Retirement income

exil

The relatives I mentioned are both widows and are managing fine on under £1,000 a month - and one of them has to find £400 rent out of this (though admittedly that includes heating and council tax). They do have savings which are used for holidays etc. Neither runs a car and they do voluntary work, help out relatives and older friends, etc, using the free bus pass to get around.

So £2,000 a month seems adequate for two IMO, given the "two can live (almost) as cheaply as one" principle.

Put it this way, we're spending £2500 a month with an 18 year old at college and 2 adults working full time with big commuting and other work costs. On this we can manage meals out, to pay people to do work that we don't have the time or energy for, and to go on holidays. If we can't manage on £2,000 with only 2 adults and no costs of working and no car (that would go as soon as we qualify for the bus pass) there's something wrong with us

margaretclare - hope your DH continues to get better. My Mum is going in for a new knee soon. Another reason for thinking about jacking it in - if she needs more support as she gets older it's my time, not my money, she'll need and I only get so much time off work and she lives 160 miles away.

dunstonh

If we can't manage on £2,000 with only 2 adults and no costs of working and no car (that would go as soon as we qualify for the bus pass) there's something wrong with us

It suggests you are planning a certain lifestyle in retirement and budgeting for that. Thats what everyone needs to do. However, the end result will vary from individual to indivdual as the lifestyle they are looking for will be different to yours.

For example, giving up the car at 65 would be impossible for many and the bus pass would be useless.

Pobby

I wouldn`t want to get rid of the car but certainly I wouldn`t need to run two of them as I do currently. I need to look into ways of using my bus pass. There are lots of beaches around here that I certainly would travel to by bus.

At the moment I am finding it somewhat difficult to calculate what income we will receive. Just over a year ago it looked like our private/ company pensions would pay around £180 to £200 per week but with the market the way it is I`m not sure what the situation will be in 5 years time. The same goes for investments.

I am putting as much as I can away into savings and isas and this hopefully will give us breathing space if we need to wait to draw on the other resources. If the markets hav`nt recovered in 10 years from now well I guess we are all up the swanee.

margaretclare

margaretclare - hope your DH continues to get better. My Mum is going in for a new knee soon. Another reason for thinking about jacking it in - if she needs more support as she gets older it's my time, not my money, she'll need and I only get so much time off work and she lives 160 miles away.

Thanks for the good wishes. Your Mum may well need help and support before, during and after this surgery. A friend of ours, who lives on her own in a flat, needed meals-on-wheels when she came out of hospital after her knee, because she couldn't stand up long enough to make herself a meal. A good hard look at living accommodation would be a good idea - I know people whose kitchen is so small there's just nowhere to sit down and even when they were offered a 'perching stool' there just wasn't space for it. A shower instead of a bath is also a good idea - we got rid of our bath years ago because of my hips and his knees.

DH would simply not be able to manage at all if I wasn't here, but then he did the same for me when I had revision of hip replacement in December 2006. This has just gone on a long time, though.

[Deleted User]

we have spent a year on retirement and op you will need a lot less than you think

[Deleted User]

we have spent a year on retirement and op you will need a lot less than you think

Pay off the mortgage as early as possible and get yourself a nice savings pot for emergencies

add up your essential outgoings and a bit on top and you will surprise yourself. Easy and enjoyable living on less than £1400 a month. Depends where you live of course and maintenance costs, insulation etc car and holidays

JayZed

Out if interest, Kittie, what percentage of your pre-retirement salary are you on? And does this include your state pension?

exil

dunstonh wrote: »

It suggests you are planning a certain lifestyle in retirement and budgeting for that. Thats what everyone needs to do. However, the end result will vary from individual to indivdual as the lifestyle they are looking for will be different to yours.

For example, giving up the car at 65 would be impossible for many and the bus pass would be useless.

Depends on where you live I suppose. The relatives I mention live in cities and I live in a suburb with a bus into town every 10 minutes except late at night (and as a pensioner I'll be unlikely to be clubbing till 3 am) and a train station nearby. If I wanted to live in a rural area then I would need to budget for more. And my personal preference is to live within easy reach of shops, cinemas, restaurants, theatres etc and go out into the country on day trips.

Also, some people drive for enjoyment and to me it's a means of getting from A to B. Whereas, for example, I enjoy eating out and have left something in my budget for that.

So I accept your point about retirement not being "one size fits all" - though our fundamental needs are more or less the same (a warm, safe and secure house, food, entertainment, a means of getting about, social contact with other people, etc) but I'm really questioning whether it's worth living at BELOW your ideal budget now and the next 20 or 30 years, so that you can enjoy a higher retirement income than you're really going to need .

The real difficulty is uncertainty - inflation, how the stock market will do, will you have a job that lasts till your ideal retirement date, will something happen to your company pension, will future governments maintain the value of the state pension, etc. The best laid plans!

This might suggest more caution rather than less. But one of the uncertainties is, I'm sorry to mention it again, that you may not actually be alive at 60/65 or whatever, or in good enough health to enjoy driving, holidays etc.

I'm suggesting, I suppose, a balanced approach and that people think about what they want from their life now and in the future. Being 50 now I find myself in danger of becoming a pensions bore. But I still have at least 10 years to go, which is a long time to sit counting my pension pot!

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[Deleted User]

it is a LOT less than our salary but our needs are simple. We don`t smoke, we cycle for days out, take the bus on free passes. Eat very very well but all home cooking. Read the paper with a cup of coffee in our sunny kitchen in our lovely 5 year old town house, gorgeous views and a sun trap outside the kitchen. What I am saying is plan ahead ie where you will be living and downsize if appropriate so that you end up in an easy to maintain, insulated house. It costs a lot less to run than our previous house. Re holidays, we feel no need as we are in a beautiful situation here

I did timeline after timeline from about 5 years before retirement but I have even surprised myself on the economics

novice-saver

It's my view that you need to have a good margin in hand, above what you need to fund the lifestyle you want.

Even a fully index linked pension won't keep pace with the increases that you (as an OAP) will be paying on the things you need. So you will have a bit less buying power as each year passes.

While it's true that you will probably do a bit less and consequently spend a bit less as you age - reducing what money you need - there will increasingly be things you can't do which you may need to pay to be done for you.


It's a one way trip, and I really don't fancy being in genuine poverty for the last few years.