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Where to Live Next: The Framework Nobody Gives You · After the Rush Podcast

• 0:01
  SPEAKER_00: I have a legal pad on my desk with three town names circled on it.
• 0:06
  SPEAKER_00: And underneath them is a question I have crossed out and rewritten a few times.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_00: Not where should we retire.
• 0:14
  SPEAKER_00: I crossed that one out first.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_00: I don't believe in retirement.
• 0:18
  SPEAKER_00: I believe in pivots.
• 0:20
  SPEAKER_00: And I wasn't about to write a word I don't use.
• 0:24
  SPEAKER_00: Not where it's cheapest.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_00: Cross that one out too,
• 0:29
  SPEAKER_00: though I'll admit the tax comparison spreadsheet is still open
• 0:33
  SPEAKER_00: on my laptop three feet away.
• 0:36
  SPEAKER_00: What's left?
• 0:38
  SPEAKER_00: The fourth version?
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_00: The one I finally let stand is this.
• 0:43
  SPEAKER_00: What do we actually need to be near?
• 0:47
  SPEAKER_00: That's what this episode is about.
• 0:50
  SPEAKER_00: Not the map, the question underneath the map that most people never stop long enough to ask.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to After the Rush.
• 1:06
  SPEAKER_00: I'm Catherine McDowell.
• 1:08
  SPEAKER_00: If this is the first episode of mine you've ever landed on, that's fine.
• 1:13
  SPEAKER_00: You don't need the ones before it to follow along.
• 1:16
  SPEAKER_00: Come in, sit down, we'll catch you up as we go along.
• 1:22
  SPEAKER_00: My husband found me at the kitchen table on a Wednesday night
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_00: with three highlighters and that particular look on my face he has learned to read
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_00: as trouble.
• 1:32
  SPEAKER_00: He asked what I was doing.
• 1:34
  SPEAKER_00: I told him I was figuring out where we might want to live next.
• 1:39
  SPEAKER_00: He asked which of the three towns I was leaning toward.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_00: I told him I didn't know yet because I hadn't figured out what I was actually trying
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_00: to solve for.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_00: He is 10 years further into this chapter than I am,
• 1:55
  SPEAKER_00: which means he has already made this decision once badly and made it again better.
• 2:03
  SPEAKER_00: He sat down across from me instead of walking away,
• 2:06
  SPEAKER_00: which is usually his way of telling me he thinks I'm about to make something harder
• 2:10
  SPEAKER_00: than it needs to be.
• 2:12
  SPEAKER_00: Sometimes he's right about that.
• 2:15
  SPEAKER_00: Not this time.
• 2:17
  SPEAKER_00: Here's what I mean.
• 2:19
  SPEAKER_00: Google where to retire,
• 2:22
  SPEAKER_00: and you'll get calculators,
• 2:25
  SPEAKER_00: cost of living against your current city,
• 2:29
  SPEAKER_00: property tax by state ranked,
• 2:32
  SPEAKER_00: Median home prices,
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_00: walkability score,
• 2:37
  SPEAKER_00: average January temperature charted against your tolerance for cold.
• 2:42
  SPEAKER_00: All of it is real.
• 2:44
  SPEAKER_00: All of it genuinely useful.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_00: None of it the actual question.
• 2:52
  SPEAKER_00: I ran three towns through four different calculators before I noticed what I was doing.
• 2:58
  SPEAKER_00: One of these calculators told me I could save $400 a month in one town over another.
• 3:06
  SPEAKER_00: And I sat there proud of myself for a full minute
• 3:08
  SPEAKER_00: before I noticed I had no idea what I'd actually be doing with any of my Wednesdays
• 3:16
  SPEAKER_00: in either place.
• 3:18
  SPEAKER_00: I was answering a spreadsheet question with spreadsheet tools and feeling no closer
• 3:24
  SPEAKER_00: to an answer.
• 3:26
  SPEAKER_00: Because the question sitting underneath the spreadsheet was never on the spreadsheet
• 3:31
  SPEAKER_00: to begin with.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_00: The calculator will tell you what a place costs.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_00: It will not tell you what a place is for.
• 3:42
  SPEAKER_00: And the tax spreadsheet is,
• 3:44
  SPEAKER_00: in fact, is still open on my laptop right now because I'm not saying throw it away.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_00: I'm saying it isn't first.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_00: And for most people, it's the only thing they run.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_00: I have a friend,
• 4:04
  SPEAKER_00: and I'll leave her name out of this because she didn't sign up to be
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_00: in this segment,
• 4:09
  SPEAKER_00: who bought a beach house,
• 4:11
  SPEAKER_00: did it right by every conventional measure,
• 4:14
  SPEAKER_00: sold the big house up north,
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_00: bought a smaller one two blocks from the water,
• 4:19
  SPEAKER_00: Joined the beach walking group by her second week.
