2020 Reminds Us That A Lifestyle Update Is Most Important
Brian Morgenweck June 3, 2020
COVID and Lock-Downs and Protests! Oh, My! It's been a wild ride so far, but 2020 is teaching us that a lifestyle update is what's most important.
Life is precious. Time is finite. Lifestyle should be our #1 priority, not for "someday", but now. Many have had the bottom fall out from under them and their existence shaken to the core. Many more are realizing congested city-living may not hold the same allure that originally attracted them. We're getting beat up a bit and we didn't plan it this way at all.
I'm reminded of the poem, "To A Mouse" by Scottish poet Robert Burns (1785):
...But mouse you are not alone,
In proving foresight may be vain:
The best-laid schemes of mice and men
Go often askew,
And leave us nothing but grief and pain,
For promised joy!
Major lifestyle changes happen to most of us somewhere along the way, often arising from completely unplanned occurrences at the most unexpected of times. Let's frame this as "major lifestyle updates that happen FOR us", instead. Just as a decision to update a home can have amazing rehabilitative results, so too can a decision to upgrade one's lifestyle. Turn it all into something good.
Everyone is talking about moving out of cities, fleeing to suburbs, or simpler country-style life not much further away where folks can still commute to work. We're also experiencing, as a result of the so-called, "quarantine", a new reality whereby working from home is a viable, even very attractive, career option.
Obviously, this 
applies to careers in which one doesn't have to be physically present at all times. As much as technology can scare us at times, telecommuting isn't too tough to take. If we can live in beautiful, simpler, more wholesome and spacious places and actually be more productive in our work and have more time to live the way we'd like, who'd be the fool to make that choice?! Add this heaping helping to that lifestyle sandwich... most often, you can do it for far less and have far more than congested living that costs a ridiculous amount to attain and maintain (and not just in terms of dollars!).
A byproduct of this whole mess we've been going through is that dynamics are changing and people's "work" methods-of-operation change with the times and technology, as well. Working from home is a "new normal" (as much as I loathe that expression). We all have the internet, telephones, email, video conferencing, etc. I don't want to bastardize a Plato quote, but what the hay... Necessity (with technology) is the mother of (re)invention.
This huge shift lately can allow for major positive lifestyle changes, especially if you can relocate and only have to physically commute occasionally. Why not enjoy open spaces, simpler living and higher productivity, to boot! Believe me when I tell you you can get far more home, property and peace-of-mind in the process. I know. I did just that. "But I can't just pick up and go", you say? That's where we enter the transitional update. My Power Realty Group is a real estate brokerage, after all. We're based in Bergen County, NJ but handle seller and buyer clients all over northern New Jersey as well as parts of New York's beautiful Hudson Valley.
If you have to sell to make a move, there has never been a better time. (That's not sales talk, either, but a hard fact!) We went into this current mess well into a very hot real estate market with a solid economic foundation. In many ways and in areas excepting parts of NYC where we'll likely see some price reductions, these crises have actually exacerbated it and added fuel to an already healthy fire. We're seeing bidding wars (or the more calming version, if you'd prefer, "multiple offer scenarios") in all areas. I see this as a time of major opportunity.
Sell HIGH... Buy much lower... Gain it all! I see it as a no-brainer.
If you agree and would like to explore your own lifestyle update, we're here to help you.
~Brian Morgenweck [email protected]
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