Retirement Dream: Buy an Island
3 August 2006This post isn’t advice on saving so much as pointing out that it can be much cheaper to have a dream retirement than you think. Case in point: this Kiplinger’s article discusses buying an island to retire on. I would have thought this was unaffordable for most people - but it turns out that if you get one in a lake or in areas such as Maine, you can actually live on your own island for about what a house in California costs - $800,000 to $1,000,000. This isn’t some kind of ideal investment, and if you decide to go live on an island that costs that much obviously it will force you to have more money saved up to keep yourself happily retired, because you can’t “sell down” into a cheaper house.
But it is nice to know that those dreams of living on a ranch or out on a beach somewhere don’t have to be just dreams. And it’s important to remember why you spend all this time on financial planning anyway. It’s about achieving security, but also about securing the lifestyle you want. And frugality isn’t just about cutting coupons or saving on the gas bill - you can hunt around for a cheaper place to retire, too - and still find one that will make you happy.
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