How much do you need to retire?

kangoora

torbrex wrote: »

Council tax is paid from a seperate fund, it was £76/month last year, I have no mortgage, it was paid off some years ago.

I have been poor on low income a few times in my adult life so I've learned how to be frugal when I need to be, it also helped me to save when times were good.
My grocery bill averages out at under £20/week and utilities are £67/month.

Well, assuming you will get the full state pension on hitting retirement age (as long as you are eligible) you will probably feel positively rich on getting an extra £150/WEEK.

torbrex

Notfarfromtheborder wrote: »

Good effort, would love some tips!

My only secret really was paying off the mortgage early then putting the money that I was paying into a seperate fund, I now use that fund for car repairs/insurance and house repairs/council tax/insurance, there is enough in that fund for another 10 years and possibly another car if I am clever.

kangoora wrote: »

Well, assuming you will get the full state pension on hitting retirement age (as long as you are eligible) you will probably feel positively rich on getting an extra £150/WEEK.

I am not sure if I will get the full state pension, I have asked for an estimate to see if i can make it up with extra NI payments but yes, it will be like a wage rise.
I have 3 seperate pension funds, 2 of which I will deplete and use for income over the course of the next ten years and the third will give a lump sum and income for when I hit my 'official' retirement.

torbrex

Judi wrote: »

Heck that's low.


Oh and how do you budget for clothes and birthday/Christmas?

I don't have any birthday or christmas expenses at all, clothes I wear out then replace when I am on holiday, it is much cheaper to fill my case when in America than it is here.
My suitcase is already about half full of clothes that will get their last outing in Hawaii and I will then buy more new ones when there. (I am not a slave to fashion which helps)

racing_blue

So you live on £215 per month... but have a car fund, a house maintenance funds, a council tax fund, a Hawaii fund (?) etc etc, any other funds?

NoMore

Yes torbrex you seem to be slightly misrepresenting your position.

You may well have an income of only £215 per month, but your outgoings seem to be higher just that you cover those with other 'funds'.

Your not really living off your income of £215 alone, which people are thinking you are.

torbrex

racing_blue wrote: »

So you live on £215 per month... but have a car fund, a house maintenance funds, a council tax fund, a Hawaii fund (?) etc etc, any other funds?

I have an income of £215/month, I have 2 seperate funds available to draw from for specific things, a holiday fund and a maintenance fund, if you had read my posts you would have seen this.
Nowhere did I state that I lived off £215/month.

Some might call it planning for the future.

torbrex

The original question was 'How much do you need to retire'

I answered that accurately and it would seem that is not good enough for some people, you seem to want details of all my outgoings as well.

Cyberman60

Loughton_Monkey wrote: »

It is partly psychological, and partly 'common sense' that when we retire, we need (want) to continue spending roughly the same amount. [Note this is not the same as having the same income].

Our lifestyle is firmly set by the amount we spend. When we retire, we still want to insure and maintain our house, and keep the gas/electric supply going. We want the same quality of food, the same type of holidays, do the same for Christmas, drive around in the same quality of car.....

Whether you are a brain surgeon, or a lowly paid supermarket worker, you have the opportunity during the last 20 years or so of working life to manage the cost of your lifestyle carefully so that it can be maintained when you retire. It's basically simple mathematics. Every £1 that we choose not to add to our cost of living is another £1 in the 'pension fund'.

We are all individuals with our unique combination of circumstances, income, needs, desires, savings..... When that magic day of retirement comes, it does not turn us into 'zombies' who follow a textbook definition of 'what income we need in retirement'.

I don't agree. I lowered my expectations to be able to retire at 52, eight years ago. I still have the same car but maintain it myself, cancelled gym memberships (I just walk a lot instead) and made a lot of sensible cuts to unnecessary expenditure, such as saving nearly 300 quid a year on my water bill by having a meter installed, and dumping my phone contract to save almost another 200 quid a year. Retiring also allows a fortune to be saved on daily commutes to work.:D

LXdaddy

torbrex wrote: »

I have an income of £215/month, I have 2 seperate funds available to draw from for specific things, a holiday fund and a maintenance fund, if you had read my posts you would have seen this.
Nowhere did I state that I lived off £215/month.

Some might call it planning for the future.

Torbrex, I admire your forward planning to be able to get to the point where a monthly income of £215/month plus some capital that you draw down for specific classes of expenditure satisfies your lifestyle.

This board is great - we see people with distinctly different positions and almost always people are prepared to give helpful advice and share their knowledge. Two adjacent posts I read this afternoon had one person wondering what to do with £100,000 and the next was what to do with £50 per month.

Goldiegirl

Cyberman60 wrote: »

I don't agree. I lowered my expectations to be able to retire at 52, eight years ago. I still have the same car but maintain it myself, cancelled gym memberships (I just walk a lot instead) and made a lot of sensible cuts to unnecessary expenditure, such as saving nearly 300 quid a year on my water bill by having a meter installed, and dumping my phone contract to save almost another 200 quid a year. Retiring also allows a fortune to be saved on daily commutes to work.:D

We took a similar approach. I wouldn't say we exactly lowered our expectations, but we were willing to make compromises, to make the early retirement possible, for example, going down to one car when we stopped working.


Our plan was to able to have a similar standard of living when we retired as when we were working.


In order to do this we've cut all unnecessary expenditure such as the second car, and Sky TV, which we were barely watching. We now cook virtually everything from scratch, and save a lot on our previous grocery bills. I try to generate additional income from eBaying (I'm in the middle of a massive declutter), and from vouchers, points, cashbacks etc. We try to take advantage of off peak rates for things like cinema and theatre, and hope to have low cost days out in the summer using our National Trust membership, and by taking a packed lunch rather than eating out.


As an example of our activities, we waited until it was 20% off day at M&S yesterday, and had a splurge on clothes, using a gift card and vouchers that I had stockpiled. As a result, we've bought lots of new clothes for no cash outlay at all.


As Cyberman says, the saving on commuting costs is massive - we last filled our car up with petrol on 20th January.


It's early days in our retirement, but our planning appears to be working. We are maintaining a comfortable life by spending a lot less than we did, say 3 years ago.