DOWNSIZING

   Articles

Couple find novel way to downsize after 45 years in the same house Instead of leaving the books, old candelabras, collections of seasonal table linens, Mali baskets and Tibetan singing bowls — among mounds of other treasures — to be picked over by strangers at an estate sale, this aging couple decided to take a different approach to the onerous predicament of modern overabundance.– PhildelphiaInquirer.com

Don’t Need to Downsize Yet? Great. Start Now  Pre-downsizing pays off for a wide range of reasons: strategic, physical, emotional, and financial. Here are eight of them… – NextAvenue.com

Over 60: Why Own When You Can Rent? In 2017, renters who were 60 or older made up 27 percent of the New York City’s rental population, a 20 percent increase over the previous decade. And senior renters outnumbered senior homeowners in Manhattan, Brooklyn and the Bronx, as is the case for renters in general. They even outnumbered those in the under-34 demographic, if only by half a percent. – The New York Times

Moving to a Smaller Home, and Decluttering a Lifetime of Belongings The amount of goods a couple can accumulate over 44 years living in the same house can be overwhelming. And that is what Wendel and Carolyn Thompson, of Columbia, Md., have been grappling with since January as they prepare to leave their split level and move to a retirement community this month. – The New York Times

Getting While the Getting Is Good As just about everyone who has cared for an aging parent knows, getting old is both an inexorable and maddeningly unpredictable forward march. Everything is OK. Then it’s not. Then it is again. What felt early on like a roller coaster becomes the new normal. In between swerves and plummets, it is almost possible to doze off.— The New York Times