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_00: She has a gorgeous kitchen, good light.
• 4:27
  SPEAKER_00: She sends me photographs of sunsets that would make a stock photo agency weep with envy.
• 4:34
  SPEAKER_00: She also flies back for her granddaughter's soccer season because you cannot watch
• 4:40
  SPEAKER_00: a nine-year-old's Saturday morning games from 600 miles away,
• 4:45
  SPEAKER_00: no matter how good the light is at your new address.
• 4:49
  SPEAKER_00: A season that used to mean 40 Saturdays on the sideline now means 4 if the flights line up.
• 4:58
  SPEAKER_00: She flies back for her cardiologist because after 30 years he knows her chart better
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_00: than the folder does.
• 5:06
  SPEAKER_00: She wasn't about to start over explaining her history to a stranger with a new set of forms.
• 5:13
  SPEAKER_00: She flies back for her sister's Sunday dinners,
• 5:16
  SPEAKER_00: which happen every week,
• 5:18
  SPEAKER_00: whether she's at the table or not, and which she now misses roughly half of.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_00: None of that showed up on her cost of living calculator.
• 5:30
  SPEAKER_00: The calculator told her the truth about the mortgage.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_00: It told her nothing about the granddaughter,
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_00: the cardiologist, or her sister's kitchen table, because those aren't line items.
• 5:43
  SPEAKER_00: They're the actual infrastructure of a life,
• 5:46
  SPEAKER_00: and infrastructure has a way of not showing up on paper until it's already gone.
• 5:53
  SPEAKER_00: I know another couple who did the opposite,
• 5:56
  SPEAKER_00: moved two towns over from their daughter specifically so they'd be close to
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_00: the grandchildren,
• 6:01
  SPEAKER_00: and found in a year that they'd traded away
• 6:05
  SPEAKER_00: the entire community they spent 30 years building For a proximity to family,
• 6:11
  SPEAKER_00: that mostly meant babysitting on short notice and a dinner invitation twice a month.
• 6:18
  SPEAKER_00: The wife told me she loves being near the grandkids,
• 6:22
  SPEAKER_00: and also in the same conversation,
• 6:24
  SPEAKER_00: that she hasn't made a single new friend since the move.
• 6:28
  SPEAKER_00: Because at this age,
• 6:29
  SPEAKER_00: you don't make friends the way you did at 30, over a fence or in a break room.
• 6:36
  SPEAKER_00: You make them slowly over years through the same book club or the same church committee.
• 6:42
  SPEAKER_00: And she'd left all of that 30 minutes down the highway.
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_00: Closer isn't automatically better.
• 6:52
  SPEAKER_00: It's just a different set of costs.
• 6:54
  SPEAKER_00: And most people never sit down and actually name what they are before they sign the papers.
• 7:01
  SPEAKER_00: I've watched a version of this play out from the other direction too.
• 7:06
  SPEAKER_00: Someone who stayed exactly where she was for a decade past
• 7:10
  SPEAKER_00: where everyone around her assumed she'd move and got asked at every holiday whether
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_00: that was bravery or stubbornness.
• 7:19
  SPEAKER_00: It was neither.
• 7:20
  SPEAKER_00: It was a decision she actually ran the numbers on,
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_00: her own version of this framework before I ever gave it a name.
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_00: And she knew precisely what she'd be giving up if she left,
• 7:33
  SPEAKER_00: down to which neighbor watered her plants when she traveled.
• 7:39
  SPEAKER_00: I want to be careful here,
• 7:41
  SPEAKER_00: because I'm not telling you nobody should move for a beach house,
• 7:46
  SPEAKER_00: or the grandchildren, or anything else.
• 7:48
  SPEAKER_00: Plenty of people move and it works.
• 7:52
  SPEAKER_00: Plenty of people stay exactly where they are and that works too.
• 7:57
  SPEAKER_00: What I'm telling you is that the research on this,
• 8:00
  SPEAKER_00: and there is research, keeps landing somewhere the brochure is never mentioned.
