How much do you spend in retirement ?

Ceme3000

barnstar2077 said:

I feel obligated to chip in to represent the lower end of the budget!  :  )

I could quite happily retire today on 12k a year.  Assuming I have a few thousand in a an emergency fund and that the 12k was adjusted for inflation annually.

All my bills, including food shopping, only comes to £450 a month.  I don't drive, and my mortgage cost is peanuts since I greatly increased the term.

So my plan is to retire at 55 and to pay myself whatever the personal allowance is for that year is (currently at £12,500.)

Anything more than that will probably go to friends and family who are either just starting out or who have not been as fortunate as myself.

To me retirement is just not working and having time to do what I enjoy most.  Which is picturesque walks, inexpensive lunches with friends and family, and the pursuit of cheap hobbies (cycling, gaming, museums and galleries etc.)

Edit:  Having just checked, the personal allowance was only £6475 in 2010, so it would seem unlikely that I will need the full personal allowance to live on in twelve years time when I plan to retire.  Even adjusting for inflation my bills will definitely not have doubled by then!

Finally a post in this thread I can relate to!
You've summed up my life perfectly.  I'm 53, early retired following redundancy and am perfectly happy living the lifestyle you describe.   Every day feels like a holiday, I'm single and love just not going to work every day. Hobbies are walking,  brewing, gardening, playing bridge, occasionally I have lunches out.  I stay in a hotel every Christmas and take a couple of 5 day walking breaks a year. 
 
I have no mortgage, I run an old car and my lifestyle consumes about £850 a month (essential bills and groceries are £500), although I have reasonable savings as well to cover big ticket items.

When I get to 55 I intend draining my SIPP over 5 years up to my annual tax allowance and then at 60 I will claim my DB pensions.

Life is what you make of it.

frugal90

agree ceme3000
we like the cheap things, being able to run first thing in the morning, then yoga in the garden at the moment in the good weather.
maybe a trip to do the shopping by bike, then working in the veg plot or the polytunnel, maybe some painting.
A bit of planning for the next big cycle tour or trek, while we still can!
At the moment we have £1620 coming in per month plus I took a lump sum of £5K earlier this year from the sipp, tax free. 
Our bank balance is getting bigger, even though we bought a new to us car last year and are to get a new shed this year, laying the base ourselves.
We love our lives at the moment, no mortgage freedom is great.

ratechaser

What I love about this thread is the spectrum of chosen lifestyles that it's drawn out. 

Whilst I will maintain that, relative to my professional peer group, I have a pretty modest existence, it is nonetheless one that many (most?) would consider wildly extravagant. And yet at the same time I get a small thrill from being MSE in some ways. I haggle ruthlessly on holidays, phone contracts, broadband, TV and the like. I exploit TopCashback, credit cards and other rewards wherever possible, and a few years back I even played the 'bank switching' game for a bit of fun. 

Yes I've been fortunate in life through my career choices (working my a@se off at the same time, so not all luck!), and I think this attitude has helped me to be in a position where I will be able to retire, at a time that suits me, and in a way that I can have the lifestyle I want. Hopefully the same will be true for you all as well...

All I have to do now is persuade Mrs RC that flat seats on planes are worth it. Not an easy one but chipping away. 

Best wishes
RC

Murphy_The_Cat

ratechaser said:

What I love about this thread is the spectrum of chosen lifestyles that it's drawn out. 

All I have to do now is persuade Mrs RC that flat seats on planes are worth it. Not an easy one but chipping away. 

Best wishes
RC

It's a battle worth fighting, but potentially a very expensive one - once you've turned left on a plane, its something that you're likely to waant to do again !

p.s. if you are going to do it, make it worthwhile.  A BC class seat to Hawaii can cost the same as a  BC seat to New York despite it being a much longet trip. As ever, cost and value etc.

ratechaser

Murphy_The_Cat said:

ratechaser said:

What I love about this thread is the spectrum of chosen lifestyles that it's drawn out. 

All I have to do now is persuade Mrs RC that flat seats on planes are worth it. Not an easy one but chipping away. 

Best wishes
RC

It's a battle worth fighting, but potentially a very expensive one - once you've turned left on a plane, its something that you're likely to waant to do again !

p.s. if you are going to do it, make it worthwhile.  A BC class seat to Hawaii can cost the same as a  BC seat to New York despite it being a much longet trip. As ever, cost and value etc.

Oh don't worry, Mrs RC and I have become extremely familiar with the pointy end of the plane over the years (there wasn't even a flat bed when I first started...). But it's much easier to enjoy/justify when work is paying for it! No stranger to either this or the black arts of airline miles, tier points and status. Sadly the current circumstances mean that I may be losing my BA silver for the first time in (almost) living memory, but... first world problems eh...

On the subject of distance/value, there were some really 'interesting' tier point runs to Hawaii a couple of years back, almost enough to renew your gold card in one trip. But again, too convoluted for me to ever be able to sell to Mrs RC. One step at a time...

vulcanrtb

I've 'turned left' many times on flights with work. It's not something I will ever pay for out of my own pocket and in retirement I will never fly again. I'd prefer to drive across Europe (though not sure how simple that will be from next year.....)
I would love for Mrs Vulcanrtb to experience 'turning left' (what a horrible phrase), but she would shriek at the cost!

Murphy_The_Cat

vulcanrtb said:

I would love for Mrs Vulcanrtb to experience 'turning left' (what a horrible phrase), but she would shriek at the cost!

If you'd love her to do it, book it and don't tell her the cost.  Simples.

Happy Wife

Happy Life.

Nebulous2

There are lots of compromises to be made to get where you want to be in retirement. My one is time versus money. We are in the middle of a convoluted downsizing by buying a second home plan. We’ve had it for almost 2 years now, but haven’t been able to visit for 3 months due to Coronavirus. The doing it up to the standard we want to retire to plan hasn’t progressed in the way it should have either. It’s far too easy to go there for a weekend, open a couple of beers and walk the dogs, because it is quite liveable the way it is. 

With 9 years to go to state pension age I could stop now with a pension of about £24k.  By selling our main home I could add £10k a year to that until state pension age and still have a cushion left. By hanging on a year I would add £4K to that, half from additional pension and half from drawing more from our capital. Waiting until state pension age would have me retire on more money than I’m currently earning. 

Lifestyle plans don’t include many long haul flights. We get a lot of enjoyment from caravanning and cycling. Spending the summer here and most of the winter touring the continent in a caravan would be the plan. That doesn’t cost a huge amount. It does require a degree of fitness however and who knows how long that will last? I’ve holidayed a lot in France and spoken to a lot of people who tour in motor homes. It suddenly struck me last year. It’s very rare to meet anyone who has been doing that for more than 10 years. Lots of people who have been doing it for 6, 7, 8 years, but very few for more than 10. So it has a limited life, depending on health and confidence. Which makes the question all the more important; when do I pull the trigger? 

chiefie

For those that love business class - remember in a plane crash it’s better to be at the back 😂

fred246

The whole idea of business class is that you only do it because someone else is paying. It's not meant for retired people. It's nice but very poor value for money.