Retirement complexes

seven-day-weekend

It was the net curtains and manicured gardens that put me off, plus my husband said there was no-where to put his motorbike. I also don't think the residents would have taken kindly to all our visitors, nor my husband having his rock music practice with his friend, in preparation for their Open Mic night.

Maybe in twenty years Certainly not now, in our 60s. We are too young!!

margaretclare

No, I didn't like being patronised, that was the main thing. There was a lot of emphasis from the saleswoman on 'we find that older people feel insecure, need the security of being able to have their TV on all the time and see who's coming to see them'... We don't feel insecure. We can usually see who's at the door, from the front window, and we don't feel at all threatened.

At the time these were fairly new in that locality and many of them went unsold for a long, long time. I agree with 7DWE. We didn't feel ready to buy into that 'older people's lifestyle' and we still don't. Maybe we never will! If we ever do it's much more likely to be somewhere like the first place I described. I think it's called Millview Court. It's very close to the little town centre which still has most things that you need. However, it's 'social housing' so I don't know how we'd get into that.

Blue_Max

AgeUK recently published a report based on the experiences of residents:

"Making it Work for Us"
"A residents’ inquiry into sheltered and retirement housing"

This in depth inquiry and report can be downloaded from
http://www.ageuk.org.uk/professional-resources-home/policy/housing/inquiry-into-retirement-housing

Well worth a read!

Owain_Moneysaver

margaretclare wrote: »

The crunch came when we asked about allotted parking spaces. One to every 4 apartments. 'Oh we find that older people have mostly given up driving...'

Parking spaces aren't profitable. They use up land and cost money to tarmac.

I bet they didn't say how much it cost to rent the guest suite either.

mumps

I have a friend who lives in a McCarthy and Stone place, she loves it. Personally i would hate it. She said to me one day that as my OH was over 55 we could move into one. At the time my two youngest were still at school so I thought that might be a bit of an issue.

seven-day-weekend

mumps wrote: »

I have a friend who lives in a McCarthy and Stone place, she loves it. Personally i would hate it. She said to me one day that as my OH was over 55 we could move into one. At the time my two youngest were still at school so I thought that might be a bit of an issue.

I personally cannot understand why anyone who is still young would want to bury themselves in a little enclave of elderly people.

Still, each to their own.

This is an affordable development in an area we would love to live in (can't afford to buy anything else there):
http://www.rightmove.co.uk/property-for-sale/property-26430151.html

But we are just not ready yet, maybe when we are older

mumps

seven-day-weekend wrote: »

I personally cannot understand why anyone who is still young would want to bury themselves in a little enclave of elderly people.

Still, each to their own.

Well we are all different and that is good but I agree with you it isn't the sort of place I would want to live. I think I will struggle to adjust, because I had my youngest two fairly late I seem to mix with younger people, even now I feel more at home on the school run with my grandchildren than mixing with people my age. I sense trouble ahead.

beedeedee

seven-day-weekend wrote: »

It was the net curtains and manicured gardens that put me off, plus my husband said there was no-where to put his motorbike. I also don't think the residents would have taken kindly to all our visitors, nor my husband having his rock music practice with his friend, in preparation for their Open Mic night.

Maybe in twenty years Certainly not now, in our 60s. We are too young!!

Are we married to the same man ??

seven-day-weekend

beedeedee wrote: »

Are we married to the same man ??

:eek:I wondered where he went when he goes off on his cycle for hours!

margaretclare

Owain_Moneysaver wrote: »

Parking spaces aren't profitable. They use up land and cost money to tarmac.

I bet they didn't say how much it cost to rent the guest suite either.

No, they did not! And we didn't get to the stage of wanting to 'haggle' as suggested above, because we were not that serious about the idea. We were just curious, wanted to know what it was all really like. I know it crossed my mind that the one-bedroom apartments would be far too small, even for one person! and the 2-bed apartments...well, for a quarter of a million quid we could have found somewhere much more to our taste.