Retirement Lifestyle

Waikiki Beach

I've had many people ask me how I can live in a 600 square ft. condo.  Here are my short answers:

1. It's in Hawaii and it's paid for.
2. We probably won't live here for the rest of our lives.
3. We want to travel while we're still healthy and a condo is easy to close up and leave at a moments notice.
4. We have a great view of Pearl Harbor and the Arizona Memorial.  I feel lucky and grateful when I look out the window each day.
5. I'm not spending my retirement years cleaning and/or repairing a large square footage home.
6. We refurbished it to our liking and we love the location.

People waiting for Friday night fireworks to start

Another question I'm often asked is how can we afford to retire in Hawaii since it's so expensive.  Let's break it down into the most expensive categories:

1. Housing - Our condo is paid for.
2. Utilities- Hawaii has one of the highest utility rates but once again, living in a smaller space means smaller utility bills.  We run our air conditioner often and our utility bill is about $100.
3. Food- Yes food is expensive since almost everything is shipped to the islands. Luckily we can shop at the military commissaries on the island. We only eat out about once a week and that really helps our food budget go farther.
4. Gas- Gasoline might run $.50-.75 more per gallon, but remember, we are on an island so we don't drive long distances at any one time.
5. Entertainment-Here is an example of our recent Friday night outing.  We had a Mexican dinner at a "mom and pop" restaurant. $27   We then walked along the Waikiki beach and watched the sunset...  Free.  After sunset on Friday night there are fireworks on the beach...Free.  And finally we treated ourselves to ice cream after the fireworks...$3.    After paying our $4 parking fee, our evening out came to $34.00 for an enjoyable night on the town.

Another amazing sunset

There is no perfect place in the world for retiring.  If there was, everyone would move there.  I suggest finding the perfect spot for you. A place where you find yourself smiling a lot and feeling lucky that you found your own paradise.

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Trial Run

In our attempt to retire in Hawaii, we weren't 100% sure if condo living was for us. Perhaps a trial run would be the best way to find out. We knew we couldn't afford a house on Oahu, so our one-bedroom condo that we had been renting out for the past 20 years would become our new home.
 When our youngest child departed for college, we closed up our Midwestern home and headed West… really West. With four suitcases between the two of us we landed in paradise with the big task of renovating our Hawaiian condo. We set a budget and timeline and went to work. All of the demolishing and most of the labor we did ourselves. We hired experts for the plumbing  and electrical work.  During our planning stage, we kept in mind that we are getting older. We switched out all the carpeting to tile, and pulled out the bathtub to make room for a walk in shower.  I think we will be able to age in place, at least for a little while.

Kitchen-before

Kitchen-after

Two months later it was a vast improvement over the rental property it once was. We slowly added more homey touches a little at a time. Since this was the first time living in a high-rise I wasn't sure what to expect, but something like dorm living came to mind. Luckily there were no issues with wild neighbors or unruly children. Within a few weeks I knew this building would serve us well. It is extremely quiet due to quality construction, and no bugs due to living on  the 15th  floor. We have everything we need packed into 600 square feet.  I guess all those articles about tiny home living are true. It is possible to live comfortably in a small space.

 Our building has extra amenities such as the pool, spa, sauna, security, meeting rooms, tennis court and more. Whenever our place gets too cozy and feeling small we can head to the pool to relax.
 This was an expensive year for us since we still had our home on the mainland and all the expenses that go along with it. Once we decided we could live this kind of lifestyle full-time we made plans for selling our house and all of our belongings. Eight months after we started, we headed back to the mainland to wrap up all the loose ends with our house and continue the liquidation process.

Vanity-before

Vanity-after

 Up Next… Downsizing everything!