Early-retirement wannabe

[Deleted User]

Bet it's like a weight lifted off your shoulders now that you've made a decision. All the best for the next part of your plan. I'm sure you will find a new enthusiasm for your work, knowing it's not for much longer and that you could really finish anytime you choose.

I hope you still intend to keep this thread up, as I and many others enjoy your updates. Happy skiing at weekends!

Wentthedaywell?

kidmugsy wrote: »

With early retirement, I was offered it by the company but my Head of Department didn't want me to go. We compromised on an 18 month delay. With all the weight off my shoulders, and a shorter horizon to worry about, I was remarkably productive for those months, and they flew by.

I so agree with this sentiment. I've got 2 years to go till 60, but I may stick it out if I can possibly bear it for up to another 2 years. I feel I need to build up a bit more of a nest egg.

However with the finishing line in view, I feel so less stressed and a weight off my shoulders. I'll probably be gone by the time projects with a long lead in start being problematic. Providing I keep my nose clean, there's nothing they can do to me - redundancy would be actually OK now, I'd get my pension early. And once I'm 60 and in extra time, if anything gets too much, I can just walk out. Oh the freedom, I can smell it already!

Prudent

Thrugelmir wrote: »

When your not working to pay the "bills" then I believe one becomes more relaxed. One's pay check can be spent as one wishes. I'd happily be made redundant now as would receive a sizable pay off! With a combination of holiday entitlement and flexi day leave amounting to 58 days a year. I feel part time anyway as working less than 4 days a week whilst receiving full time pay.

I would agree with your post. Since 2008 my job has been getting steadily more stressful. By that time I had already paid off the mortgage and began seriously saving. I began to consider what I would need to retire early and started working towards that goal by tracking and reducing spending and by saving as much as I could. I now have enough to live comfortably until my occupational and state pensions kick in (allowing for inflation). I am 49 and have decided it is feels too early to depart from the world of work although I will soon be looking at part- time or a different kind of work. For now I am still full time, but when it is simply 'money for enjoyment' the whole dynamic changes. If I go in one day and have had enough I can simply resign without worries. Nothing matters in the same way because I am not dependent on it.

kidmugsy

Prudent wrote: »

I am 49 and have decided it is feels too early to depart from the world of work although I will soon be looking at part- time or a different kind of work.

Part-time work calls for a lot of discipline and backbone on your part, judging by my wife's experience. They paid her part-time but seemed to heap a full-time job pile on her. She returned to full time work. It was different when she was self-employed: she just billed them by the hour or by the task.

SJD48

Marine_life wrote: »

A couple of posters have made comments as to the reasons why they retired early and I would like to hear from others as to what drove them.

From where I stand today the reasons are really not yet completely clear. I need to get those ideas straight over the next four years but they are not fully clear yet.

Part of the planning is driven by fear. That fear comes from a) The fear of redundancy - I am in a relatively high paid job and you always feel vulnerable combined with the fact that I would never get into a similarly paid job b) Pressure, Stress - partially driven by a. but also the pressure has increased over the last few years. Therefore I have always wanted to be in a position where if I am to go into retirement I want it to be my choice and not something I am pushed into.

The real blocker (if you can call it that) is I want to continue to support the children through school / university and my son will be in university in four years.

So whether to go at 50 or not depends on a lot of factors - but I don't want finances to be one of them!

I worked at a company for over 20 years. Enjoyed going to work every day, had great friends at the workplace - company taken-over and everything changed and ended up redundant. 7 years on and I've had a couple of different jobs that just aren't the same.

I'm lucky I had a DB pension fund that due to low Gilts was worth a decent amount. Calculated if I worked for another 6.5 years until 55 with average growth of 5.5% pa until then I will hit the lifetime allowance at that point. For my lifestyle that's plenty for me to live on considering I expect to retain my pension pot and generate approx 5% income to drawdown from the pot.

My advice to younger people is if it's possible make your pension contribution early retirement target. You never know how your mindset will change and you may up like me desperate to retire at the earliest date possible and that new car might be better invested in your pension as it will be in the scrapyard when you're working at B&Q at 70 because you've been hit by the pension timebomb.

Marine_life

gfplux wrote: »

I suspect that many of us who are retired were pushed in some way.....

...or perhaps pulled? And by that I mean, the pushed part if clear i.e. I am sure there are plenty out there who have been forced to effectively retire early as they were made redundant later in their careers and found it difficult to get back in. I also suspect there were others who had a strong “calling” to do something else and couldn’t wait for their final freedom.
I wonder how many of “me” there are out there? I.e. those unlikely to be made redundant (or if I am it will come as a bloody surprise) but who don’t have a strong enough passion to pursue something else and therefore the default is to do nothing. Or almost nothing.
There is a danger and it goes a little bit like this. We have an early retirement scheme that kicks in at 56 which means if you wait until then (5 years away) you yet 15 months’ pay-off. A very sizeable chunk of money indeed.
But at the moment I think I’m expecting to do just less than two more years and we will see where that leads us.

kidmugsy

After I took early retirement my employer offered me a small part-time job, paid effectively as piece work. I did it for three months, just to help out with my expertise. I then decided that I'd rather be in the garden, and declined the offer of more work. Quite how they replaced my expertise was not my worry.

tony4147

I'm 52 and would like to retire at 62, but it is all very dependent on my wife.
My wife is 53 and a Teacher in a secondary school and been teaching about 12 years and is on a very good salary as she is also Head of Department.
Unfourtunately the Head has a habit of pushing older members of staff out of the school by making life diffcult etc, and for what they pay my wife they could hire two younger Teachers, so my wife doesn't really see herself getting past 55 when really she would like to work until 60, and we need her to work to 60 so that I can go at 62.
So unfortunately I think it will 65/67 before I can retire.

chucknorris

Marine_life wrote: »

Thanks

Its been a weird year.

One of my colleagues died in February from lung cancer, he was only 1 year older than me. It kind of puts things into perspective but I waiver between those moments which seems to be life defining and the practicalities / nuances of day to day life. Its like driving past a traffic accident, you look and slow down for the next few miles but it doesn't last. I am not trivializing the life of a colleague just trying to overlay a dose of realism.

When the moment comes it will be weird, very weird. But we've now passed 1 July which means (according to my contract - 6 months notice from the end of the quarter in which you hand in your notice), I'm actually not going until March 2016. Its funny but my spreadsheets always had the options of retiring at 50, 51 and 52. I wonder whether it was a bit prophetic.

For me the turning point was our last (not current) dog dying of cancer, losing Mills drove the point home that life is so fragile. That was just over 2 years ago, and I have now told my employer that I will retire next summer, just before the start of the next academic year (aged 58). IMO we have easily passed the point where we are working to eventually leave money to friends and favourite charities anyway (we don't have any children).

atush

tony4147 wrote: »

I'm 52 and would like to retire at 62, but it is all very dependent on my wife.
My wife is 53 and a Teacher in a secondary school and been teaching about 12 years and is on a very good salary as she is also Head of Department.
Unfourtunately the Head has a habit of pushing older members of staff out of the school by making life diffcult etc, and for what they pay my wife they could hire two younger Teachers, so my wife doesn't really see herself getting past 55 when really she would like to work until 60, and we need her to work to 60 so that I can go at 62.
So unfortunately I think it will 65/67 before I can retire.

If she thinks she will be pushed, maybe she should look to transfer elsewhere, or to take a job at a private school, or if she gets the shove she should look to do supply work.

I for one would be onto the Union to earn their crust the second I got any such shenanigans off the head. It is constructive dismissal and is against the law.