Retirement Club

Many seniors that are reaching retirement age often make the decision to live in a retirement community. They often find the retirement community setting more appealing than a single family home for a number of reasons.

Residing in a retirement community will cut down or completely eliminate the need to do any home maintenance. Many communities maintain the grounds so the residents can enjoy the surroundings fully.

Most retirement communities’ offer organized activities for their senior residents. Activities can vary widely to appeal to just about anyone’s tastes. Activities can include card games, tennis, swimming, golf, movies nights, dances, seasonal parties, and much more.

I’ll never forget the first time a large brown trout spooled me on the Upper Madison. It was back in the early 1980’s and I’ve been addicted to trout fishing in Montana ever since. Generally, I’ve never shared my secrets and there are some I will just never share because they are uncrowded and I like it that way. Of course some of these destinations take a really fit person to get to, so very few people ever see them. I bet Arch Lake doesn’t see over a dozen fisherman per year, so the fish aren’t real educated.

The first time I hooked up with a really large fish on the Bighorn I was chest high in my waders bobbing down stream after him trying to keep up before he blew past my backing. This was in the early 1990’s and the river had just re-opened after years of closure by the Crow Indians and the fishing was absolutely nuts. Back then it was our secret, today it is everybody’s secret. So, you ask, where are some of the other great places that aren’t as well discovered? Here are a few in south central Montana near Red Lodge, Montana, one of the best Montana real estate secrets left. In fact it is one of the very best mountain real estate and vacation properties left anywhere in the country.

Frank Zappa made slight notoriety in a 1970’s song, “Moving to Montana soon, going to become a dental floss tycoon” and I’ve been here ever since. There are not many Western adventures that I have not tried at this point from Arizona all the way up to British Columbia. I’ve participated in heli-skiing, summiting big peaks, mountain biking Sun Valley and Moab, fly fishing most of the big rivers, windsurfing Hood River, and all sorts of various and sundry mountain sports.

Did you buy real estate in Aspen in the 1950’s? How about Park City, Utah in the 1970’s? You’d be pretty darn happy if you did. Many of these destinations have seen twenty to one hundred fold levels of real estate appreciation.

This begs the question: Where is the next undiscovered gem in the Rockies that might become the type of real estate investment that Jackson, Vail, Aspen and Park City once were? In todays deepening recession it is likely that lower cost alternatives will move to the forefront as Americans take a more conservative approach to investing.

People that purchased real estate in Jackson, Wyoming during the 1970s and 1980s are dancing a jig today. That is because this southern entry community to Yellowstone National Park has seen real estate prices rise twenty-fold, or more, as some of the nations wealthiest individuals purchased real estate in the area. The same is true of Aspen, Vail, Park City, and many other Rocky Mountain resort locations.

Rocky mountain resort real estate spun out of control over the past several decades, so much so that all you can do is here M.C. Hammer singing, “Can’t Touch This”. Enter Red Lodge, Montana – you can touch this. Why? Well, because it is affordable and contains all of the recreation you go to all of those other overpriced places for.

This may come as a shock to many people, but after a lifetime of working, Social Security retirement benefits do not provide enough for most people to live on, especially if they plan to continue their previous standard of living. In order to maintain their quality of life, they will need something to supplement the Social Security retirement benefits they earned during their lifetime.