two or maybe three bedroom house would make a lot more sense with enough of a backyard for a garden and a dog or cat to ramble in. And ideally on one floor so cheaper to heat and cool, and less difficult for aging bodies to get around in.
Interesting observation. Multi-household extended families. All of it depends on a declining sense of home being fixed in time and place. People are increasingly disconnected from the idea of being 'from' somewhere. Home is where the heart is and the heart is usually with our family.