conflicts in retirement

Newly_retired

So a year has gone by and he has now retired officially, but not a lot else has changed.
He has done a bit of decluttering and is still onside for moving eventually but not in any hurry.
I'd like to invest some of the savings into a different property, get it how we'd like it, then the rest of savings is ours to spend or put away for grandchildren or save for a rainy day.
Interest rates are not on my side at the moment to keep it in savings.
Interesting reading though, a year on!

annberlin

It takes time to get used to being retired for both of you. When we first retired OH used to ask me every day what we were having for lunch and dinner at the breakfast table ( jeez) just in case HE had to take something from the freezer bear in mind he never cooked a meal in his life lol! He just needed to have a purpose. I used to still get up at six just like I did when working still rushing around like time was short. You know what we both got a project that suited us and eventually we settled down to the down sizing and travelling that we always talked about so just give him time. He will come round but not if you insist on confronting him. Anyway I wish you both a happy retirement

Mojisola

annberlin wrote: »

He will come round but not if you insist on confronting him. Anyway I wish you both a happy retirement

He may not if he loves his job. We've got one oldie in the family who has only just given up his part-time job and he's in his 90s.

Newly_retired

We have had a number of conversations- progress.
We obviously have very different ideas.

He is not really interested in long holidays, but has agreed to a short break, in addition to the week already booked for the summer.

We have looked at several houses online and here again, have very different expectations. Some of his are unrealistic. I want less stuff and a simpler lifestyle. He wants a bigger place to house all his stuff.
At our stage of life, I don't want the maintenance of a bigger house. I want to downsize somewhat.

But at least we are able to talk about it.

Dunroamin

Your different ideas on holidays shouldn't be a problem as you can go on your own. The house move might be more of a problem, although you could look for a smaller house but with a lot of storage, which is what we have done.

seven-day-weekend

Maybe look for a smaller house but with enough land to have a couple of outbuildings where he could have his 'stuff'. You can't really expect him to get rid of all of his stuff.

Make the garden as low-maintenance as possible and then spend some money on having a gardener once a week.

Then you have a small easy house, he still has his stuff, neither of you have the upkeep of a large house and garden.

Newly_retired

seven-day-weekend wrote: »

Maybe look for a smaller house but with enough land to have a couple of outbuildings where he could have his 'stuff'. You can't really expect him to get rid of all of his stuff.

Make the garden as low-maintenance as possible and then spend some money on having a gardener once a week.

Then you have a small easy house, he still has his stuff, neither of you have the upkeep of a large house and garden.

Our conclusions too!

Newly_retired

Update!
Going for a couple of house viewings tomorrow!!

margaretclare

We don't like long holidays either. We don't much like the idea of being stuck in one place for too long. What we do is to have multiples of 'short breaks'. We're going away soon, will be away for 2 weeks up to the west of Scotland/western isles but we'll only be staying in one place for 2-3 nights max. Even when we drove down the Rhine valley a few years ago, the longest we stayed was 5 nights at Friedrichshaven.

seven-day-weekend

Newly_retired wrote: »

Update!
Going for a couple of house viewings tomorrow!!

Yay! Keep us posted.

We are viewing a ground floor flat in about half an hour. We're not ready to live in a flat yet, but it looks suitable for the future and we are going to see if it is possible to have it as a buy-to-let until we are ready to live in it.