Thursday, July 15, 2004

Retired and ready to move

Since writing this blog I have read a lot of ‘research’ about where people close to retirement, want to spend the next stage of their lives.

Back on the January 24 there was a posting about the lemming like desire of Brits to receive their first pension payment and cross the channel and live in Spain or France. The Centre for Future Studies predicted that over the next 10 years an extra 2.3m people, over 50, will be leaving Britain to retire abroad and that the proportion of UK retirees living overseas could hit one in five by 2020.

A bit latter in the year (June 16th) a research study was released by the UK’s biggest insurer, Prudential saying that nearly a quarter of Britons approaching pension age say they aim to retire overseas.

More recently I was speaking at a conference with Professor Richard Webber, the originator of geodemographics and the builder of the ACORN and MOSAIC neighbourhood classification systems. He believed there was a strong link between retirement and holiday locations. Because of the UK’s abysmal weather (yes, it is raining at this very instant in London) most sane people have headed to the sun for their holidays, so I guess this does a lot to explain the popularity of France and Spain.

Some research has just been released on this same subject about the US market.
The study was conducted by MetLife in coordination with AARP Health Care Options. This is the link for the full report. The main conclusions were:

People close to retirement, the population between 50 and 65, say adult retirement and 55-plus communities are second choices to remaining in their own homes during retirement.

86% of those surveyed said aging in their own homes would be their first choice, respondents also indicated interest in other retirement living options.

Apartments for those 55 and older and communities where people can live independently but have access to special amenities would rank next in their list of choices.

22% of the sample was interested in building a new home to share with friends that included private space and communal living areas. Interestingly, more women (27%) than men (17%) were interested in this idea.

I still believe there is a big difference between being interesting in moving and actually doing it but what all of these bits of research show is that there are going to be a lot of people moving when they are 50+. Now, just think of the marketing opportunities that presents. Dick Stroud: www.20plus30.com

No comments: