Early-retirement wannabe

westv

"It's ages away" or "Stop looking forward to being old" is what my wife often says when she knows I've been looking at pensions!

edinburgher

westv wrote: »

"It's ages away" or "Stop looking forward to being old" is what my wife often says when she knows I've been looking at pensions!

I never understood the complaint - *she* might be young enough to enjoy it :rotfl:

gadgetmind

edinburgher wrote: »

First conversation we've had about eventual ER when she didn't complain about discussing pensions when 'that's ages away'!

It will always be ages away unless you talk, think and act.

I get my wife to focus on this once year. We sit down in early April (natch) and I show how things are going, what's working well and what needs attention, what I've moved and what's been left alone, and how money has moved between cash, bonds, equities, etc.

Afterwards she always gives me a big kiss, and did even in 2008 and 2009.

Sterling is very flattering right now, so my fingers are crossed for April 2017.

mozza78

westv wrote: »

"It's ages away" or "Stop looking forward to being old" is what my wife often says when she knows I've been looking at pensions!

I live abroad and my GF of a year told me at dinner the other night she had absolutely no pension. Not even a state pension. Not a penny in savings either. She is a lawyer and doesnt earn a bad wage so I was rather shocked at her total lack of planning. Turns out her mother who is 64 also doesn't have one but plans just to continue working in her native South Africa and so has never discussed it with anyone. Managed to convince her we need to start looking into options for her.

gadgetmind

mozza78 wrote: »

She is a lawyer and doesnt earn a bad wage so I was rather shocked at her total lack of planning.

Read "The Millionaire Next Door" to see how common this is even for (and perhaps even "particularly for") those who in reality are well placed to be making such provision.

Wednesday2000

Just to speak up for women, I'm the one who does the budgeting and the reading and the planning for retirement in our relationship.:D

mozza78

gadgetmind wrote: »

Read "The Millionaire Next Door" to see how common this is even for (and perhaps even "particularly for") those who in reality are well placed to be making such provision.

Very true. I have worked with plenty of one time millionaires who haven't got a penny left except maybe a 10 year old Rolex, a rusting Lotus Esprit and some hazy memories of lap dancing clubs in the 80/90s. Most had no idea what pension provision was. Quite sad.

mozza78

Wednesday2000 wrote: »

Just to speak up for women, I'm the one who does the budgeting and the reading and the planning for retirement in our relationship.:D

Sorry, hope you don't think my post was a comment generalising about women, merely my situation. I live in Asia where its nearly always the woman in the household who looks after the finances!

gadgetmind

Wednesday2000 wrote: »

Just to speak up for women, I'm the one who does the budgeting and the reading and the planning for retirement in our relationship.:D

Yes, couples do tend to divide this stuff up in very different ways, and it often just evolves rather than being planned. For instance, my wife does all of the online banking, handles all the bills and direct debits, and all the insurance and utilities.

She also plans all the holidays as nothing would happen otherwise!

Everything to do with pensions, investments and tax is in my court.

Marine_life

Its interesting but I wonder how many couples have full financial transparency (we do) and we also have a fairly clear demarcation of activities whereby she does all the day to day bookkeeping (including my tax return).

I play for and book all the holidays.

There is an element of tension as she is very cautious with money and that dictates our approach to investments (and why we have so much money in cash). but that needs to change over the coming months. I see some interesting discussions coming.