Scaling way back

Imagine you’re a retiree living in a secure place with utilities included, a comfortable bed, cable TV, daily maid service, an exercise club, swimming pool and hot tub, even with breakfast, all for just under $60 a day.

Terry Robison thought outside the box and claims he lived just this way when he was in his mid-60s. At least that was his story reported by USA Today and the Grit Post.

The more I contemplated Robison’s new lifestyle, if he’s not joshing, the more sense it made to me on so many levels.

Thoughts about such issues as what awaits as we age come more often once one passes 60 and the check-engine light comes on.

Described as an average working American, Robison, from Texas, said he crunched the numbers and determined that, as a senior, it was far more economical for him to lease a room long-term at the Holiday Inn than settle into an expensive retirement home.

He posted on his Facebook page that, using his senior discount, a hotel room would cost just under $60 a day, while a senior home would run about $188 daily, according to a 2019 story by USA Today writer Kristin Lam.

That meant the licensed long-term care facility cost more than three times as much. Also, acquiring a room in a respectable nursing home in the age of retiring boomers could take weeks compared with easily available hotel reservations and the ability to move at will.

Plus, Robison is quoted saying many Holiday Inns offer amenities we all use and enjoy in daily living such as regular complimentary shampoo, soap, toothpaste, body lotion and razors on request.

He went on to say that the hotel staff will “call an ambulance … or the undertaker” if anything goes wrong. And with more than 1,100 Holiday Inn locations, Robison said he can travel wherever he wants.

Change of scenery and social opportunities are available with an airport shuttle or city bus. Family visits also aren’t a problem. “They will always be glad to find you, and probably check in for a few days’ mini-vacation,” he reportedly wrote on his Facebook page. “The grandkids can use the pool.”

There were other benefits. “Five dollars’ worth of tips a day and you’ll have the entire staff scrambling to help you,” Robison also wrote in a Facebook post. “They treat you like a customer, not a patient.”

Grit Post’s Tom Cahill wrote that over a year, Robison would pay about $21,900 to stay at a Holiday Inn at the senior discount rate he cited, while the retirement home he studied would run a hefty $68,620.

That’s the general price paid for a senior facility. In a 2017 article, Forbes examined the cost of retirement homes, finding that many senior homes weren’t transparent about costs, but the data its reporter could find suggested a cost of up to nearly $100,000 a year.

Forbes’ Richard Eisenberg wrote, “Median annual cost for assisted living, according to the 2016 Genworth Cost of Care Study: $43,539; for a private room in a nursing home: $92,378.” Cahill reported that Dan Brewer, who works for a company that invests in private-pay senior housing facilities, in 2018 wrote that senior housing can run from $1,500 to $6,000 a month, or $18,000 to $72,000 in a year.

While Robison’s idea certainly is intriguing for we septuagenarians, it sounded a bit too good to be true to this one. So I did some checking here in Harrison. I learned the Holiday Inn Express doesn’t have a long-term rate for seniors, but will offer them a discounted rate of $109 plus tax a night. Not far down the road, the equally well-kept Quality Inn, while also not having long-term rates, would offer a nightly discount to seniors of some $80 plus tax. That seemed to make sense since neither is a residence inn.

Although both of those rates are considerably higher than what Robison says he paid in Texas, they still each are far less than the reported average daily care home rate cited at $188.

By calculations within my shriveled, math-challenged brain, that still amounts to just over $32,000 a year to stay at the Quality Inn and about $40,000 annually for a room at the local Holiday Inn, compared with up to as much as $70,000 annually at the average retirement home.

While it’s interesting to contemplate this nursing home alternative, I doubt there are many Terry Robisons in good health who are willing to pack their suitcase and check in for their final years. (Well, unless the pool is heated and they offer bacon and eggs for breakfast).

Address to contribute

I appreciated the positive response to my column last week about Tracy Boyd of Green Forest and her rescue farm for a variety of aged and disabled animals, including cows, donkeys and horses. Several readers wanted to contribute to her determined and compassionate effort, which can be expensive. Her mailing address is 202 Hwy. 311, Green Forest, 72638.

Now go out into the world and treat everyone you meet exactly like you want them to treat you.