Delray Beach, Florida
Betty is such a firm
believer about the benefits
of reverse mortgages that
she has recommended them
to friends, three of whom
took out their own
reverse mortgages. “I’m
a very satisfied customer,”
she says.
Many reverse mortgage stories involve seniors
who are facing profound challenges, such as
financial difficulties, medical problems, or
family turmoil. They choose to use reverse
mortgages as a tool to help alleviate these
troubles and greatly reduce the intense stress in their lives. It is
important to note, however, that borrowers make decisions to
use the equity they have built in their homes in a variety of
different ways. For example, some seniors use their equity to
pursue interests that they have been passionate about all of their
lives. Often, they would have to give up these interests in
retirement if not for choosing the reverse mortgage option to
tap the equity they worked so hard to build. Such is the case
with Betty, 76, a vibrant, outgoing resident of Delray
Beach, Florida.
In 1994, something was missing from Betty’s life. She
had only lived in lovely Delray Beach for a few months, during
which time her husband had passed away, and now she felt
lonely in her large, beautiful house. Volunteering in the office of
the terminal patient care organization, Hospice by the Sea, and
as a group counseling facilitator with Mental Health of Palm
Beach County was rewarding work, but it didn’t completely fill
the void. She had been a lifelong supporter of the performing
arts when she lived on Long Island in New York, and she longed
to pursue this passion in Delray Beach. More specifically,
she longed to see live dance and theater performances. She had
been doing so from her childhood up until her retirement.
“When they cry, I really want to see the tears,” said the lifelong
audience member and usual front row occupant, commenting
on stage actors. “[In New York], going to the theater was a family
affair...we took our children, and [then] they took their children,”
she continues. Betty has seen live performances
of Oklahoma!, South Pacific, and West Side Story “many, many,
many times.” She enjoys stage productions much more than
movies, preferring the connection she feels with live actors. She
and her family has seen many live performances in New York for
dance and also for theater “on and off -Broadway, too many to
count,” she says.
But live performance tickets were not in Betty's budget
in 1994. Like many seniors, she might have been described as
cash-poor and house-rich. A retired bookkeeper and widow,
she was living on a fixed income. Her large, gorgeous home was
encumbered with a forward mortgage, which was the real burden
keeping her out of the theater. At that time, she was unfamiliar
with some aspects of reverse mortgages and didn’t realize that she
might have remained in that home if she had obtained a reverse
mortgage then. She had explored the reverse mortgage concept,
but “I was having trouble wrapping my brain around it,” she recounts. Besides, Betty adored the house, although she
knew that it was quite a bit of space for one person. Contemplating
her next step, she paid on the forward mortgage for three more
years. In 1997, she sold the home and bought a smaller one in
Delray Beach, because “it was a good time to sell,” she says.
She used proceeds from the sale of the larger home to purchase
the smaller one, but there still wasn’t enough left over for Betty to attend more than the occasional live performance.
Now that she had a home entirely paid for, however, she was
ready to consider a reverse mortgage in order to tap into her new
investment’s equity. She met with Pamela Kirkpatrick of Allied
Mortgage Group. “Pamela helped me to understand reverse
mortgages,” says Betty. She was eligible for $141,000,
which she chose to access in a line of credit.
Now, Betty is a subscriber to season tickets for
performances by the Caldwell Theater Company, the Delray
Playhouse, and a dance company that performs at the Duncan
Theater at Palm Beach Community College. She sits in her
favorite spot in the middle of the front row for the theater
performances and in the middle of the third row for the dance
performances. Last season, she saw the plays Doubt and Frost/
Nixon performed by the Caldwell and attended a continuing
series of musical tributes to well-known composers and lyricists
performed at the Delray Playhouse. “[The director] does…a lot
of research on composers, lyricists...[the show] starts with their
childhoods, family life, how they got started…[and then] he
and two or three other performers sing their songs. You learn an
awful lot about the people who [have written] the music that
you’d never known before. It’s a delightful, delightful evening,”
she raves. The series is called “Musical Memories” and upcoming
performances include retrospectives on George Gershwin, Bob
Merrill, Charlie Strouse, and Arthur Schwartz.
She has also been able to replace her old car, which had become
unreliable. She took her old car to a dealer for repairs, and while
there she noticed a 2008 Mercury Sable in the showroom. “I love
it,” she says. “In my community, you need to drive.” She paid for
the safe, dependable vehicle entirely with reverse mortgage
proceeds. She related to Ms. Kirkpatrick that driving the Mercury
makes her feel “like a queen” and that she “couldn’t have done
it without a reverse mortgage.” It’s especially fortunate that she
replaced her car, because she is usually the driver when she and
her friends spend evenings at dinner and then the theater.
Betty is such a firm believer about the benefits of reverse
mortgages that she has recommended them to friends, three of
whom took out their own reverse mortgages. Two worked with
Ms. Kirkpatrick and Allied, and the other had an existing forward
mortgage and went through that lender. “I’m a very satisfied
customer,” says Betty. “Without a reverse mortgage, I
wouldn’t be able to go out and see theater and dance.” The
Delray Beach performance art community is fortunate to have
such an enthusiastic and supportive audience member.