After Retirement

Good to see that you persevered with your colleague, Leper and that it is working out. My best friend is my wife. We do everything together and I feel that I could easily be that colleague of yours if something ever happened to her.

Unlike Cervelo, both of us are early risers, share the same interests....although she seems to have twice the energy that I have.....and can keep going long after I have thrown the towel in.

I suppose that we are all different. I have a friend that I meet up with about 3 times a year. However this is usually at my instigation. We have a great time when we meet up but he never ever contacts me first....it is always left to me to make the arrangements. I can never understand this.

I have a brother who does the "your turn, my turn" thing. I contact him, then he contacts me....then it's left to me to make the next contact because it is "my turn". He has never strayed from this. He is now approaching 70 years of age and is still at it. I send him an email, he responds then will not contact me until I reply to his email. I remember some years ago that he went 6 months and would not contact me because it was "my turn".

I think that the best part of retirement is being spontaneous. Just heading off on a whim for a night away, a picnic etc. There are still some people out there who will look at you strangely because they don't do this. They always do their shopping on a Friday, only go for a drive on a Sunday etc.
 
Laramie said:
I suppose that we are all different
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I took early retirement in my 50's. I remember the comments passed by family members as to how I could do this and where did I get the money etc. My sister being the main culprit, stirring it among other family members.

When I retired we headed off on a few expensive holidays overseas. They weren't that expensive but to someone like my sister who spends her money changing her furniture every year they must have seemed expensive. She then started the rumour that "we must have won the Lotto". Unfortunately my parents and brother believed this and thought that we were holding back and not telling them. It was a very nasty time.

I took great pleasure in never giving her any information. Any reasonable person could have seen that our lifestyle is devoid of bling and other luxuries. Money is spent on travel however.

So, there are some people out there who can have a jealous warped idea about other people who can retire early and it can be their purpose in life to spread rumour.

Thankfully, many years have passed, I don't talk with my sister, and continue to do the things that I want to do.
 
Leper said:
This thread is interesting and I'm glad to see those retirees contributing have had positive experience in retirement. I had two retirements one over 22 years ago where I was retired for two days Saturday and Sunday before I started working for the HSE from which I retired over 3 years ago. A work colleague of mine retired 22 years ago too, his wife died shortly after and while things didn't go further downhill for him he just existed, had his breakfast, lunch, dinner and washed up once a week which later became once a fortnight and worse. He never became visibly unkempt, but other than breathing he had little raison d'etre.

Recently, he asked that he compare his pension payslip with mine and as usual I had no problem with this. It is obvious that he is paying too much income tax and when I pointed out this he said all he wanted was enough to get by. He hadn't advised Revenue in 22 years of his pension income and never claimed medical/prescription expenses (hence my recent Tax query on AAM).

His P60's for years have been stored in a biscuit tin along with his GP receipts, Prescription Charges etc. He was reluctant to allow me to sift through his personal paperwork, but with his permission I've sent off his relevant information to Revenue neatly summarised year by year. I have no doubt he is entitled to rebates and I'm hoping Revenue will cast a friendly glance at his claims. (He has no IT skills whatsoever and doesn't even want to know how to use email).

Now I meet the guy a couple of times per week and I have got him to go for a morning walk each day and he is even cleaning up his house and becoming (dare I say it?) a little more careful of his personal hygiene etc. I'm not judging the guy, but I'm just pointing out a pitfall or two somebody could easily fall in to.
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My Grandad struggled when he was widowed, but a bit later, age 80. Didn't want to do anything with his time. After much cajoling, he worked out that it was nearly as cheap to spend 3 months in a Spanish hotel in winter than it was to heat his house. Food and entertainment laid on. He wasn't much of a drinker. And he hadn't been abroad since being in the British Indian army in the 1920's.

He got himself a girlfriend, and had a great time. When we cleared out his house after he died, he had condoms in his bedside table, not a full pack and well in date.

Funnily enough, he was a really nasty man almost all of his life, horrible to his wife and kids - my Dad and Uncle's childhoods were only saved by being evacuated from London as kids during WW2 to an amazing foster family in Cornwall for five years. But then my Grandad had this realisation of how terrible he had been and that it was still possible to change, and he ended up a real pleasure to be around. Just show it's never too late. Still feel sorry for my Granny mind - lovely lady with a ruined life.
 
