Over 50's, how did you accumulate your wealth?

schoey123

How did you accumulate your wealth? I don't need specifics but more general themes. I'm interested to learn if there are patterns or different circumstances, paths people take.

Thanks,

jerrysimon

Keep going, working etc. Little by little the mortgage becomes more affordable and the pension contributions build.

Retired this year at 56. I would not class myself as wealthy in fact a lot of what I have seems by chance in terms of my house value tripling in value (not really wealth unless I sell it), PS DB pension started when I was 16 (who thinks about pensions at that age) and a small inheritance that paid off my mortgage a few years ago.

Although we need money to live, of equal importance I have realised is your health and state of mind.

Its been a strange last six months since I retired. I have found myself doing a lot more reflection of years gone past, maybe the lack of daily grind and pressure allows you to sit back and think a little.

With a 14 month old first grandson and another on its way wealth can be measured in many ways.

I guess summing up, I would say keep going, keep loving and with some luck/fortune it "can" come together.

missile

Save more than you spend :-)

worried_jim

missile wrote: »

Save more than you spend :-)

And what you save into a pension scheme.

Cash-Cows

Started saving early into pensions and investments, started at 18.
Bought our (second) home at 26 and instead of trading up and up kept it. Nothing reduces cash like paying mortgages. So our low cost interest only tracker mortgage was paid off in 10 years and consistently increased pension and ISA contributions.

jerrysimon

Although I agree "save more than you spend" is excellent advice, I have to say up until a few years ago we never had any savings.

Paying the mortgage and raising a family always left us with zero balance or for many years an overdraft

Linton

Very difficult to say since my detailed records only go back to 1999. So best guess:

Omitting wages and pension income used for expenditure...

Largest first...
1) return on investments and DC pensions
2) savings and personal pension contributions from income
3) house price inflation
4) inheritance and gifts
5) employer pension payments

Wenlock

I don't really have any significant "wealth" but I did manage to retire at 50 on a small occupational pension.

The "secret" was living frugally, overpaying/offsetting the mortgage and downsizing prior to retirement to clear the remaining mortgage and leave some savings and investments.

I now have vey low outgoings and enough cash to cover unexpected or one-off expenses.

Terron

I didn't save more than I spent, but I spent less than I earned.
I lost money on my forst two homes, but more than made up for it on the third.
I put quite a bit into pensions, most of which (5/6) did pretty well.
What I had left I invested, sometimes well, sometimes not so well.
I also inherited a bit.

LHW99

Avoided loans as far as possible, started investing early, even though I didn't know much when I started, always tried to save 50% of any pay rise, never opted out of wok pensions (although I had one automatically transferred to a very tiny insurance co after my first job, as I left after a year and that was what they did).
The one thing I regret is that it was so difficult to find out the details of financial products in the early days, so ended up with things like with profits endowments, and went with the general opinion that you shouldn't try and pay off your mortgage early.

tacpot12

Slowly, I bought my first house with two friends, then I bought a house with my wife, then I bought a house on my own - due to divorce :-( - then I bought a house to let out with my partner. So I went from owning a third of a house to owning half, to owning a whole house and finally a house and a half!

I got lucky with pensions - the new md of the business I worked in wanted a good pension for himself, so set up a group personal pension scheme for the whole company; I had no idea about investing as a 25 year old but over the next 25 years, spending some pay rises and putting some into the pension has paid off.

I've been a computer contractor when it was very lucrative and put the extra money over what I needed for my current lifestyle into my pension.

I did get into a lot of debt after my divorce; at one point in rhe 1990s, I owed £12,000 on credit cards and had a mortgage of about £30k. So recovery from debt possible - earning a lot and focusing on clearing the debt recovered the situation in a surprisingly short amount of time. I think it took two and half years to get to the point where the mortgage was my only debt.

I started to track my net worth around that time. That helped me focus on not spending money without good reason.

My partner taught me to budget for expected expenses and I now budget for all my regular and irregular expenses.

I've just retired, aged 53 and a half.