Wow. Allow me to be parochial: you won't have heard of a place called Huntly, but for years it was the local equivalent of Po-Dunk, an awful coal dust town that you drove though on the way South. Ngaruawahia was worse with two infamous pubs and a gang reputation. Now they're both filling with young professionals and workers with schools and amenities following. Why? Because people who can't afford a house in their favourite street in town, take command of their own destiny and vote with their feet. Give it a few years and Huntly may be more desirable than a rat race suburb in the city that young people thought was what they wanted.

This is how Andy and I have been able to get to the point where we can afford to semi-retire in a few years. There are some very cute little lakes in the Akorn area in which we lived. They are called Portage Lakes. When we moved from England to Akorn, we were qualified for a mortgage to buy a half million dollar house on one of the lakes but we didn't do it. Why? Because we did not want to spend our lives working to pay off a house. We preferred to buy something modest that we could afford to pay off in a year or so. We want to be able to have a life style where we can travel, play golf and enjoy a few other amenities.