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Ron & Pat Gunder, CRS, CDPE, MBA

10 Reasons Why You Should Consider Heather Gardens, Denver Colorado Area

10 Reasons Why You Should Consider Heather Gardens, Colorado.

1. Great Location! Just off of I-225 at Parker in Aurora.

Heather Gardens  Denver Baby Boomers Residences

2. Affordability: Price range from the $60Ks to $300Ks.

Heather Gardens  Denver Baby Boomers Residences

3. Variety of Living Options: Condominiums, Townhomes and Patio Homes; 865 sq ft to 2364 sq ft; one to four bedrooms.

4. Golf Course that is rated by the PGA as one of the best in mid-west, and there are swimming and tennis courts.

5. Over 100 planned activities, clubs and classes.

6. New Community Center to be built without disruption to current activities and events.

7. Underground parking on certain units and covered parking on others.

8. HOA includes utilities in certain units.

Heather Gardens  Denver Baby Boomers Residences

9. Beautiful 198 acres park-like grounds.

10. State Park across the street. RTD Light Rail close by to take you to Downtown Denver.Heather Gardens  Denver Baby Boomers Residences

Little Known Rental Option for Baby Boomers in Denver

Heather Gardens  Baby Boomers ResidencesLittle Know Rental Option for Baby Boomers in Denver. Little Known Rental Option for Baby Boomers in Aurora off of I-225. Many baby boomers have decided to rent for a season but still want a maintenance free home with some services. However, for most, they are limited in resources. I think Pat and I may have found an answer for some. Heather Gardens  Baby Boomers Residences Heather Gardens normally has rentals available. The price range is anywhere from $800 to $1600. This includes some paid utilities. Heather Gardens features include a PGA golf course, underground parking, a restaurant, and beautiful 198 acres park-like grounds, lots of planned activities, clubs and classes. There is a state park and the RTD Light Rail close by.

Heather Gardens  Denver Baby Boomers Residences

Best Kept Secret in Highlands Ranch, CO

Best kept secret in Highlands Ranch, CO: One of the best kept secrets in Highlands Ranch is Palomino Park Resort, a 24-7 well guarded and gated residential community located near Quebec and C 470. Palomino Park, Highlands Ranch, CO, TownhomesThis community is luxurious in every way with several communities within its gates. What many people do not know is that though this is purported to be a luxury apartment community, two of the communities, Silver Mesa and Gold Peak, offer affordable attached homes in the resale market. Silver Mesa is the more affordable of the two, while Gold Peak's homes come in a variety of sizes including some sprawling upper end units.

Palomino Park, Highlands Ranch, CO, Townhomes

There are five communities within Palomino Park Resort; Red Canyon (apartments-attached garages), Blue Ridge (apartments-detached garages), Green River(apartments-detached garages), Gold Peak (attached residence-attached garages) and Silver Mesa (attached residences-attached garages). Within Palomino Parks' gates each community has its own luxurious club house, pool, and spa. Palomino Park, Highlands Ranch, CO, TownhomesThere is also a central community club house that sports a massive pool, workout facility, racquetball courts and restaurant with pool side service. There is a central park area with ponds, outdoor entertaining areas, tennis courts, volleyball courts, a horse shoe area, a baseball field and bouce game. Palomino Park, Highlands Ranch, CO, TownhomesActivities abound with events planned throughout the year for the residences of Palomino Park. Sitting on a ridge, many of the west end residences of the community offer sweeping mountain views! Palomino Park, Highlands Ranch, CO, Townhomes

Snowy Day Activities for Empty Nesters

Adult snow day activitiesSnow Day Activities for Empty Nesters: We are snowed in....Actually we are almost buried in snow here in Highlands Ranch. We can see Quebec from our place and there is very little traffic on the street. This is always our gauge as to whether or not we should venture out. Our own poll of sorts. If there is 75% less traffic than normal on Quebec then 75% of the Highlands Ranchers who travel this road are telling us it is not safe out there. That is good enough for us. So now we have to decide what we are going to do today. We are Empty Nesters, so we do not have children who want to build snowmen, sled, or make snow angels. The first thing that comes to both of our minds is prospecting....People are home, so it is a great time to call. But then, it is a snow day so this calls for leisure activities...What do Empty Nesters do for fun? First let's make a list of what we are NOT going to do:

•1. No Prospecting

•2. No Mindlessly Surf the Internet

•3. No Cleaning house

•4. No laundry

•5. ...And definitely do NOT wash the car!

This is our usual list of activities for our "day off". Today is different. After all it is snowing for goodness sake!

So here is our top 10 list of snow day activities for Baby Boomers and Empty Nesters:Adult snow day activities

•1. Get out that teapot. Find the specialty tea you bought last year. Dust off that book you have wanted to read. Open the shutters. Curl up by the window. Light the fireplace and read.

•2. Pull out the scrapbook supplies. Dig out those family photos stored in boxes and create something beautiful and meaningful to leave for your kids.

•3. Charge the battery to your camera. Bundle up and take a photo shoot walk in the snow.

•4. Invite friends or family members over to share your snow day. Play games, watch movies and drink hot chocolate.

•5. Make a pot of chili, light the fire and invite a couple of neighbors you have wanted to meet over for dinner.

•6. Make it a day to make casseroles to freeze, and bake goodies for the coming week.

