<p>Our idea is to buy some property on the water soon, preferably with access to the ocean (intercoastal), and eventually build on it, buy some watercraft (motor, wind, and muscle powered) and enjoy nature.</p>
<p>My plan ha ha…is to work until the year after DD graduates from college when I will be 59. During that year, I will use my salary to pay off all of both kids’ stafford loans. The total equals less than one year of what I’m paying for tuition. Then I’m replacing my kitchen countertops, and going on a BIG vacation. Maybe I’ll take my kids along. All of my appliances will probably die that year too. I’ll also work part time, and DH (who married an “older woman”) will continue to work for an additional 10 years. Then we’ll sell this big house and move to NC.</p>
<p>Here’s the new plan I just came up with a few days ago:</p>
<p>I plan to save an extra $30,000 per year in order to pay off the mortgage (now at ~$150,000) in five years. Then I’ll work for a few more years in order to re-do the bathrooms, do some landscaping. THEN – probably at around age 66 or 67 or so – I’ll retire, kick back, and learn Spanish and how to sail.</p>
<p>This is a different plan than before. THAT plan was to sell this gigantic house and move into smaller quarters. Turns out I really want to stay in this town, and there ain’t no smaller quarters to be had that are worth moving to!!</p>
<p>We’ll probably cash in our home equity, buy a house somewhere we love with a lower cost of living, and travel. H will retire for the second time, and I’ll probably retire, too–or maybe work part-time, being more choosy about my clients.</p>
<p>We will own our house in eight, and it has a lot of equity. Give us a couple more years after that to get the youngest through college, and then??? H and I think the cost of living is outrageous here, and we’d love to think of going somewhere else, but all our friends, contacts, everything are here. The COL and weather are true negatives, but there are a lot of positives too. Most likely we will end up going somewhere warm for a couple months in the winter, but not relocating there.</p>
<p>Keep the house, buy a new car, travel and hopefully have some grandkids one day to dote over. I have worked underpaid for a non-profit most of my life…not doing the peace corp in my retirement… but D is thinking of it, so there will be family representation:)</p>
<p>They’re not going to send you to a country where you do not speak the language. The Peace Corps do a ton of background checking and things like that, to make sure you are qualified.</p>
<p>Hi soozievt,
I did realize that not all graduate programs fund their students, but that part stayed in the back of my brain and didn’t come out in print. 
We (and S) realize that he/we is/are quite lucky.</p>
<p>dank08,
Actually, you can be sent to a country where you don’t know the language. </p>
<p><a href=“http://www.peacecorps.gov/index.cfm?shell=learn.howvol.topques#question2[/url]”>http://www.peacecorps.gov/index.cfm?shell=learn.howvol.topques#question2</a></p>
<p>Do I need to speak a foreign language?
No. Knowledge of a foreign language is not a requirement for Peace Corps service, as the Peace Corps provides language training. However, knowledge of French or Spanish will help qualify you for programs in certain regions.</p>
<p>A young person I know who was in the Peace Corps was sent to a very remote part of Africa and had to learn the obscure local language in order to communicate with the people who live there.</p>
<p>Yes, many volunteers must learn indigenous languages and go to remote areas. The PC provides volunteers with 3 months of language and culture training in the host country before their stint starts, that’s why the commitments are 27 months, I guess. The programs for older volunteers apparently take into consideration that foreign languages generally are harder to learn at older ages.</p>
<p>My aunt joined the Peace Corps after she divorced my uncle. She was sent to Thailand. I’m quite sure she didn’t speak Thai until they trained her!</p>
<p>I’m expecting to be working for quite a while after kids graduate from college.</p>
<p>There are some places you can work in the Peace Corps where English is spoken. My brother was in the Peace Corps in Jamaica after he obtained his law degree. Yah Mon.</p>
<p>Peacecorp sounds like a wonderful idea.
We haven’t thought about retirement. We still have a least 10 yrs till the youngest would be done with undergrad.
We already live in a place where people long to retire. I think we will stay. I do think about downsizing in house to something cute with a picket fence. I know my kids all hope to one day settle back in town so grandchildren would be nice.
I would like to travel.
Husband is already planning on playing beach volleyball till the day he dies. He already has made the switch to working more hours at the end of his day and getting in a few hours of ball each noon. We are self employed but feel like we have made good plans for the future but my spouse will have to continue to work some unless a child takes over.
Momof2inca my sibling has worked for Ca governments for her entire career and has the wonderful option of retiring early with full salary. Hope your husband is so lucky.</p>
<p>mom60, that’s so funny about your H playing beach volleyball! Young at heart, for sure! Too cute.</p>
<p>H won’t be able to retire with anything near his full salary, more like 40-50 percent, after 25 years. But we have simple tastes and definitely want to downsize from our current house and move into something small and easy to care for, after we finish volunteering abroad and traveling, that is. A couple we know just retired last month and are doing something neat. They plan to spend 6 months of every year in China, volunteering to teach teachers how to be more personable with their students and more creative rather than relying on rote methods and even beatings (!). (They’ve been volunteering in this way 3 or 4 weeks every summer for years). Then they will spend 3 months visiting one of their children in Georgia and three months in Canada with another child. They are keeping their Calif. house but renting it out while they do this. Eventually, they’ll move back to town permanently, I think.</p>
<p>well all I can say is I thought I was young when I had kids- but we wont have both through college till I am about 56. Who knows when it will be paid for!</p>
<p>However- I think I will either become a [what can I say?](<a href=“Vedder Daily — LiveJournal”>http://community.livejournal.com/vedder_daily/</a>) stalker, but if I can’t convince my starter husband to be part of my disguise I will dump him and become a [url=<a href=“http://www.ritagoldengelman.com/]nomad[/url”>http://www.ritagoldengelman.com/]nomad[/url</a>]</p>
<p>* no I am not really gonna be a stalker— I don’t think I can be a nomad either- I don’t really travel well* :p</p>
<p>My post-tuition plan? </p>
<p>Solvency!</p>
<p>H plans never to retire…he has no use for free time. He’s antsy by the end of a three-day weekend. I can’t wait to pay off DS’s tuition so I can retire. I’d like to go to Smith as an Ada Cromwell scholar. Maybe DS will pay MY tuition bills…a mom can dream.</p>
<p>I found the nomad book while searching for the other book in the local library. It was interesting read. No I don’t plan to dump my H anytime and vice versa. H & I function as one person, we’re a team. I can see close, he can see far. His hearing is fine, but not his memory. My hearing is not as good, but I have a good memory. My D was joking the other day, if she needs something done then she needs to tell both of us, otherwise it won’t be done.( because Mom is hard of hearing, Dad can hear but forgetful).:)</p>
<p>I’ll be 59 by the time the last of 3 are done with college. By then the house will be paid for. We’ll definitely trade down. But we’ll then have to figure out if we to live. We’re not that far along in our planning yet.</p>
<p>This article piqued our interest about high end mobile homes. The article mentions a retired couple who split their time between 2 of these homes: <a href=“http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/06/20/HOGGJQH0B41.DTL&type=homeandgarden[/url]”>http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/06/20/HOGGJQH0B41.DTL&type=homeandgarden</a></p>