It's early January, 2000. It's raining out (what else?), and my cup of tea and I are sitting down to pay the bills. I come upon a renewal notice for "Golf for Women", and mechanically begin to write out the check. "WAIT!" My subconscious says to me, "why are you doing that? You won't be here to read it! You're going on a year long trip, remember?" And so the serious decision making of preparing for "The Trip" begins. At first the tasks seemed almost overwhelming. So many things to think about-it's enough to make you cancel the whole idea before you get started! But with that first small step of not renewing subscriptions, came a torrent of activities and checklists over the next 6 months.
The first big decision we had to make was what to do with the house. Since we still have a mortgage to pay, that decision was a major factor in the budgeting process. Once we decided that we could probably lease it furnished to a visiting Executive or Professor, we had a major portion of the ongoing expenses covered. We knew that renting it unfurnished was not a preferred option, as the cost to store our goods, including getting them to and from storage, would be about $8000 - about ½ the cost of leaving the house empty for a year - plus all the hassle and risk of renting it on top of that. We even considered selling the house, but we both love Charbonneau, and wanted a place to come home to next summer. So staring in March, we put together a marketing plan that included all the major businesses in the area, all the Colleges, Relocation firms, local realtors and other local businesses here in Charbonneau. We built a website with pictures of the house, and put together a nice color flyer about the house. We made calls, had an open house, and followed up every possibility. We were rewarded with just the right couple in early May. Thanks Don Perkins.
The second big consideration was the cars. Do we keep them and store them, if so where, or do we just eliminate the expense (payments, insurance, a year's worth of depreciation, etc.) and buy back a couple of cars when we return. For us, we decided "they're outta here!" You may remember from last month's column, we have purchased a 19' self contained Van that is fully outfitted for all the necessities of life. We consider it a large car, not an undersized motor home! Neither of us was comfortable with the idea of driving one of those "big rigs" - and there are a lot of places you can't go with them. We wanted the freedom to be able to go pretty much where we wanted, without that additional consideration.
Since we also have rental houses, my Mom to check in on, and a brother whose affairs we handle, we needed someone to manage those responsibilities. Graciously, our daughters decided they could take care of those things for us. We always knew those girls would come in handy one day! Our mail will be forwarded to one daughter, who will decide what, if anything, to forward to us (only our November ballots so far!). She will keep what we need for our records, and pitch the rest. She can forward anything we need to General Delivery in any small town down the road about a week ahead of us. Everyone says it works great, as long as you pick a 1 post office town!
With the biggest impacts on monthly expenses dealt with, we then turned to what it was going to cost to travel for a year. After talking to a lot of people, we came up with what seems like a realistic budget, and it really isn't any more than we spend currently to live here (remember, we have eliminated most of our monthly ongoing costs). We'll see how accurately we predicted all this. We've even remembered to include things like birthday presents, cards, souvenirs, postage, a trip home by air at Christmas, and haircuts along the way. Our ongoing prescriptions will be filled along the way, and any non-emergency medical and dental needs will be dealt with at Christmas when we're home-we already have the appointments!.
The final pieces of the puzzle were mostly solved with technology. Even just a few years ago, we couldn't have considered some of the technologies that we will be using. This column is written on a laptop, which we will be taking, along with a small printer. We can email the column to KC, along with pictures taken with our new digital camera. We are putting the finishing touches on a web site (www.home.att.net/~retirement_lifestyles) that friends, family, grand kids and others who are interested, can access to see what's going on. They can leave us e-mail, see our pictures, or even pick up their phone and call us on our cell phone - a local call for them from this area. We are changing to one of the nationwide cellular plans with no roaming, no long distance, and are adding voice mail for when we are away from the phone - just like home! We can manage our stocks, pay our bills, transfer money around, send and receive faxes and catch up on the news, all through the Internet. Most larger RV Parks now have some type of phone access-some even have it right at the space. Since we plan on staying in motels about half the time, we can also access the Internet and email from those locations. Our Internet provider has local numbers all over the country, as well as an 800 number for other locations.
By the time you read this, we will be on our way to our first major stop, the US Open at Pebble Beach. We were fortunate enough to get 4 tickets for the whole week in the USGA lottery, and traded two of them for a condo in Carmel for the week. Should be a great event. From there, our route will be generally across the Northern states this summer, New England in the fall, down the Eastern seaboard, home for Christmas, and back across the Southern and Midwestern states next winter and spring. Will we see you on the road somewhere?