As a recent retiree, since about a year go in my 50s, i gotta say im enjoying it.
Its been a bit stunted by covid, but once thats all over i can start traveling and doing stuff again.
One thing i did do to wind down was take on some charity work, but then after about 2 months they started assuming i was their employee and actually giving me more work to do and deadlines. That got nipped in the bud and i kicked them to the kerb.

Right now if someone asked me, what do you do with the time. I smile and say, whatever i feel like doing, at whatever time i feel like it.
And that is the most blissful part of it.
Dont regret it one bit.
And when i can get out and about, will be even better.
 
As soon as humanly possible Mrs Wahaay and I intend to drink ourselves around the world.
Summer in Ireland, Autumn in Greece, winter in Florida/Tenerife, spring in the Caribbean.
If you do your research right, register for deals on a few reliable websites and time it right( school term time ) there really are some very good bargains to be had.
And at the moment there are some cracking cruise deals on offer from an industry that's been at a standstill for a year.
We've just signed up to spend two weeks this Christmas on a cruise around Thailand and Vietnam - £2000 each for AI drinks,tips and BA flights.
Cruises fill me with dread but that's a steal.
We're also fortunate to own a second property in Ireland and we use this exclusively for home exchanges all over the world - a large number of like-minded retirees with holiday homes constitute a big chunk of the main websites catering for these.
We're also investigating house and pet-sitting in far-flung sunny locations and there are a couple of websites devoted to these too.
The idea of staying permanently in one place and ' pottering ' fills me with dread.
We both reckon I've got about 10 years before I'll have to slow down but who knows ? Might as well make hay etc etc.
My one tip is avoid other pensioners and cultivate younger friends.
There's nothing more dispiriting if you're a glass half full type of person to be among whiney old people.
 
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I'm afraid I can't answer your query re the accessing my pension early as it's not something I've done yet
I was lucky in sofar that I didn't need to access it as I had enough liquid cash to start our journey into early retirement
It was something that was discussed when setting up my financial portfolio with our FA but was decided to leave it alone for now and let it grow tax free and only access it only when needed or have to.

Having said that the portfolio that we did set up was set up with the view that the pension would be cashed in and added to it and then turned into our ARF, so for all intents I did have an ARF type fund but with out all the T&Cs and that did throw up something that I wasn't expecting.

Put quite simply the fund did not preform as expected and not just for one year but nearly all five years that the money was invested there
Had we being relying on the "ARF" as our only source of income I would expect at some stage later into our retirement we would have issues with drawdown percentages and longevity of the fund.

We have since cashed in that portfolio and invested ourselves in the market and are for all intents we're back on track with where our investments should be at this moment in time but it's not for the faint hearted and wouldn't recommend it unless you have a high tolerance to risk and a clear understanding of what can happen good or bad and are comfortable with either outcome.

On a side note but still relevant to this thread there is something that has happened to me subconsciously and helped me settle into retirement. And that is what motivates me, when I was working I was consumed with status and wealth etc etc while now all I'm interested in is personal goals and happiness. I think it's referred to as internal and external motivation and though both go hand in hand during the course of our lives I feel that in retirement one should be focusing more on the internal.
 
Brilliant contributions.

Any thoughts on avoiding dreaming about retirement too much when in your late 40's??!!

I'm loking forward to spending more time playing the sports & doing the activities I love. Also reading more, when I want to. Travelling, though I know I might have the same appetite for this when I am older. Going for a coffee with my wife when we want, or lunch, and then having a drink. If we feel like it! Keeping the garden clean is a great shout. And key one for me: remember to be kind and generous (time, thoughfulness, financial support if I can, in that order) to my kids. It's a good way to make them better parents when the time comes, but it should also give me joy and be part of their lives.

One thing for me would be key: have some sort of daily routine, get up/read paper/have breakfast at in or around the same time each day. Have a plan for the next day, a list for the week.
 
David_Dublin said:
I'm loking forward to spending more time playing the sports & doing the activities I love.
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Age is a barrier here though. Alas, I was thinking the same in my 40s and only from a hill walking perspective which I like. My last 'hike' was only 12 miles and I was strggling after 8. I made it but the legs are not what they used to be and I'm still under 60.
 
elcato said:
Age is a barrier here though. Alas, I was thinking the same in my 40s and only from a hill walking perspective which I like. My last 'hike' was only 12 miles and I was strggling after 8. I made it but the legs are not what they used to be and I'm still under 60.
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Good shout, I'll take rugby off the list so ;)

But seriously, no reason why things like hill walking, golf, tennis, lawn bowls, cycling and many others can't be tailored to fitness levels as we age. I think it's probably key to begin while relatively fit to built up a group of friends to do these with. Ideally if your partner, if you have one/continue to have one, could share some of the interests with you, or wider family members.
 
