There are some advantages to renting for retirement, especially when it comes to downsizing!

Renting for retirement may be the way to go if you are planning to downsize!

A lot of retirees end up not knowing what to do once they have retired, especially if they have been living in a huge home. Now that they are retired and their kids have left the nest, they are faced with a decision: downsize or go into renting?

Depending on your life experience, the choice may seem obvious, but a lot of us have lived vastly different lives, and what may seem like a no-brainer choice for some may be harder to adopt.

Renting for retirement, in particular, seems like a scary option, especially if you have been living in your own home for a long time.

Yet for many, it may be the best choice in the long run, and more retirees should be looking into this option.

From why it may be the best choice for you when you are downsizing all the way to why it may be the best overall choice for your golden years, we have gathered the top advantages as to why you should consider renting for retirement as opposed to buying another property or keeping the big family house!

Keep on reading to discover them!

Have you considered renting for retirement? Do you want to downsize once you are retired? What are your plans for retirement? Any and all thoughts on the matter, leave them in the comments down below!

1. You can be more at ease when it comes to income.

Let’s be honest: even if you own the home you are currently living in and in which you have raised your kids, there are a lot of surprising costs that may need to be covered.

Even if you have covered the mortgage, maintenance on a big house can come with a lot of hidden costs, which can easily make a dent in your retirement savings.

Not to mention, even if you are downsizing and moving to a smaller home that better fits your and your spouse’s needs, there are a lot of things that could go wrong and could cost you a pretty penny as a homeowner.

Costs in retirement for homes can be extremely unpredictable, especially if you happen to need to do renovations or remodeling if you do not catch something wrong with the property you are buying.

This is why renting for retirement is a great choice if you do not want your property to drain your egg nest. You do not have to worry about impromptu reparations, and you can easily budget and plan your needed income over the course of your lease.

The flip side of renting in this case is that you do not have any control over the lease, and you may have to move a number of times. Depending on your health and income, this may or may not pose a significant issue.

2. You can use it as a temporary solution for downsizing.

Maybe renting in retirement is not actually the lifestyle that appeals to you most. However, once you decide to downsize, between selling your home and finding another one to purchase, you will need to stay somewhere.

This is where renting for retirement comes in handy to help you in a case where you may not be sure about what to do.

Going on to rent as a retiree is a great way to check out the neighborhood you may be trying to move into before you commit to actually relocating there.

Sure, you can vacation somewhere and get a vibe of the neighborhoods, but going somewhere on vacation and living there is a totally different experience.

Renting is going to help you scout out several neighborhoods and places that may appeal to you before you end up buying a new property.

Given how there have been numerous retirees who have downsized and then spent the next few years buying and selling places until they found one that appealed to them, you can skip this costly step.

Try out a couple of neighborhoods and even cities (this method works best for urban areas rather than rural ones) and see which one speaks to your hearts and golden years best! If you do not like a spot, you are not stuck there forever—just until your lease is up!

3. You can generally make the most of a turnkey or move-in-ready rental.

If traveling is included on your retirement bucket list, you may find yourself away from your home for a couple of months a year.

This can pose a problem for a lot of homeowners, and you never know what can happen while you are away if you do not have family around.

You would not find it too comfortable to pay a stranger to come and check on your HVAC system.

This is why turnkey rentals are some of the best options to rent as a retiree who likes to travel. You can easily check a few things and then leave on your vacation without having to worry much about the place.

If you still had your home before downsizing, you would have to take into consideration way more variables before leaving for that 3-month cruise over the winter months to escape the cold.

Truly, if traveling makes up a lot of your retirement schedule, you should look into turnkey or lock-and-leave rental spaces and make the most of them until you decide to settle roots somewhere.

4. You get more time to enjoy your retirement.

Yes, this part of our list may seem strange but believe us, downsizing to rent or just downsizing, in general, may come with a ton of bonuses that will help you enjoy your retirement more.

As a homeowner, you may have a lot of expensive repairs to make, and it may put a stop to a number of your retirement plans.

You may not be able to do certain hobbies or go on a trip you really wanted to, as you are living on a fixed income now and your budget would not allow you to be dipped in for both.

In a rental, you will only have to deal with your landlord and, in the end, use all the money you would have had to use to maintain your home for other, more enjoyable activities.

It may not sound like something that holds much weight now, but later in your retirement, you may have to think twice about this.

If you are wondering what other items are on other retirees’s bucket lists, we recommend that you take inspiration from this book.

5.  You can avoid inheritance drama down the road.

Let us be frank for a moment with you: even if you do not think there will be problems with the inheritance, grief can do weird things to people, especially when the kids lose one or both of their parents.

The chances of there being a lot of drama surrounding your family home if you have more than one kid in the will and if you do not downsize are higher than you are expecting!

If you leave it to be split between all of them, everyone will have a different idea of what they could do with the home; one of them may want to move into it, one could want to rent it, and someone else would need the money.

In times of high stress and grief, you never know what can happen between the relationships in your family, not to mention that it can become a tax burden!

Many assume that leaving a home is better, but in the long run, it will create a lot more problems for your children and can even cause issues between them.

And leaving the physical home is not better than leaving liquid assets, as in terms of taxes, they are both capital assets, so they will be taxed accordingly.

If you are trying to avoid any more problems once you are no longer with them, make sure you consider downsizing and even renting for retirement so that the family home is not a liability!

If renting sounds like what you want to try out in retirement, then you should start to research your favorite towns and states. If you do not know where to look first, we have some of the cheapest cities to rent for seniors here that may just give you the starting point you need!