In the meantime, he’s renting out his future retirement home, reaping the tax benefits and getting a step up on the retired baby boomers who he hopes will flood the housing market in years to come.

“And they’ll be looking for their place in the sun,” he said.

Kelner, a CPA for the accounting firm Schechter Dokken Kanter in Minneapolis, has already found his. He’s among a growing number of boomers who are buying retirement homes now, but using them as vacation homes or investment properties until they can live there full time.

While most second-home purchases are for immediate use, the 2006 Baby Boomer Survey by the National Association of Realtors (NAR) shows that those born between 1946 and 1964 are more active than any other group in the second-home market — they own 57 percent of all vacation/seasonal homes and 58 percent of rental properties. And many of them plan to use them as their eventual retirement homes.

Where are the hot spots? Typically by water and near the mountains. A 2008 NAR survey says that the sunny South had the largest share of second-home purchases, with the West coming in second.

A rising number of those second-home buyers are boomers who plan to use their investment as primary residences when they retire, said NAR spokesman Walter Molony. He attributes the trend to changes in tax laws, changing demographics (more baby boomers) and a desire to diversify investments.

http://www.startribune.com/lifestyle/homegarden/20559634.html?location_refer=Prep%20Sports

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