Early-retirement wannabe

MallyGirl

I think that is what my Mum was thinking about. Sounds perfect for her.

penwise

Thanks for the reply

I'm sorry that i was not clear - the service i was referring to was the 'good advocates' - ie help in getting to the right care home etc rather than just one the council puts you in.

lisyloo

penwise wrote: »

Thanks for the reply

I'm sorry that i was not clear - the service i was referring to was the 'good advocates' - ie help in getting to the right care home etc rather than just one the council puts you in.

The people who would understand which home is the best for your personal circumstances are the people who know you well i.e. close family or close friends.


We visited about 20 residential/nursing homes, not to mention multiple phone calls, emails and meetings. Admittedly my MIL was a difficult/borderline case, but it's going to cost a fortune to pay a solicitor or other representative to do that.


Do you really have no family or friends at all?

penwise

I do, but they are all around my own age or quite a bit older and most of them would not be good at dealing with this sort of thing anyway.

Thankfully I am not in the situation when this is currently on the horizon.

I was trying to get a feel for what is out there should the need arise.

Thanks again Lisyloo- your posts here have helped me do that .

AnotherJoe

lisyloo wrote: »

Another vote for dont count on it.
My MILs life is pitiful, but she has lost capacity so can’t decide to go to Switzerland.

If you really fell that’s an option for you then you need to document your wishes, but it’s still hard to be definitive I.e. who can decide when your life is no longer worth living? How are you going to define that?

Nothing is certain. All yiu can do is play the odds.

AnotherJoe

lisyloo wrote: »

Yes many people want the advantages but also like their home.

I have no issue with it, but I’ll give you an example where it won’t always solve the care issue.

My MIL and FIL downsized from a 3 bed home to a flat when they were 74. Earlier than some but they were both disabled.
They went from £135k to £99k so didn’t free up a massive amount as flat are expansive compared to 3 bed semis but they had a few cruises.

When it came to MIl going into nursing care at 89, they could not downsize as the year were already in a flat.
They didn’t have to pay.
Luckily we found somewhere nice not perfect but caring but many of the places we saw were appaulling and we only got here someonwhere nice by strong advocacy and MIl being in hospital where the LA get fined for bed blocked which meant they didn’t want a length delay.

So be aware that if you downsize early (which may be a great idea especially if your losing your mobility) and spend some of the money (remember retirement flats and bungalows come at a premium) then you may be unable to sell/downsize later on if one person is remaining in a small property.

To take this specific example, the £36k they realised, even if they'd kept it and not spent it on cruises, would only have lasted for 6 months anyway, so taking the cruises worked out well.

hugheskevi

Primarily out of idle curiosity, I have planned out my future in the same way you might provide regular reports on a project and its various strands. A more complex model underlies the overall plan, but that is only fully accurate on 6th April each year (it could be made completely accurate, but it would be more work than is justified). This plan updates automatically each day.

To recap, myself and partner currently aged almost 41, planning to retire in about 3-5 years.

The table below plots out progress against each future phase of life, based on amount of pension currently accrued and showing what the position would be if I retired now. I decided to use two scenarios, one being a central scenario and one a 'cautious' scenario which uses the highest possible figures I would want in each phase - a sort of 'no compromises' retirement I suppose (other than having to work longer to fund it!). Note, obviously house purchase is not income per year, that is a one-off expense to purchase the house we will retire to (I assume I sell current house and all assets prior to going traveling). The phases largely correspond with when different DB and DC pension sources become available. All figures are in real price terms and are on a household basis (ie cover both myself and wife). For simplicity of calculation, DC returns are assumed to be in line with price growth (so extremely pessimistic).



There are by necessity a few assumptions needed about how capital is divided between the pots - these are mostly set to smooth income across the different periods, as far as possible. I could have allocated funds exclusively to one pot, eg, house purchase, first and then fill up other pots sequentially, for example. Note that the central scenario has income increasing in real price terms so that income is constant relative to expected earnings growth up to State Pension age.

Whilst this exercise doesn't really help me too much as I already have a very detailed plan and model, I think it is helpful to illustrate the need to focus on multiple different elements at the same time, and not to focus exclusively on one element to the detriment of other elements of the plan. Most commonly that would be focusing on fully paying a mortgage to the detriment of pension planning. It may of course be optimal to focus more on one strand at different times, eg, for tax efficiency, but having a plan covering all strands will be most efficient overall.

In my case, my regular work pension contributions will continue over the next few years and take my long-term pension up past 100%. In a couple of years some nice DB AVCs my wife and I have access to with cease, and we will make a few more DC contributions too in that time, as the tax relief is too tempting. When the DB AVCs cease due to reaching maximum value permitted (financial year 2020/21) I plan that we will both go part-time, so as to reduce our income to around the higher-rate tax threshold to avoid paying 40% tax. Again, that is just for efficiency, as there is no need to pay high rates of tax just to retire slightly earlier, we'd prefer to relax and work that bit longer (although less days in work overall, as the lower tax increases net income per day worked).

With each additional year worked, it is one less year in the 'post travel to age 50' column, and the amount of capital available to fund the period up to age 55 increases - the period after age 55 being most efficiently funded by pension contributions.

Bimbly

I'm surprised at the number of people wanting to downsize to a flat on retirement. Sounds miserable. Get a smaller place, yes, or a bungalow. But a flat? After being in a house? I like my own space and not being on top (and underneath and to the side) of other people.

Having said that, I met a couple who had downsized to a flat on retirement and were coping with it ok. But they had done so to free up money for travelling and they weren't at home that much. It was a sacrifice that was working well for them.

I suppose I've never lived in a flat. I'm probably missing something.

DairyQueen

Bimbly wrote: »

I'm surprised at the number of people wanting to downsize to a flat on retirement. Sounds miserable. Get a smaller place, yes, or a bungalow. But a flat? After being in a house? I like my own space and not being on top (and underneath and to the side) of other people.

Having said that, I met a couple who had downsized to a flat on retirement and were coping with it ok. But they had done so to free up money for travelling and they weren't at home that much. It was a sacrifice that was working well for them.

I suppose I've never lived in a flat. I'm probably missing something.

Depends on the flat. The usual applies: the higher the price relative to the average price in your area the more space, privacy and peace.

We have two homes. One is a 2-bed Victorian semi and the other a flat in a converted mill. The former is traffic and neighbour hell in the country whilst the latter sits above the busy-ness of town life and is so well noise-insulated that the neighbours are invisible. It also has the advantage of zero external maintenance and a large terrace.

I know which I prefer.

We will be selling both on retirement and replace with a house (in the middle of a field) but our final home is likely to be a flat rather than a bungalow. House maintenance is a pain once you reach your late 70s. Come to think of it, house maintenance is a pain at any age but at least you have the time and capability to deal with it in early retirement.

atush

A big thing of a flat over a bungalow is the maintenance of both the property and the garden. which is fine if you are 70, but maybe not so at 85.

I prefer a bungalow in the above choice, but am not too old to take care of a house/garden yet.