I'm Never Going To Retire

by Bernard Kelly
(Geelong, Australia)

In my professional career - as a consultant to residential property investors (which still continues, thankyou) - my focus was to prep my private clients to have enough for 20-25 years of comfortable retirement.

Now I also met along the way many couples who - for whatever reason - weren't able to commence an investment portfolio, but I always tried to give them guidance.

One of my favourite recommendations was that they should take whatever hobby they have, and convert it into a "profitable hobby".

And that was how my practice as a retirement counsellor began!

Over time I developed a five pillar structure - your health, family & friends, your finances, best place to retire, and your zest for living

I started an online business www.practical-retirement-planning.com
(which isn't very successful because while I write about "retirement lifestyles" the search engines think that I'm writing about "retirement planning" i.e. money). Right now I'm in the throes of deciding to transfer it all over to a new domain name: www.BestRetirementLifestyles.com Feel free to tell me what you think about that.

However, back to my story - I'm Never Going to Retire!

One of my five pillars of a successful retirement (the best place to retire) and I write articles for my business about retiring to a small town or perhaps to what the Americans call a "college town". I like the latter best because, by immersing yourself in a youthful community, some of their zest for living automatically rubs off onto you.

So two years ago we (that's just me and my wife of 45 years - no pets) moved to Geelong, Australia, and downsized.

In anticipation of an eventual old age, we moved to a single level bungalow, built flat on the ground. There are no steps.

And Geelong has a population of 220,000 itself, plus a further 80,000 in the surrounding regional towns. So there is ample recrecational activity, diverse shopping and good health care and hospitals.

My wife has taken to urban farming with gusto, and I continue with my causes - to provide continuing education to the community. At the moment I'm having discussions with two institutions to offer programs that will add additional zest for living for retirees.

One propram is to teach them all how to develop an on-line business via SBI - now renamed as Solo Build It! - and the other is to be the mentor for an Action Learning program - Create Yourself a Job Geelong - based on my experience with profitable hobbies.

So I'm never going to retire. I've had both knees replaced, so I'm hoping that my body doesn't deteriortate too much, too quickly.

And who knows - if I live a clean and healthy life, like a Seventh Day Adventist, I should be a candidate to live at least to 90.

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