• 8:07
  SPEAKER_00: The general still being sorted out finding across studies of well-being
• 8:13
  SPEAKER_00: in later life is that proximity to people more than proximity
• 8:19
  SPEAKER_00: to amenities tracks most closely to how satisfied people report being with
• 8:25
  SPEAKER_00: where they've landed.
• 8:28
  SPEAKER_00: Some of that work looks at daily social contact,
• 8:32
  SPEAKER_00: some of it looks at loneliness measures over time,
• 8:36
  SPEAKER_00: and none of it agrees on exact numbers, which is exactly why I won't hand you one.
• 8:42
  SPEAKER_00: What it agrees on, broadly, is the direction.
• 8:47
  SPEAKER_00: People near their people tend to report doing better than people near their views.
• 8:55
  SPEAKER_00: That's a pattern, not a guarantee.
• 8:58
  SPEAKER_00: And it doesn't hold for every person or every family.
• 9:03
  SPEAKER_00: Some people are genuinely restored by solitude and a good view.
• 9:08
  SPEAKER_00: And I'm not here to talk anyone out of that if it's exactly true of them.
• 9:14
  SPEAKER_00: I want to say plainly that this is my own reading of the material,
• 9:19
  SPEAKER_00: filtered through my own experience, navigating it with my own family.
• 9:23
  SPEAKER_00: Not a prescription for your particular chart of relationships and needs.
• 9:28
  SPEAKER_00: Your judgment about your own people, in the end, matters more than any study I can hand you.
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_00: Here's where the industry gets this wrong.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_00: The reinvention version of this conversation tells you that the move,
• 9:46
  SPEAKER_00: wherever you land, is your chance to become someone new.
• 9:51
  SPEAKER_00: New town, new self, blank page.
• 9:54
  SPEAKER_00: I understand the appeal.
• 9:56
  SPEAKER_00: I have felt the appeal.
• 9:58
  SPEAKER_00: There's something genuinely thrilling about arriving somewhere as nobody
• 10:03
  SPEAKER_00: in particular and building an entirely new version of yourself from the ground up.
• 10:08
  SPEAKER_00: The way a novel starts on page one.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_00: I don't believe it though.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_00: And here's why.
• 10:15
  SPEAKER_00: You are not a blank page at 55 or 62 or 71.
• 10:21
  SPEAKER_00: You are a person with four decades of Sunday routines,
• 10:25
  SPEAKER_00: a specific way you take your coffee,
• 10:28
  SPEAKER_00: a specific handful of people who would notice if you disappeared,
• 10:33
  SPEAKER_00: a body with its own particular history,
• 10:36
  SPEAKER_00: and its own doctor who already knows what your numbers usually run.
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_00: Reinvention asks you to set all of that down at the property line and start fresh.
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_00: Design asks a different question entirely.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_00: Design asks what you already have that's worth building around
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_00: and what you're finally free to change because it was never actually load-bearing in
• 11:02
  SPEAKER_00: the first place.
• 11:05
  SPEAKER_00: Where to live next isn't a reinvention question, it's a design question.
• 11:11
  SPEAKER_00: And design questions have a structure.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_00: If anyone ever bothers to hand you one, which most nobody does.
• 11:21
  SPEAKER_00: So here's the framework.
• 11:23
  SPEAKER_00: I built it at my own kitchen table because I got tired of running the wrong numbers.
• 11:28
  SPEAKER_00: First question, what can't move without real cost?
• 11:34
  SPEAKER_00: Not preference, cost.
• 11:36
  SPEAKER_00: Your cardiologist of 30 years is a cost
• 11:40
  SPEAKER_00: If you leave him.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_00: Your church, if it's the one that walked you through your mother's funeral, is a cost.
• 11:50
  SPEAKER_00: The physical therapist who finally solved your shoulder problem
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_00: after four other people couldn't, that's a cost.
• 11:58
  SPEAKER_00: Name the things that are genuinely expensive to replace,
• 12:03
  SPEAKER_00: not the things that are merely inconvenient to replace.
• 12:07
  SPEAKER_00: Those are two very different columns.
• 12:09
  SPEAKER_00: And most people run their whole decisions off the wrong one.
• 12:15
  SPEAKER_00: Second, who can't move without cost?
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_00: And what does it actually look like in hours and holidays, not in feelings?
• 12:27
  SPEAKER_00: If your granddaughter's soccer season runs September through November,
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_00: and you'd see four games a year instead of 40, say that number out loud.
• 12:37
  SPEAKER_00: Don't round it up to, we'll visit plenty.
