Can one greatly bring down the cost of living these days by having enough solar panels installed on a 1800 Sq Ft house to supply most electrical needs? And charge an electric car? I understand there was recently a big fight in Hawaii with the utilities over solar panel installations and the utilities lost.
My goal is get a house on Hawaii and live there 1/2 of each year.
Well, you will save on not having to winterize here. I always recommend that folks have a prolonged stay before deciding they really plan to live in a new location. Vacationing vs long term living in a location can be rather different, especially getting med care, building network if friends/tribe, dining, hobbies, prices, etc. Iâm not thrilled with the AL and SNF places in our state either.
Nice to have choices and be able to divide your time if itâs something you enjoy and can afford. My folks and H had several friends & relatives that rotated among several homes. It worked for awhile for them but some tired if it after awhile.
ShawWife and I just came back from a week in Northern California and have now sublet a place for her to work from Jan-March of next year. Now weâll have to find a place to live. So, weâll be giving the place an extended stay. Weâll get to know it better and see whether we like it there and if so, where we would want to live. It isnât that warm there in the winter, but she doesnât like hot weather and it beats Boston by light years in the winter.
Iâm a fan of Northern CA. Itâs A much more relaxed and more outdoorsy vibe than LALA, IMHO. Good luck wiwith your visit. Iâd probably life somewhere 6-12 months before seriously considering multiplying band moving. I guess its partly that weâre so rooted and happy here, plus have read about and met many unhappy transplants who decided they chose to hastily.
Where in N Calif?
DH says he will never retire. Heâd be one of those folks who comes home and does nothing but eat, sleep and read.
I wouldnât want to move and then have a medical crisis some place where there arenât a lot of resources. OTOH, my expiration date is probably shorter than average, so living large now may not be a terrible idea.
I lived in Davis for three yearsâ1979-1982. Didnât recognize it as the sleepy town I had lived when we visited in 2005. I havenât spent any extended time anywhere except Eugene, Davis and Honolulu (mostly the latter).
Oh that makes me so sad to hear you say that, CD.
Shawbridge,
Iâve had fantasies of finding a cute place in Napa where we could stay for a month or 2, probably in off season, and see the kids, and the rent it out other times. Maybe we could work out a deal 
Iâm just thankful to even be here at this stage.
jym - Maybe in a few years we can get various house swap deals going.
We are in Colorado, but we have a dream to go spend a month or two in Barcelona after we retire. We had 2 days there a few years ago and loved it.
Medical insurance is unhelpful, CD. Even if there is a good hospital where one is visiting, insurance may only cover emergencies in another area or may cover only with coinsurance.
Jym, if we like it, over time we might buy a place but it is on the expensive end of things. We have some friends in the area plus a son, but ShawWife is good at making friends. People are often attracted to us as a couple because I do really interesting work but remain friends with us for many years because ShawWife is so amazing.
Much depends on the policy. We are fortunate that our BCBS PPO insurance covers us at any participating and preferred provider throughout the U.S. Internationally, they will cover at their usual & customary rates OR what is billed minus copay, whichever is lower. We can also fill Rx at participating and preferred pharmacies throughout US. We have had service covered in many states with few glitches.
@shawbridge, so great that you and shawwife are such a great team!
BCBS in AL is strong/dominant. Years ago (late 1990âs) they were able to drive UnitedHealthcare out of the major market (Bâham), but Obama has changed the insurance landscape some. We are covered by BCBS of Texas (company headquarter), which sort of has some kind of âpartnershipâ with BCBS of IL and at least one other state. Not sure when the time comes if BCBS will be our preferred supplement policy after Medicare, or something else.
I agree with @HImom about big network with BCBS.
In HI, BCBS has 75-80% of our market of over 1 million people. Despite the problems folks have with them, theyâre pretty much the only game in town, unless you are willing to have Kaiser as a HMO. Iâve been with BCBS all my life, as have my kids. H has been with them since we got engaged, as I had just deposed the all the OB/GYNs at Kaiser for a very sad medical malpractice case we had, where one of our clients had died. H had been a lifelong Kaiser member prior to that and his sister was as well. They did provide her with excellent care, including oncology care and allowed her 2nd and 3rd opinions. Theyâve come a long way since the 1980s, when our client died.
shawbridge, we have coverage similar to HiMomâs. If thereâs a hospital, itâs covered in one form or another. The scary past is when one is far from a hospital. I climbed Masada three weeks before my heart attack. I can tell you there are NO hospitals nearby â we keep thinking âwhat ifâŠâ I was in a number of places on that trip either sightseeing solo or far from emergency resources (Edinburgh, London, on a train from Prague to KrakowâŠ).
My biggest concern about relocating is replacing my medical team.
When we went to Yellowstone and Mt Rushmore with my folks, I kept thinking how far away and remote the hospitals and other care was and was relieved when we returned to HNL without medical incidents.
Medical resources loom larger as we age. In Korea I would not have wanted to seek out medical care in many of the places we toured.
Iâm currently in an HMO, and outside of the service area only emergency and urgent care are covered.
Iâm switching back to a PPO (which is absurdly more expensive) so that DD has coverage at school, otherwise I have to buy separate insurance for her. Out of network only pays up to 80% though.
Are there ACA plans that have a national network?
Our PPO covered D in LA, CA and S in Arlington, VA with no problems for many years. They also covered our visits to specialists in CO, NY, CA, as well as Rx wherever we needed it and picked it up. I donât know much about ACA plans, but will have to figure out what to buy D, as we donât think sheâll be vertical and able to hold a job in the near future, sadly. On her birthday, sheâll turn 26 and age out of our plan. 
Iâve been chatting with some friends whose nests are starting to empty.
What is everyone doing or planning to do with housing during the early âactiveâ years of retirement? Specifically, as most of us have or are planning to pay off our mortgages by retirement, there is quite a nice sum locked up in our houses.
I happen to love the location of our house and we custom designed and built our house, so I have a great emotional attachment. But it is too big now and will be âtoo biggerâ when our D is away at college. It will be nice for her to come home here, but I doubt that she will want to spend much time here during summers as her interests lie elsewhere and she will maintain few ties here except to family. H and I might take rentals nearer to her.
That said, the prospect of moving more than once (and taking into account all of the services to which we are well accustomed in our community) prevents me from downsizing anytime soon. I am mainly downsizing our possessions so that it wonât be so arduous later.
Does it help you decide if you (1) take into account the % your house equity represents of your assets and (2) do not have to count it as part of your retirement assets?
In our case, the answers are (1) approx 15% and (2) no, we do not count the house.
How is everyone making this decision?
Our house is really not all that large. It is 3 bedroom, 2 bath and about 1200 square feet. We will probably not ADD to it, but probably wonât move from here either. We may get some longer term rentals in the areas where our kids end up sticking around for a prolonged period.
Our house has no mortgage or HELOC and is probably about 15-20% of our net worth, but we do not count it as among our retirement assets and have no plans to ever borrow against it. Possibly if the bank offers a 0% for some months on our HELOC, we MIGHT take advantage of it and pay it off before they will start charging interest, but donât foresee this happening.