•7. Use this time to get into your computer and organize files and photos stored on your computer...And back them up in the process. OK, this is not a leisure activity, but you will feel better for doing this!

•8. Get out the gardening books and create your flower bed plans for spring. Start making a list of plants you will need to purchase. Some can be ordered online for spring planting.

•9. Plan your next vacation. There is a wealth of information about vacation destinations online. Dream big, shop smart!

•10. Watch old movies, order in pizza, pop popcorn, have a true day off, you deserve it!

So what did you do today? We would love to hear from our Colorado friends. Any ideas you have and would like to share here are welcome! We look forward to hearing from you!

The Hardest Day in A Baby Boomer's Life . . . Some Info You REALLY Need to Know Now!

The Hardest Day in a Baby Boomer's Life

assisted living in denverThe Hardest Day in a Baby Boomer's Life: The Hardest Day in a Baby Boomer's Life just happened to us recently. It's time to move mom to an assisted living place and she doesn't want to leave her home. We had been taking mom to a doctor on a monthly basis, and the doctor had assigned a state agency to be checking on her at home on a weekly basis. After several months the doctor advised my mom on one of her visits that she would need to be moved to an assistant living home. My mom said absolutely not, she was not moving. The doctor quickly turned to my sister and said that there were legal liabilities in keeping my mom at the house. If my sister needed it, she as a doctor would sign a statement that my mother had to go into an assisted living home for her own safety and my sister could take this to the state and demand her move. My mother immediately told my sister that if she did that, she would never talk to her again. Very difficult, but we knew that if she were not in such a place, she would continue to fall and most probably not eat more than one meal a day, if that. My sister had been going to her home every day for the last 18 months. She couldn't take care of herself, could not cook, had loss of memory, and when asked what she ate for the day, would say something like a piece of cake or whatever - although my sister had made sure she had food that she could easily eat without preparation. Yes, there were tears.

Another problem we had was that my sister was moving 300 miles away to Houston and I live in Denver. Where do we move mom? We had been talking to mom about this move for over a year. What we knew was that she did not want to move to Houston or Denver. We all worked and she was concerned that she would be lonely. She wanted to move to Waco when she was ready to move. We wanted to be near her, but we also wanted her to be happy. She has brothers, sisters and friends in Waco who would see her on a regular basis. We made the arrangements for her to move to Waco on the coming Saturday morning. Fortunately for us, our mother agreed 2 days before we were to move her that she was ready and willing to move to Waco. We had not told her that we had already made the arrangements for the move. When she agreed to the move, we informed her that arrangements had already been made for her to move within a couple of days. What a giant relief for us.

We were not too early in moving our mom. We discovered in the first few weeks how much she really needed this place. For the most part she was incontinent. Her mobility was limited. We now had someone to help us. It was good to know that our mom was being taken care of and she was in good hands.

Within a couple of months, mom needed additional care. This meant spending considerably more money so we had to move her into a very small 2 room apartment in the facility and find another home for her dog that she loved so much. This was very hard but a necessary decision (losing a dog for some of us is momumental!). A roommate was in one room, and she was in the other. We loved the other roommate. She was delightful and had been a nurse and we hoped this would help her take her mind off the dog. Everything was fine until about a couple of weeks ago. My mother was found lying on the floor face down in her room and had to be carried to the hospital to be checked out. She was OK and sent back to the assisted living home. Within 3 days she was found again lying on the floor with a repeat trip to the hospital. How was it that she kept falling out of the bed? We finally found out after the 3rd time this happened that the roommate that we loved was trying to help our mom out of the bed and in fact, insisted she get out of the bed by pulling on her arms. As she was trying to get her out of bed, mom fell. We also discovered in this time that certain items were missing in her room. Our mom became paranoid that this roommate would come into the room after others had left and try to make her get out of the bed or look in her closet for items to "collect". The staff found some of mom's guest's jewelry and mom's TV remote in her roommate's room. The roommate was not a bad woman - she just believed that she was helping mom. We were advised on the "thievery" that the roommate had actually believed these were her items. We have since learned this is a common occurrence in these facilities.

Once we learned about the problem with the roommate, we immediately took action - although it was about a week before wemoving mom out of her house could move my mom. (The roommate for some reason could not be moved, so we had to move mom.) We double checked that we would not run into the same problems with this new roommate. After she was moved into this new room, a nurse came by to check on her. Mom had been put under a Hospice Care program for about a month. This week the nurse advised us that it would be between 60 days and a year for this disease to "end". We had placed mom into this assisted living place only 4 months ago. We have seen the steady decline, but hoped that she would get better. We are still hoping.

In the meantime, Pat and I were in the process of selling mom's home. Our family spent a couple of weeks going through her home and deciding upon what was to be kept and what was to be discarded. Did I tell you that my mom never threw anything away? It took almost a month before we could place the home on the market. This is tricky in that we have to explain to mom where her things are now "located".

In this process we have learned much, including the consequences of selling a parent's home BEFORE consulting with an attorney... even if the home is sold at a loss! We have learned about what kind of trust is needed, Medicare processes and about little known VA benefits available for the spouse of war veterans and the importance of doing in depth research BEFORE deciding on a care facility. We have become pros in this area! If you are facing a similar situation we can help with the sale of your parents home and point you in the right directions regarding resources, processes and steps you may need to take prior to making any decisions. Helping others is always a benefit of facing hard times in your own life. We are here to help!