One of the big issues around retiring is knowing when you’re ‘ready’. David and Nora made their move into a Marian Grove New Release apartment late in 2020 after considering this question for some time!
“We’d known people here for years” says David. “We bought a café at Urunga so we were close by and we used to come and sing here, as well as having friends who moved in to the Village that we kept in touch with.”
“We’d bought a big house in Urunga as well because we had family living with us, and at first it was okay. But then the family moved out, and we retired and started travelling. Well, you had to have someone to come and check on the house, to keep an eye on it …”
“To cut the grass”” laughs Nora.
“That’s right, all the maintenance” David continues “and we were away for eight months visiting the family overseas, so we started thinking that maybe we should look at downsizing, somewhere we could just lock it up and go away.”
David and Nora looked around at various options. “We looked at Pacific Towers and other places, at units, but there was always something we didn’t like. As we got older, we thought maybe we should consider a retirement village but it’s funny, every time you look in the mirror, you tell yourself, I’m alright, I’m not ready for that yet!”
Then Nora became ill and life changed for the couple. “We thought, we need to be somewhere smaller and if one of us is left, then the other one can look after it more easily” says David.” We started looking seriously, but it seemed like everywhere we went it was a two story place, or you had to drive to get anywhere, there was no view and some of the places after you’d paid for it you’d have to spend the rest of your money fixing it up. All the while, the people we knew in Marian Grove were telling us, ‘you should move here’!”
“We knew this new place was being built, but we missed the first open day” Norah says. “So we left it for a while until a good friend in the village brought it up again and we came and had a tour.”
“We had a good look at the display apartment and thought, yes, we could downsize, give the kids everything we were going leave them anyway and fit everything in here “David says. “It was a brand-new place with nothing needing doing, it’s a walk to Toormina to the shops and the Doctor, you can walk down and get the paper and everything else you want is close too, like it was for us in Urunga where we walked everywhere. So we made that decision, we were ready, and we put our house on the market.”
Enter the global pandemic, holding up the whole process, until eventually the couple sold their house and made their move. “We couldn’t be happier” says David. “The assistance from the Marian Grove team during the sale of the house was great- and look at this view. I’ve been down and gotten myself inducted into the men’s shed and we’re going to join the choir when things start up again, but we’ve been so busy I don’t think we’d have had the time anyway!”
“We’ve joined the library too” says Nora.
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