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jrmanville · 07-29-2008

Aloha,

My wife and I are just beginning to explore the possibility of retiring to Panama and I have a few questions.

We currently own a condo in Kailua Kona, Hawaii and, while it's a very nice place to live, even with the vog, it's also a very expensive place to live. The prospect of being able to live comfortably on $2000 a month(excluding housing expenses) is very appealing to us, assuming this is a realistic expectation. Is it?

My wife would like us to purchase a house that we could convert to solar electricity and reduce our carbon footprint as much as possible. I've seen several homes on real estate sites that could do the trick but I have some questions:

1. The ones that I've seen always seem to have bars on the windows and massive gates. Is crime that much of a problem or are there just certain areas that one wants to avoid?

2. How hard would it be to find a contractor that could do the modifications?

3. Finally, from what I've read to date, there seems to be a requirement in place that any mortgages have to be completely paid off by the time the borrower reaches the age of 75. Is that a hard and fast rule or are there ways around that? If we moved at this time, that would mean that we'd be stuck with an 18 year mortgage and correspondingly much higher monthly payments.

Aloha and mahalo.

07-29-2008	#1 (permalink)
jrmanville Junior Member Join Date: Jul 2008 Posts: 10 Rep Power: 0	Retiring to Panama Aloha, My wife and I are just beginning to explore the possibility of retiring to Panama and I have a few questions. We currently own a condo in Kailua Kona, Hawaii and, while it's a very nice place to live, even with the vog, it's also a very expensive place to live. The prospect of being able to live comfortably on $2000 a month(excluding housing expenses) is very appealing to us, assuming this is a realistic expectation. Is it? My wife would like us to purchase a house that we could convert to solar electricity and reduce our carbon footprint as much as possible. I've seen several homes on real estate sites that could do the trick but I have some questions: 1. The ones that I've seen always seem to have bars on the windows and massive gates. Is crime that much of a problem or are there just certain areas that one wants to avoid? 2. How hard would it be to find a contractor that could do the modifications? 3. Finally, from what I've read to date, there seems to be a requirement in place that any mortgages have to be completely paid off by the time the borrower reaches the age of 75. Is that a hard and fast rule or are there ways around that? If we moved at this time, that would mean that we'd be stuck with an 18 year mortgage and correspondingly much higher monthly payments. Aloha and mahalo.