You might say I am in early retirement.  That is to say all of my children have left the nest for now, and I have been for many years privileged to be a stay at home mom.  At the same time, my beloved spouse has decided to call it a day from his career.

We are in the throws of finding ourselves and creating new interests.  The first few months for us involved getting ready to downsize our household.  We sometimes enjoyed de-cluttering, cleaning, painting, and fixing our home getting it ready for sale.  Now we have sold our home and are looking for a new adventure.  Our goal is to find a home that is a little less maintenance, but still some – so that we are free to travel without worrying about our home.  We still need room for our kids to visit or stay at any time, – that’s what we are all about anyway.  It would be nice to be close to things that are interesting to us – places to walk, enjoy a coffee, perhaps a beer or glass of wine, visit with neighbours and try some new activities.  All this would be nice, while taking some of the capital in our house and freeing it up by buying a less expensive home, and investing in some other assets for our retirement cash flow.

This is more difficult than you would think, as we are finding many properties in our price range, but they have all been acquired in a property flippers frenzy by people wanting to become Dave and Courtney, or Tarek and Christina.  In our house hunt we have visited a sea of grey.  We have been hoping to find a century home in a small town close to our current home – but their character has been “improved” by covering the hardwood floors with grey laminate, replacing the baseboards and trim with fresh white MDF, and painting the walls grey.  While I love grey walls and white baseboards, when you have seen 20 houses decorated identically in 2 weeks of house hunting, you will understand our frustration.

What is supposed to be a fun adventure for us is getting tiring and frustrating.  Wish us luck!