Has anyone on board had to make the decision to stay in your existing home or move to another home? My husband has Parkinson disease and dementia and other health issues. We both are 65 years old. We live in a 2 story home where all of the bedrooms are on the second floor. With his health, I feel eventually we both need to have our bedrooms on the 1st floor. He wanders at night getting up several times at night going to the bathroom. We have been comparing the cost of adding a bedroom on the 1st floor, but, it is costly. The value of the homes in my neighborhood is down due to the original owners moving out and renting out their homes, short sales of homes, foreclosure, therefore, they are not up keeping their homes. When I look at the cost of the addition, which will make the value of my home more than what the houses are selling for in my subdivision. I looking around at different houses and the thought of moving makes me uncomfortable too, to start all over again. We have been in our home for 20 years. I just wanted to see if anyone out there had to make the decision to stay in their home or move. If so, how did they decide what to do?
In your situation, I would also be concerned about starting over, but rather in a positive way - no more stairs to climb, less area to clean, beginning with a clean slate and hopefully no older house issues to address.
Two things I absolutely will have in my next house are an attached garage and laundry facilities on the first floor. I'm tired of lugging wet laundry upstairs to air dry (reduces my energy footprint).
And it wasn't until this last winter that loading and unloading the car became uncomfortable during winter weather. Plus it's a lot safer to get out of the car in a garage and enter the house when I come home late at night from a hospital trip.
Given the situation you describe in your neighborhood, the value of homes might also be an encouragement to start planning to leave now, rather than later. The city in which I live faces some similar problems, especially a few hundred (last I heard) vacant houses from foreclosures.
Housing values have dropped and even though they've recovered somewhat from the recession, I doubt they'll ever hit a pre-recession high again. Given the lower prices, a different class of people is moving in, changing the dynamics of the neighborhood, something that could happen in your area as well.
The only parts I dread are the actual house hunting and the packing...all the packing! I see it as a good time to downsize.
Given your house (2 stories), aging, and the neighborhood issues, I think those are sufficient justification to consider moving, especially if the neighborhood doesn't stabilize or improve.