A lot of talk about retirement recently...

We know several guys our age from the motorcycle club who have retired (or been retrenched) and who go out together during the week . We cant wait to be able to join them, going to the beach for example when it is quiet and going to the Cheap Tuesday restaurants and movies. I am looking forward to all the cruises that are so much more affordable and quiet outside of school holiday periods. One of the downsides to working in a school is that we are only allowed to go on holidays during school holiday time. Who wants to go anywhere and be surrounded by more school kids?

We think it will take us about ten years of retirement to do everything we want to do.

 

We were the complete opposite. Prior to selling our business (which we owned for 20 years) and retiring 5 years ago, we worked up to 60 hours per week. When we were going through the sale, people asked us what we were planning to do. We said nothing. They said you will get bored. We said we can't wait, bring it on.

Now, after 5 years in retirement, we have never been bored. In fact, we are amazed how we ever fit 60 hours of work into our lives every week.

I have just done a quick scan of our horizon - nope, can't see any boredom heading our way .

 

I think once the last kid has finished school, we'll be the same ... I'm only concerned if he retires prior to then

 

I retired a couple of years after my husband too. I must say, it was so nice to have the tea cooked and the washing done. Ahem. He even gave me a lesson in how to hang out washing properly! Isn't that generous?

 

I know I could write off at least 10-15 hours a week right away with extra sleep once retired.
Just don't seem to get enough when working full time.
Want to do more exercise/training too, so sleep is very important to recover well.

Don't think it would be difficult working out what to do with the other 30 hours, which is not that much time in a week.

 

This reminds me of a couple I knew from Sydney, he retired and moved down to the coast as planned, she decided to stay in the city and keep working!

 

A woman at my workplace retired earlier this year and has just started back again as a temporary one month contract position became available. She said the thing that surprised her the most about retirement was that it can be a lot more expensive than you imagine. After all, you are at work for 40-50 hours per week so you don't need to occupy yourself with anything else during these hours.

I'd be happy to retire on about $800-1000/week net. My plan would be to travel indefinitely (returning home on occasion) and combining this with freelance writing.

 

We are retired and our budget for living expenses is $1,500 pw or $7,000 pm. We don't live on caviar but we live very comfortably.

We have a separate budget for travel as it is a major component of our retirement.

 

Still waiting for a report.

What was the highlight?

 

My parents retired a few years ago and report that living costs dropped. But yes entertainment costs increased slightly. Some of the drop in costs are due to their age, rather than just not working - reduced rates, rego etc.

You can do things off peak. eg folks go to the seniors movies - they get a cheap ticket and morning tea is included. Dining at lunch is usually cheaper than dinner. etc

Work-related costs, like clothes, travel and tools vanish.

You've got time to save money on grocery shopping. Rather than just hitting coles on the way home from work and grabbing anything in a rush, you can visit several shops to save money. You've got time to research the best deal on anything you're buying.

Most couples can easily make do with one car, rather than two that was necessary when working.

No need for takeaways because you're too tired to cook.

 

Trophy husband!

 

Retirement was something I never thought about until last year when a colleague retired. My first thought was "Retiring - but he's not much older than me!". Then came the realisation I had been so busy making ends meet I had no plan for retirement.

We would like to look after Grandkids, finally get out fishing (weather always seems better on weekdays), and join our group of caravan park friends when they do their annual 3 month trek north.

Doubt that super will get us where we need to be, hence actively pursuing property investment rather than just browsing the for sale ads.

 

Hubby is halfway thru reading "retirement ready" and decided he's not ready to retire ... wonder if it was the chapter about 'nurturing your changing relationship' that made him change his mind

 

My parents have done it in the last 18months / Dad is 57 Mum is 55

Mum works out around 5 times a week - either hockey, tennis or the gym. Dad plays golf around 3-4 times a week
Mum's president of masters hockey association. Dad's vice captain of golf club and on around 2-3 different boards in the community
Mum gets into the garden and house a fair bit. Dad still does some consultancy work once a week for bit of play money
They have travelled overseas once a year together - next year is Canada for 6 weeks
They have travelled together and by themselves across Australia for around 4 months
Have been mix of planned and spontaneous trips
They struggle to see how they fitted work into their lives before
Both really enjoying it

 

Working part-time for a longer period of time would be my preferred way to do it as well. I work in an industry that is nicely suited to part-time work. The one thing investments need is time to "curate". However, time is also a finite commodity. I plan to work full-time till the point where my investments have reached a critical mass that we are satisfied with and then cut back to about 20 hours a week and enjoy life in the slow lane.

I am fortunate to be paid a decent amount of money for for I do (with minimum aggravations) and will take a fair bit of time for me to replace my income. I already spend about 10% of the year overseas and will increase it as we start part-time work. Working part-time will keep the mind sharp, keep me social and pay terrific money while the investments are ticking away nicely in the background. Also, I don't want to leave all my travel to my retirement years. I will tick items off my bucket list when I am young and energetic, see the world when I still have a salary from working just 20 hours a week pay for it all.

One of the benefits of having a high savings rate during the asset accumulation phase means you can cut back on your working hours when you semi-retire and find that you still have the same amount of spending money as you had when you were working full-time and saving every available dollar.

 

No pressure. You commented about it a few times before you left and I believe your first big OS trip, so thought you might like to share something.

 

It's been about 18 months since I stopped working in my j.o.b and 'retired'. We are both in our late 30's.

My job used to be very stressful. I would often come home, eat dinner with the family, then work until midnight. Would also travel a lot for work too. Now I do school drop offs and pick ups for the kids; play footy with them in the park; take them to after school sports and music; help them with homework.

I enjoy running as a hobby. In the last 12 months, I've trained for and ran 3 marathons. Next year I am planning to run one of the big US marathons - maybe New York or Boston.

I've explained it to others as - what would you do of you were "unconstrained" by not having to go to work everyday? I'm thinking of doing a PhD in something I find really interesting (as opposed to studying to increase earning capacity or trying to further my career). We are also thinking of travelling and living overseas for a few years, whilst the kids are still young and enable them to experience other cultures.

There are of course trade-offs in every strategy. I no longer want to live in the $4m trophy house and spend the next 20 years slaving to pay it off, like some of my friends and ex-colleagues. I also no longer yearn to drive the latest model Porsche or Lambo.

 

I was thinking about this again earlier and realised that we could probably do it with less than the 1k/week net I was initially thinking we'd need if we spent most of our time outside of the country. Our ex-PPOR rents for $500/week now. If that was paid off, it could easily fund living costs in a country with lower cost of living together with some freelance work. I'd probably have some buffer in savings or a small additional investment for the SANF but it. An expat website says that Seville in Spain, for example, has half the cost of living of Canberra. Could spend a big chunk of the year abroad in similarly priced place - bit of a light bulb moment