• 12:42
  SPEAKER_00: 40 isn't four.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_00: Say the real number and sit with it before you decide it's a price you're willing to pay.
• 12:51
  SPEAKER_00: Third, the one people skip because it's the hardest to answer honestly.
• 12:57
  SPEAKER_00: What do you actually do with your days?
• 12:59
  SPEAKER_00: And does the new place support that?
• 13:02
  SPEAKER_00: Or does it just photograph well?
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_00: A walking group along the water is wonderful if you're the kind of person
• 13:10
  SPEAKER_00: who joins walking groups.
• 13:12
  SPEAKER_00: If you're the kind of person who reads for four hours and calls a friend and counts
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_00: that a full day, the walking group is set dressing.
• 13:23
  SPEAKER_00: Build around who you actually are on an ordinary afternoon,
• 13:29
  SPEAKER_00: not who you'd like to become in the brochure version of yourself.
• 13:35
  SPEAKER_00: That's the whole framework.
• 13:37
  SPEAKER_00: What can't move?
• 13:39
  SPEAKER_00: Who can't move?
• 13:41
  SPEAKER_00: What do you actually do?
• 13:44
  SPEAKER_00: Run your three towns or your one town or your decision to stay exactly
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_00: where you already are through all those three questions before you run any of it
• 13:55
  SPEAKER_00: through a single calculator.
• 14:00
  SPEAKER_00: Let me actually do it right now with one of my three circled towns,
• 14:05
  SPEAKER_00: the one with the good tax numbers and a walkable downtown,
• 14:10
  SPEAKER_00: because that's the one my highlighters loved most.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_00: What can't move without a real cost.
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_00: My husband's cardiac team is 40 minutes from our current front door
• 14:21
  SPEAKER_00: and roughly three hours from that town.
• 14:25
  SPEAKER_00: And after his last several years,
• 14:27
  SPEAKER_00: I'm not trading that team for downtown, no matter how walkable it is.
• 14:32
  SPEAKER_00: Column one, crossed off.
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_00: Who can't move without a cost?
• 14:39
  SPEAKER_00: Your younger son is an hour away right now, close enough for a Friday dinner on short notice.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_00: And that town would turn Friday dinners into a twice a year visit.
• 14:54
  SPEAKER_00: I already know I'm not willing to make that trade.
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_00: It took actually writing the hours down for me to admit out loud instead
• 15:03
  SPEAKER_00: of just feeling vaguely uneasy about the whole idea.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_00: What do I actually do with my days?
• 15:09
  SPEAKER_00: I read.
• 15:11
  SPEAKER_00: I walk with one friend in the mornings.
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_00: I write at this table.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_00: I go to my gym group and my yoga classes.
• 15:21
  SPEAKER_00: None of that requires a walkable downtown at all.
• 15:25
  SPEAKER_00: It requires a table and a friend, and both of those already exist exactly where I am.
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_00: So that circled town is crossed off,
• 15:36
  SPEAKER_00: not because the numbers were bad,
• 15:38
  SPEAKER_00: the numbers were wonderful,
• 15:40
  SPEAKER_00: but because it failed all three questions the moment I actually asked them instead
• 15:46
  SPEAKER_00: of admiring the spreadsheet.
• 15:54
  SPEAKER_00: I went back to the pad last night.
• 15:57
  SPEAKER_00: I crossed out nothing this time.
• 16:00
  SPEAKER_00: Under the three circled towns,
• 16:02
  SPEAKER_00: I wrote the three questions instead,
• 16:04
  SPEAKER_00: and I started answering them one at a time in my own handwriting.
• 16:09
  SPEAKER_00: Badly in pencil, because pencil means I can still change my mind.
• 16:14
  SPEAKER_00: My husband asked what happened to the highlighters.
• 16:17
  SPEAKER_00: I told him the highlighters were for a question I don't need answered yet.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_00: Pick up your pencil.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_00: Write the three questions under whatever you've already circled.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_00: See what's actually sitting in those columns before you let the spreadsheet decide
• 16:34
  SPEAKER_00: the rest of it for you.
• 16:40
  SPEAKER_00: If this was useful, get the next podcast delivered straight to you.
• 16:45
  SPEAKER_00: And if you know someone standing at their own kitchen table right now,
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_00: working through the same three towns, send it their way.
• 16:53
  SPEAKER_00: There's a companion piece on the money side of relocating,
• 16:57
  SPEAKER_00: the part where the spreadsheet actually does matter,
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_00: linked in the show notes, along with the rest of what's over at aftertherush.store.