In some ways it is breaking our hearts to leave. We intended to live there for good - but my part-time income no longer sufficed, and we ran through our savings fixing it up and then maintaining it, especially when all three of our adult kids (plus a granddaughter plus a boyfriend who was over all the time) who were un- or under-employed were sucking us dry. Then I started thinking about what if there was an earthquake, and that we still had 15 years left on the mortgage which we were not going to pay off anyway, and our taxes went up - and we were having SO much fun RVing, that it just became clear we had to go. And our neighborhood is changing and we don't like most of our neighbors now. And a few other factors.
But after kicking our kids out, they are all doing somewhat better - everyone is employed, more or less. Their housing situations are all very tenuous - renting rooms in other people's houses - the housing and rental market in San Jose is ridiculous. But I really DON'T want to have to leave them, especially my daughter who is facing some surgery soon. And my father, who is 85 and his memory is failing, lives nearby and he's terrified that his ladyfriend is going to ask him to leave and then he will have no place to live (all he has is $1200/mo in social security, and he lives in her lovely condo and helps take care of her), and so we are going to have to plan to take him in in the not too distant future. But in the meantime, we want to travel while we still can.
Unless the housing market crashes while we're traveling, we will not be able to buy back into the area - that troubles me a great deal. I don't know where we are going to end up - I'm trying to be untroubled and footloose about this, but it is hard.
