Why Gen X Isn’t Retiring Anytime Soon

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Change in the terrain, change in mindset. It’s kind of like, you know, that Jimmy Buffett song was it changes in latitudes, it changes in latitudes, something like that. yeah, change in the terrain, change in mindset. Let me tell you what I see going on. It’s kind of giving you a little bit of insight into how I look at the overall economy, the people I speak to.

One of the groups I do speak to is people that are involved in real estate in various different areas around the country. Home buying. How are homes being built? When I talk about how are homes being built? And I’ll talk about I’ll talk about two areas in particular. I’ll talk about where I live right now. I live in South Tampa in the city of Tampa and neighborhood that I live in. am I’m one of the old guys in neighborhood.

one of the old guys in the neighborhood and I love it. I have to come home from gym in the morning, drive extra extra slow, elementary school right around the corner, kids don’t walk into school with their parents. It’s for me it’s I love it. Okay. I love it. I love you know, I can open up my window and I can hear the kids playing outside on the playground, you know, street hockey also that well I love that stuff. Okay. Anyway, neither here nor there.

lot of young families moving here. And let’s just say the homes in this neighborhood are not cheap by any stretch of the imagination. A lot of older homes here and many of get knocked down because they’re over 100 years old, getting rebuilt. And that’s kind of what’s happening all around the city of Tampa. But these are not starter homes. And again, these are young people. These are many of are in their 30s.

might be their second home, but I talk with them and listen, and I also talk with real estate agents. Many of these homes are being bought with help.

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help. Parents are helping a great deal because not many people in their 30s can afford 1.8 over $2 million homes in the city. They’re not all at that price, but a lot of them are. Neither here nor there. Again, same thing. There’s major right now because of Mamdami. It’s not just the super rich people that are leaving New York City.

It’s people that are living in Queens and Brooklyn and other places are moving out to Long Island areas in Long Island. I’m throwing some names out there. Some are going to be familiar. Some are not. Comack, Levittown, various different places where not traditionally known East North or Northport to have very expensive homes. You can’t find them. They’re flying. There’s bidding wars taking place because, again, people afraid of what’s going on in the city.

moving out there. Again, I speak to the people that I know in that area. Same thing. Same thing. These are a lot of younger families moving out to these areas and they’re getting help. They’re getting help and this is happening in a myriad of places around the country. This is what’s happened when housing prices are as parabolic as they are. Kids need help. Let’s talk about change in the train, change in mindset.

I am seeing this more and more. I’m telling you what I see. And again, let’s just say my information’s pretty good. My information’s pretty good. We’ve got clients all over the country, myriad of different businesses, also various different age groups. And one of the groups that we have as well happens to be my generation. Generation X. Yeah, it’s the generation that Washington skipped over us. I guess we were, I don’t know.

We all we’re a little different. OK. Critical thinkers, you know, whatever it may be. Neither here nor there. OK. Generation X parents are. They’re helping our kids out. They’re helping our kids out. And again, it’s it’s what I’m hearing from a lot of people that are in my generation is that, yeah, having kids, they see what’s going on, they see the costs. Many of the thought they were going to retire, many of them that.

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have retired, they been downsized out of their jobs, you know, early retirement, whatever it may be, you know, again, they want to go back to work, they’re going back to work doing consulting, doing other things because again, they see, they see, know, same thing, I’m worried about my kids, I’m worried about my kids, I’m worried about my kids or whether or not they’re going to be able to afford a house, I’m going to have to help them out. It’s different.

The terrain without a doubt has changed. And, you know, inflation has gone parabolic. It really has been warned about it for a while. I didn’t expect housing prices to be at this level. I really didn’t. I thought that they would come down. They’re starting to in some areas. I hope that they correct. But that’s what we’re seeing right now. I think you’re probably more than likely going to see.

as far as demographics here in this country, I think you’re going to see Gen X that very state on much, longer. Much, much longer in the workforce. We had high college costs, but not nearly not nearly like the millennials or Generation Z that, you know, get everything post Obama taking over student loans again that, you know, that all bets were off prices just went absolutely nuts.

and we see the issues that are out there. And it’s a theme that I’m, it’s not a random thing, it’s not an anecdotal, it’s something that I’m hearing on a regular basis. I probably won’t retire. Probably won’t retire. If I do, I’m gonna cut back on the hours or cut back on the days I’m gonna want to help my kids at. That’s what I’m hearing from my people, my generation. And this goes back.

to what I was suggesting, was almost 10 plus years ago when I put on my, I put out my retirement crisis white paper. And again, the things that I said in that white paper were completely the opposite of what Wall Street and other advisors were saying, because they don’t like telling people the truth. They don’t enjoy that. They would rather, blow, again, I’m sorry, blow smoke up people’s ass.

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and make them feel good, rather than tell them what’s real, what’s true. And at that point in time, I was saying, hey, listen, know, many people with the costs that are going on, I said, you know, I talked about building homes with in-law appearance and the financial incentives for doing that again.

my Mediterranean mindset, but there’s nothing wrong with that. Having parents there, to grandparents there, to help take care of your kids, you know, it’s good. Yeah, you gotta run into some problems from time time, but it’s okay, it’s family. You’re supposed to take care of your family. Again, I never really understood that. But that, and also, also thinking about rethinking retirement.

That idea about it 60 total bar 65 bar 67 fine if you can and if you know you can mentally handle that I I couldn’t But I might suggest was just cut back

cut back a little bit, you know, you may want to retire from your first career, but you’ll find something else to do. I don’t care if it’s three days a week and yeah, what are you talking about? I want to go back to three days a week. Thanksgiving week, man. You work Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday, off Thursday, Friday, Saturday, Sunday. You can’t get golfing. You can’t get fishing in over those four days. Work around the house. Sure you can. Sure you can. And guess what? You’re going to have you’re going to have more income. You’re going to be able to help out your loved ones. Again, to me, it’s all.

you know, building up families and family wealth and what you can pass on and do for the future. This is the terrain. It’s a terrain I’ve been talking about that I kind of explained it was coming, but it has shifted. It’s different. And this is what we’re going to see moving forward. Gen X, I don’t see them leaving the workforce and I see a lot of help, a lot of help to younger generations. Watchdogonwallstreet.com.