Early-retirement wannabe

I can't think of many things I'd hate more than living in the tropics in the wet season. The dry season, though, is a different kettle of fish. In many ways the best bet for us would be Queensland, but alas Oz has become expensive.

Marine_life wrote: »

I was browsing some travel blogs and I came across this recent post:


ourbigfattraveladventure - sorry I'm not allowed to copy the link:(


Very interesting for those seeking early retirement.


You can live incredibly cheaply overseas and in this case less than £10,000 per annum. Ok so moving to Vietname is a little extreme but even if you add in the cost of flights (around £700), living there for 3-6 months a year is certainly viable and would make a material difference to the "NUMBER".


I visited Hanoi in 2008 and I have to say it was a crazy place (nice crazy not nasty crazy), I can think of other places in Asia which would be similarly attractive.


Who has tried this?

Lol! As it happens I'm using a similar strategy!

I’ve followed this thread by Marine_life since September 2013 when I was trying to work through my early retirement prospects. Reading the discussions helped a lot in crystallizing my thoughts for this most profound change in life style. Tired of office politics and toxic work relationships (not mine thankfully) after more than 30 years loving my work, I realized I didn’t have the ‘love’ anymore and needed to look elsewhere before I entered the ‘dark side’. I wouldn’t normally have thought to post here as my circumstances are probably quite exceptional but as Marine_life has asked I thought it about time to give something back to the community I have benefitted from for so long! I’m writing to show what is possible when retired in the Far East in a low cost of living environment but I would certainly recommend DYOR - there are many pitfalls.

Why exceptional circumstances? Getting a visa for any thing longer than a one month stay is impossible unless one has relations in this country, however the Far East is many countries and has diverse residency rules that it may be possible to replicate my experiences in another country of your choosing. Added to this we own property here so our living costs wouldn’t necessarily reflect housing costs except for the fact that we have taken to holidaying in places of interest - so some months are relatively cheap and other months have rental expenses to add.

The flat was bought off plan in 2009 for the princely sum of £12k. Two bedrooms, large lounge and separate kitchen and bathroom - 87 square meters in all. Flats here are often sold as shells so adding a fitted kitchen, toilet facilities, flooring, wallpapering and furnishings added another £5k - the benefit of a strong GBP. 2014 sale prices are now in the region of £45k - the benefit of a weak GBP! This was all done with a distant view to poorly defined retirement but also served as a holiday home and a base to travel from - just pay for flights. Certainly early retirement wasn’t in the plan, just a modest and comfortable one. Things change!

With my wife we worked out that a budget of £500 per month for living was possible. This was about 30% of our income from renting our house in England and my reduced DB pension - I left work three years early, so I had to bite the actuarial bullet. There was a reasonable income buffer built in to which we could add savings that we could live off for about a couple of years if both income streams were to fail for a while. I must say that no longer having mortgage and credit card debts makes all the difference. We are not extravagant people but living the usual life of credit card debt, barely affordable mortgages and supporting a child through public school and university have necessarily made us into MSEs.

So the figures for living here since retirement (we’ve not been at it long but long enough for a general pattern to emerge).

September - £389
October- £361
November- £409
December- £292

Groceries average £100 a month, spending £200, meals out £25, the rest is bus and taxi fare, broad band £5, gas, electricity, mobile phone, water and buildings maintenance charge £2.

For November, December and January we need to add £300 a month rent as we have moved to the sea side for a holiday and need to add another £350 for flights. From YNAB I could tell we could easily reduce expenses to £300 a month and proved that with our December figures. Novembers figure is high because of some setting up costs for our holiday flat as was September making some enhancements to our flat. Using YNAB made it easy to break down the costs.

To break down these costs even more, meals out - usually a lunch if we get hungry when we are out on a walk - cost about £2.40 to £3, sometimes just £1.20 for the two of us. Even our anniversary splash wasn’t more than £7 all in. We go to the supermarket or market most days and buy fresh fruit, fish and veg and eat it that day. A couple of fish - one each - may cost £1.50 or we can go cheap and share a whole fish which may have cost us 25p. Fruit may be 25p to 40p a lb.

