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Baby Boomers May Opt For Communes (Again)

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I didn’t ever live in a commune. I visited a few in the 1970’s in California, Massachusetts and Vermont. But the lifestyle just didn’t do it for me. A bit too cozy?  Too “hippy”? Too smiley? Too many vegetables? Who knows. But, it did occur to me recently that people over, say 60, could actually start to think through the benefits of communal living to share costs, space and to connect. As many people realize, it gets harder and harder to connect once you’ve gotten past college, having kids in school and even moving around the country. It is simply more difficult to make close friends.

So, when I saw the article “Baby boomers may opt for communal living again” I did a Huh! Like, why not?

The article points out that we are witnessing a significant societal shift: millions of people are heading to 65+ (10,000 turn 65+ every day), they don’t live near their kids and they want independence. But, that independence does not have to mean living alone (or, oh shit, in a retirement home.)

Baby Boomers said that they were going to change the world. Well, they are: “By force of sheer volume, the (baby boomers) who in 1968 thought they would change the world by 2028 actually will,” said Andrew Carle, founding director of the Program in Senior Housing Administration at George Mason University in Fairfax, Va.

What might I want in a communal experience?

Scenario 1: I see myself living in a tropical land (Chiang Mai Thailand?; San Miguel de Allende Mexico)  in my own cabin in a chain of cabins that share communal services. Food, gardening, media…. brains, conversation, who knows.

Scenario 2: I live in an apartment in a large house in Brooklyn’s Williamsburg. This one is a bit more about intellectual stimulation.

The bottom line is that my buddies and I could share some universal services, living costs and laughs. Sure sounds better than moving into Happy Acres Nursing Home.

 

 

 

 

Are Bernanke And The Fed Killing Baby Boomers Via Low Interest Rates?

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It is very hard for most of us to remember the days when your savings could safely grow via double digit interest rates. In the 1980’s you could generate 18%, in the 1990’s 8%. Today? How does 1.05% for a 1 year CD sound?

18% wow. Hey, if you had just $200,000 in savings you would have generated $36,000 per year in cash and add that to say $25,000 in Social Security and you could live real well in Mexico on an annual income of $60,000. I know you can do math. But, I like this one. if you had $1,000,000 in retirement savings then your bank or bond would send you $180,000 per year. Now we are talking France.

Today? Nada baby. Assuming a 2% rate of inflation you are way screwed if you have moved a good chunk of you dough into under 2% yielding fixed income securities. You are running a negative program.

Could the Fed’s monetary policy be killing people? All I know is that suicides by Baby Boomers 65+ is on the increase.

How I Wrote And Published My First Book In Three Months: Length

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I am not a writer. Well, I was (I have been writing business related documents and white papers for years) and wasn’t (as in an eBook or “real” book writer) until I committed to writing a book (actually at least two non-fiction books per year.)

Back to not being a writer. One of the issues I had to deal with was how long of a book to write. I needed a target to to have some sense of when I had what I would consider a book-length manuscript. I am not super prolific and believe strongly that most people do not need the 250-page non-fiction book. In fact, according to Kindle statistics, yes Amazon knows abut your reading habits, most people don’t finish their business books (see “Your E-Book is reading You” from the Wall Street Journal.) Frankly, I think that most non-fiction can be a bit word-padded (I just made that term up) to get to a marketable page count to satisfy traditional publishers. Once upon a time, I even thought that I would create a series of short books under a form of imprint related to attention deficit disorder. Imagine, “ADD Books.” Books for the millions of the unfocussed.

Back to length. There are no rules. However, research indicates that most fiction books seem to fall into the following range: Books are about 60,000 to 125,000 words or 200 to 500 pages at 250-350 words per page. Most fiction starts at about 80,000 words.

However, non-fiction books run the gamut and can be much smaller. My favorite non-fiction, especially for business books, tends to be punchier and designed to be quicker reads (think of Seth Godin.)

“Boomercide”, my non-fiction book, is topping out at about 20,000 words or 80 to 90 pages at 6”X9”. This works for me as the book is intended to be very direct. No fluff. I am trying to get to the point.

So, how long should a book be? Depends… as usual.

 

 

 

How I Wrote And Published My First Book In Three Months: “Why”

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Decide Why You Are Writing Your Book.

If it’s to get rich, you better look elsewhere. Sure, you might become the next Tim Ferris. But, it ain’t that easy.  Bowker, the company that issues ISBN numbers, more on this later, estimates that they will issue 15,000,000 ISBN numbers for individual books in 2012.

Your odds? 15,000,000 : 1. Maybe less as many books are simply garbage.

OK, so despite this competitive headwind, I decided to write a book. Why? Two reasons.

First:

I did some my-life scenario planning. I considered what I’d like to be doing in a couple of years and thought that it would be great to maintain my home-base in Portland but be able to have a very portable means of generating income while traveling around the world. Writing, combined with the growing ease of self-publishing and expanding eBook market, looked like a plausible path. Now, I am not oblivious to the fact that this won’t be easy. But, I think that if I apply my marketing background to writing books I should succeed.

Second: I think that I have a very compelling proposition for my first book. I am going to commit suicide to help add some control to my financial planning; I’ve picked the date and how to do it. My book, Boomercide: From Woodstock To Suicide, covers this journey, my view that I am not going to be the only Baby Boomer to do this (Baby Boomer have the highest suicide rates) and the details of the subject of suicide. Additionally, I am a 30-year marketer and know how to do my research and apply it to a rich subject. My smartest friends, strangers and some book editors have vetted the book’s premise.  All think that Boomercide is a powerful subject.

Now you:

Why DO you want to write? I recommend really getting this objective-driven rationale down so you can really focus. Hey, writing can just be for fun. Maybe you’ve had that idea in your head for years and want to get it down on ePaper. Maybe you really want to launch a writing career. Maybe you want to leave something for your kids and grand-kids. Maybe you see the value in writing a book to polish your personal brand to help your career. There are lots of reasons. But, be clear about this and then just start typing.

Everyone is going to approach the act of writing differently. People with full-time jobs have to go to work; dads and moms have to take care of the kids. Finding the time is hard. That said, find it and get going. It feels great. And, your friends will envy you.

There is lots of advice on the web — start here at Joanna Penn’s site The Creative Penn — about how to attack a writing project. Go Google and drive yourself crazy. But, just start and devote whatever time you can. Maybe its time to give up the NFL or Ellen or even Yoga for awhile. Yes, stop and feed the kids but get going on your eBook.