I used to dream about retirement in my 40s, but now I'm 55, I've had a change of heart.
During last year, as we weren't going anywhere on holidays, I used my annual leave to take every Friday off in June/July/August/September. In effect, going down to a 4 day week for the Summer. As my wife doesn't work on Fridays, this was ideal. So, now my thoughts have turned to going down to a 4 day week, and further reducing it to a 3 day week, before eventually retiring. Of course, that is if the employer is on board.

The ability to work from home was also a deciding factor.

I remember a friend who had retired once said, see what you do for the weekend, now imaging if that was 7 days a week. It's a lot of time to fill.

And finally, on funding retirement, as we went nowhere, didn't eat out, and worked from home, and used the credit card for 99% of transactions, it gave me an opportunity to see how much money we actually need at a minimum to survive when retired. It was a bit more than I had envisaged and, while I could reduce it and live more frugally, I wonder do I really want to?
 
Ive noticed we have spent hardly any money in the last year.
Not even as high as €1000 pm between us I think. Nothing to spend it on apart from food and a bit of DIY :).
We arent a bit frugal and never have been.
We used to have expenses to go to work, get lunches, pub after work on a Friday etc. Several insurances we didnt need. Donations to bothar. All gone now.
The big life expenses are all gone now.
Mortgage is gone now too. That was part of the retirement plan (no retirement until mortgage was gone).
College fund put away and ring-fenced.
House paid for, down to one car. And it will do us at least 10 more years.
Insurances all cut down to just whats needed/
Next year though we will probably have a big budget for trips and holidays.
We invested €50k in equities and will use any money that makes every year as the holiday fund.
If it makes money we will use that money it made for holidays the next year.
If it makes nothing or a loss we will go on cheaper holidays the next year. Though its off to a very good start and yet we can go on holidays.
Thats where i see most of our money going in future. Holidays and weekends away :)
 
Buddyboy said:
And finally, on funding retirement, as we went nowhere, didn't eat out, and worked from home, and used the credit card for 99% of transactions, it gave me an opportunity to see how much money we actually need at a minimum to survive when retired. It was a bit more than I had envisaged and, while I could reduce it and live more frugally, I wonder do I really want to?
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I'm often asked how did I do it when people find out that I'm an early retiree
And I generally respond with asking the person three questions that I feel have to answered before a person can consider early retirement

1. How much does it actually cost you to live at the moment.
For me it's not good enough to say that I earn x amount per month and at the end of each month there is x left
I feel a person considering ER needs to know the Who, What, When and Where of every euro that they spend
This is not about criticising a persons spending habits but understanding how a person spends
What is essential spending, what is not and how each effects your total yearly spend

2. If you were to retire tomorrow how much do you need to live on
Based on the answers to the first question you should be able to a fairly accurate costing on how much you would need on a yearly basis

3. How are you going to fund your early retirement
And normally the conversation ends there, But if it doesn't that's when life gets interesting
As Confucius said "Everyone has two lives, and the second one begins when you realize you have one"
 
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Something that a lot of people forget to factor in is their medical insurance and susequent bills mostly because a lot have it included in their current pay (I know I did). As this may rise also with age initially it's worth a mention that you need to add about 2k to your annual spending for at least until the 70 bracket assuming all to stay the same.
 
elcato said:
Something that a lot of people forget to factor in is their medical insurance and susequent bills mostly because a lot have it included in their current pay (I know I did). As this may rise also with age initially it's worth a mention that you need to add about 2k to your annual spending for at least until the 70 bracket assuming all to stay the same.
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Are they allowed to raise insurance based on you getting older?
 
time to plan said:
He got himself a girlfriend, and had a great time. When we cleared out his house after he died, he had condoms in his bedside table, not a full pack and well in date.
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What age was the girlfriend that your over 80 year old grandfather got himself where he was worried about safe sex??! I guess STI's can be an issue at any age but how much fun are these people having at that age!!

Sorry to hijack a very good thread but just had to ask!
 
@elcato good point on expenses included in current pay and benefits, not just medical, but any membership fees or mobile phones and latest gadget upgrades, even voluntary PRSI if relevant.
@Cervelo these are great questions, I’m still working on the third one! in fact it should probably be a separate AAM question to see if my plan will work as I would like.
 
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