Barbara Corcoran - Nextville: Amazing Places to Live the Rest of Your Life

Authors Note: The book includes the authors opinions based on their research and experience. The authors believe that the information in this book is accurate as of September 1, 2007. The authors and the publisher are not affiliated with the companies whose services are referred to in this book, do not endorse or sponsor any such services, and are not responsible for any such services.

Copyright 2008 by Barbara Corcoran Inc.

All rights reserved. Except as permitted under the U.S. Copyright Act of 1976, no part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed, or transmitted in any form or by any means, or stored in a database or retrieval system, without the prior written permission of the publisher.

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First eBook Edition: April 2008

ISBN: 978-0-446-53617-2

Barbara Corcoran smartly recognizes that retirement is a dirty word for break-the-mold boomers. She dishes out inspiring advice on where and how to fabulously live the latest stage of your life.

Bonnie Fuller, author of The Joys of Much Too Much

Whether youre just toying with the idea of moving, considering a second home, or seriously ready to relocate, dont make a final decision without first reading this book.

Barbara Stanny, author of Secrets of Six-Figure Women

An incredible how-to guide... to find that next dream home in that perfect-for-you community, and it shows you dont have to be wealthy to do so!

David Caplan, entertainment journalist

Barbaras book is essential! You wont want to put it down and when you do, you will run to the Realtors office.

Guy Doc Holliday, CEO, USA Elite Technology

This book is dedicated to the three best men in my life:

My dad, who taught me the joy of living in the moment.

My husband, Bill, who brought me the joy of unconditional love.

My son, Tom, who gave me the joy of being his mother.

Forget Florida!

Why Everything You Thought You Knew About Retirement Has Changed

I believe its out there. Somewhere in this world, theres a place where youre meant to be. This book is about helping you find that very special placewhere you can do what youve longed to do and become the person youve always wanted to be. Where you can begin the glorious next act of your life.

The urge to seek out the place where you belong is nothing new. Restless souls have been on this journey forever. It has made us explore, settle in new countries, build whole new worlds, and then try to find our way back to the old country again. It has led people out West to California and down South to Florida. It happens on a smaller scale, too. Within the city of New York, people are constantly moving. They move from Brooklyn to Manhattan, go uptown, then downtown, east, west, and then back to Brooklyn again. Ive spent most of my life in the wacky world of real estate, and its been downright mind-boggling to watch so much movement and so many territorial shifts. At first glance you might think that theyre dictated by how much money people have and how much houses cost. But theres more to it than that. People can always find a bigger place in the town where they already live. They move to that next place because theyre searching for something morea place where they can do a better job of living.

The quest to find the perfect place takes on even more importance as you reach a certain stage in life. For some of us that stage is age fifty; for others its forty; and today for many of us its even younger. But Ive found that the exact number makes no difference, because its defined by your mind-set more than by a figure. Its the age when we each start to think, seriously think, about something more than today or tomorrow or even next year. Its the age when we start to think about the rest of our lives.

Many more people are thinking about this right now than ever simply because so many baby boomers are rapidly approaching the time in life we used to call retirement. Just think: every eight seconds, one more lively boomer turns sixty.

But our generation is approaching the next stage in life differently. As it turns out, were just not the retiring typesnever have been and never will be. We dont even like to use the word. Retirement suggests that youre on your way out, that your usefulness is over. But unlike our parents before us, we believe were just getting started at this age. Its almost as though all of life before this was just a means to get us ready to go on to the next great thing. So instead of retiring, its more like graduating.

But graduating to what? And where? These are the two big questions for all of us, and as we answer them in the coming years, therell be another mass movement of people. Different people, different ages, different circumstancesbut all with one thing in common: we need to find our next great place.

Thirty years ago I arrived in New York City, a twenty-something Jersey girl hoping to find myself in the big metropolis. New York looked to me like a city that loved change, and it transformed me the moment I set foot there. New York would prove to be where I would discover my potentialthe place I was truly meant to be. This was my first lesson in the power of place: by finding the right place, I could start to build the person I really wanted to be. This same lesson was reinforced many times in the years that followed because in my new job as a real estate broker I would help thousands of other people find the place where they truly belonged.

A dozen years later my little start-up company would become one of the most successful brokerages in the country, bringing me a ton of money and a lot of fun. But for me, the real measure of my successthe one thing I would always take the most pride inwas my innate ability to match up the right person with the right place based on his or her unique needs and personality. This, I learned, is the guts of the real estate business. I had to really listen as people told me where theyd been and where they hoped to go, and over time I came to see the clear connection between our dreams and the places we choose to live. I began to understand that places and dreams are always joined at the hip.

And so I truly believe in the transforming power of place. I believe that when you go to a new placewhen its the right placeyou have permission to start over, to do things you couldnt or wouldnt do before. In short, you have an opportunity to meet the better you. Its never a cure-all, of course, because we often bring our emotional baggage with us when we move. But the new place at least lets you make a clean break with your old patterns of day-in, day-out living. It gives you a chance to shake your life up and reopen your eyes to see the world afresh.

Im totally defined by where I am. When Im in a place with energy and lots of color, surrounded by people I love, I feel I can accomplish anything! I also feel comfortable enough to do nothing at all. Place is always at the center of my life. Every one of my happy memories is tied to a specific place, and if I try to separate the experience from the place where I lived it, the memory simply dissolves when the context is gone. The same is true when I dream about tomorrowmy vision needs a frame in the form of a place, and without it, I cant picture my dream. So I believe that if you want to make a dream come true, you first need to find the right place.