How much to live on

Albermarle

£25000 for a three week cruise!

Just to put things in some perspective, I live quite close to a very wealthy area ( but not in it !)  and in recent years the local garden centres have been slowly but surely going up market.

Visiting one of them over Easter, I noticed a rather striking display of garden ornaments. I checked the price of one -- £27,000.......... and others were similar.

Not very MSE !

Frogletina

blue.peter said:

[Deleted User] said:

£25000 for a three week cruise! You can actually do a world cruise for a few thousand less.

That'd be halfway tempting for me. I rather fancy the idea of going round the world on the surface (i.e., no flying), but not entirely on ships. I'd like to do some of it by train - notably across North America, maybe other bits as well. I also don't like the look of those huge floating hotels that seem to dominate cruising. They look so top-heavy as to be a capsize waiting to happen, and appear to have next to no open deck space. I recall my grandfather going on a trip to Australia and having a passenger cabin on a cargo ship. I wonder if that still happens? I wonder how much such a trip would cost? I ought to look into it.

My grandmother was housekeeper to a retired schoolmaster who used to travel on cargo ships every winter. They were limited to 12 passengers, but sometimes only two or three. He always wanted to go to Australia, but never made it there. As a young girl in the 60s I used to see lots of slides of his adventures and his treasures from the far east and other places. 

I've just found a newspaper clipping (dated 1964) in which he said he was sailing from London to Hong Kong on/around 16 December, and returning sometime in March. During that time he would celebrate his 71st birthday. 

It would be costing him, as I remember him telling me, around £5 a day. 

BooJewels

You'd have to pay me £25k to go on a cruise - I can't think of a less suitable holiday for me.  I go on holiday to get away from people, not be crammed into a tin can with absolutely loads of them - especially if there's hot weather and alcohol involved.

[Deleted User]

Well In have just done a quick exercise to estimate how much I would need to live on my own in my current house. The figure comes out at about £19700. This includes everything apart from holidays. Using savings for holidays just for period up to July.

Essential Bills come to £9500, Personal Spends £3600, Annual Bills and Expenses £6600 (This includes Car Service, MOT, Road Tax, Car Insurance, House Insurance, TV Licence, Christmas, Clothes, Birthdays, House Maintenance and garden.)

My current income from small annuity and works pension is currently £20796 after tax so that's ok lol! I actually save the difference at the moment into a S&S ISA.

From July annual income, after tax, increases to just over £30000 so I will able to finance some travel add once again to savings.

Albermarle

blue.peter said:

[Deleted User] said:

£25000 for a three week cruise! You can actually do a world cruise for a few thousand less.

That'd be halfway tempting for me. I rather fancy the idea of going round the world on the surface (i.e., no flying), but not entirely on ships. I'd like to do some of it by train - notably across North America, maybe other bits as well. I also don't like the look of those huge floating hotels that seem to dominate cruising. They look so top-heavy as to be a capsize waiting to happen, and appear to have next to no open deck space. I recall my grandfather going on a trip to Australia and having a passenger cabin on a cargo ship. I wonder if that still happens? I wonder how much such a trip would cost? I ought to look into it.

They do still exist but after Covid stopped them all, only a small number have resumed offering passenger accommodation. Also not necessarily cheaper than a cruise.

helensbiggestfan

Cruises.......there really is no one size fits all, there is so much choice.  Everything from the large floating gin palaces to small sailing ships sailing in flotillas.  I generally prefer the smaller to medium sized ships, although to be fair the larger ships do tend to cope better with rough seas.   

Whilst it might seem that some of the larger ships can appear a bit like "Butlins" you don't have to engage with other passengers if you don't want to.  You can be as sociable as you like or just keep yourself to yourself,  it's not compulsory to join in with organised activities.  There are usually plenty of quiet corners where you can relax with a book or just sit and watch the horizon.  

My last big cruise was 6 weeks to the Amazon and the Caribbean, set sail in January and missed the worst of the winter, no flying. Came in at around £5k plus spending money. I thought it was a bargain and loved every minute. Even the stormy Atlantic. Lol.  

I am hoping for another bucket list trip either next year or early 2026.  Just need to move house first. I have a few bucket list type trips which I should really concentrate on before I get too old and decrepit.  Having said that when I went to China there were several people aged 80 plus on our tour so age isn't necessarily a barrier.  All the more reason to work on my health and fitness so I can keep travelling the world.  

Baron.........Sounds like you are going to be just fine.  

I haven't quite finished by financial year end stuff.  I did receive my private health insurance renewal the other day.  I did wonder if it would still be affordable.  Pleased to say it's only gone up by £9 a month so that's fine by me. I may not be wealthy but I still have fat I can trim off the budget if needs be

Organgrinder

[Deleted User] said:

Well In have just done a quick exercise to estimate how much I would need to live on my own in my current house. The figure comes out at about £19700. This includes everything apart from holidays. Using savings for holidays just for period up to July.

Essential Bills come to £9500, Personal Spends £3600, Annual Bills and Expenses £6600 (This includes Car Service, MOT, Road Tax, Car Insurance, House Insurance, TV Licence, Christmas, Clothes, Birthdays, House Maintenance and garden.)

My current income from small annuity and works pension is currently £20796 after tax so that's ok lol! I actually save the difference at the moment into a S&S ISA.

From July annual income after tax increases to just over £30000 so I will able to finance some travel add once again to savings.

Always helpful to see other people's figures and indeed the manner in which retirement plans come to fruition.

Your income seems very much like my own will be. 

My latest review has changed my predicted income somewhat in that the sipp i've been building up to supplement my teacher pension in the years before state pension now looks like it won't be touched. Even with no growth it's going to be about £100k which I intend drawing down on IF i need to. 

It actually caused me an unexpected dilemma. I'll try to explain.

The initial plan was to draw down on my pension for 6 years. It's become apparent I may not need to. So I started to look at buying additional pension.

Omg, what a minefield. I could change the accrual rate, buy out early retirement reductions, buy additional pension, buy an avc.

In the end I decided to stick to the original plan as it's looking to be a pot of approx £100k with no real terms growth and maybe £120k in real terms with very moderate growth.

Taking 3% annually if need be gives me the same additional pension as I could purchase but also means there's savings/lump sum to leave to family. 

At 61 our pensions and savings will give us a combined after tax income of some £31k without touching my SIPP with the potential to add £5k per annum to this is need be from other investments. At 67 this increases after tax to about £47k per annum. Weirdly this is about what me and Mrs O have now!

Throughout this whole period the £100k goes untouched and we should inherit a similar amount too.

It's lead me to believe our whole pensions industry is geared towards the wrong goals.

Indeed there's threads on the pensions board talking about THE figure. There's more than one figure! There's what you need whilst in work. There's what you need between retiring and SPA. There's what you need post SPA.

[Deleted User]

@Organgrinder our circumstances are not that similar. I will have no inheritances and my savings and investments are a small fraction of yours.

Roger175

Organgrinder said:

There's more than one figure! There's what you need whilst in work. There's what you need between retiring and SPA. There's what you need post SPA.

That is the issue which is becoming ever more apparent to us. We are now both more or less retired at 60 (I have a few ongoing commitments, but pretty much there) and we need around £32k a year to maintain our current standard of living, which is actually pretty good. The wife has some small DB pensions paying just short of 9k, so we need to find £23k for the next 7 years, after that, with SP coming in we only need to find another £3k (all at current values). After years of worrying and saving bloody hard, it's suddenly looking like a relatively easy thing to achieve. In fact there's a good chance that at this rate, we'll never actually touch my DC pension pot of around £450k. [edited, originally said DB pension pot]. