When you have Hanukah or Christmas dinner with your older parents they might talk about moving where it is warm.

There is a “pull” to move. The pull is usually not driven by a crisis or decline in the older person. They are still able to live in their own home but often just want to relocate where they are warm and don’t  have to shovel snow or put on chains to drive.

 The reality of age hits them and they solve it by moving to a retirement community, like the Villages  in  temperate Florida with an enhanced lifestyle (endless golf courses and places to drink and line dances)__ plus desired social, recreational, or health opportunities. When the move occurs early in late adulthood, coinciding with retirement, it is called the “amenity move.”

This relocation offers an improved lifestyle or home environment for the older adult. Whether it’s the pull of the vacation-style retirement community, warm weather, or reduced house payments and taxes, These amenities pulls the older adult out of his or her existing home and into a new environment.

An example of this is a 65-year-old Wyoming native who wants nicer winter weather or year-round, warm-weather recreational opportunities that a city such as Phoenix, Arizona has to offer. Or a 69 year old couple moves from a large home in New Jersey where they pay high taxes and have freezing winters to a retirement community in Cape Coral, Florida.

These elders have the choice, the ability, the health and the freezing December “ Pull” to move.