As a recently retired couple with two children who have now fled the nest and are living in rental accommodation, we've recently begun to reassess our situation. We actually initially moved into the 4 bedroom family home that we have grown over the years to love when the children were still in primary education – choosing the area not just for a convenient location to commute to work, but also for access to schools.

Now that we are retired, and with our children living independently, obviously neither the commute nor the access to good education are significant for us. We do have a small amount remaining to pay on our mortgage, and this is part of what has prompted the decision for us to look for a different property.

Although it's in some ways a tough call and quite emotional to sell the family home where we have brought up the children and enjoyed so many memories and occasions, we have friends and family who have made a similar move and we haven't heard many regrets.

In terms of what we are looking to change, we think a 2 bedroom property would be more appropriate, as our current 4 bedroom is no longer appropriate, and keeping the house up together and regularly cleaned is no small task. Our relatively large garden is similarly quite a substantial, so we think somewhere with a smaller plot would actually take far less time and effort to maintain.

The goal of downsizing for us is going to be to achieve a good selling price for our current family home, and move to a smaller property, with a more manageable garden, but also still have enough space on the lower floor to entertain family and friends. Doing some research we also think we should have quite a lot of money left over, being able to pay off the mortgage, but also potentially to help each of our children when the time comes for them to buy their own homes. This spare cash should also help us to transition into our new retired lifestyle, and help us to make the most of it!

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