Bus in our resident city is 8p a journey within the city using a bus card. That is for any distance! The bus outside the city is based on distance and is about 40p end to end. In our holiday place buses start at 20p a journey or £1.70 from one end to the other (daylight robbery!). I guess we’ll need to buy clothes at some point but at the moment its 26c outside (10 January) so its not something we are thinking about much.

We don’t really do entertainment, broadband is as exciting as it gets. My last haircut was £2, a bottle of the local beer will set you back 10p, or something a little more well known will be 35p. Local wine is about £10-12, but we don’t drink this. If you want overseas stuff like olive oil the cheapest I’ve seen is £18 a litre. Foreign wine and hard booze is similarly stratospheric so we don’t bother. When I was traveling to these places on work expenses these prices never worried me but I wasn’t bothered with these items even then.

All in our expenses, including flights, each month come out over the £500 budget, but still less than half of our income, so no problem. What is certain is that I have no desire to return to work and that we are enjoying the retirement we never knew we wanted so much. Even if we were bored - which we are not - I would rather be bored in our little paradise than be at work. Because the cost of living here is so low early retirement hasn’t affected our living standard.

All I can say is that it is all in the planning. I can’t tell you how much paper I used up calculating this and calculating that. All the what if’s and flow charts trying to tie it all together and of course you’ll say this only works if we stay out of the country as both the income streams are needed until my state pension arrives. Well, that is also accounted for!

As an aside the ourbigfattraveladventure.com blog is a great find and even more interesting is that this couple did all this for a cost of £1732 per month. On my modest retirement income - with a little top up - this is possible. Trimming a few excursions - personally I could do without the skydiving, bungee jumping or the neighbours trip - just makes this the more affordable!

I have experience of healthcare systems and my wife and I considered living in Rural Thailand. She is a teacher and I am retired. We also spent a month in Bangkok. Leaving aside the possibility that ease of living there might diminish as laws and governments change, there are lots of attractions. As others have said, cost of living is amazingly low and quality of life can be high. Of course living in a foreign country has its limitations without learning the local language and the Far East is more challenging than a European Language.

My main point is that in retirement healthcare needs have to have consideration. Research shows that for the last 10 years of one's life chronic illness is to be expected. When you are a fit 55/60 year old it all seems so distant and the many attractions of exotic locations, coupled with cheap living tend to dominate thoughts. Then a few years down the road, healthcare needs can occupy thoughts.

Who would know that ambulance services in these places can be so poor and often non-existent. Good healthcare can be found, but it has to be funded even if it is cheap by International standards. But standards are far from universal. Despite all the critics of the NHS the universal healthcare, excellent ambulance services, and excellence in acute care, are far different and much better than those found in most Far East countries. I know some will write in and say how wonderful their treatment was, but my point is that standards are very variable and in some places very poor. The low lifespans are not just a product of lifestyle, but medical care too.

So before you rush off with stars in your eyes, just consider what will happen, inevitable as it is, when, in 10 years or so you have an acute life threatening illness which you could not have expected or a chronic condition that saps your savings and totally erodes the overall cheapness. Some would say you can up sticks and return to the UK. You can, but not when sudden illness strikes you, choices become very limited.

We were close to making a decision and considered myself very fit and healthy. Back in the UK for some months, I was struck by an acute condition, out of the blue. Ambulance care, and great hospital care saved my life and I am back to normal. Had I been in Thailand, I hate to even think of the outcome, especially in rural areas but in cities too. As an example of this, people do die regularly waiting for the very scant ambulance services coupled with the really bad traffic. There is a strange statistic that many people die in taxis. Why could this be? Because they tire of waiting for an ambulance, and grab a taxi with an acute condition and no clinical support. Just to add to the risk, the number of people dying on the roads of Thailand is 6+ times the UK. So you might just be one of those statistics too as, in the hot climate, Brits just love to ride motorbikes without a helmet

So, just another dimension to consider. Very low costs of living by UK standards usually equates to variable and poor quality healthcare and one you might choose not to ignore as the years advance.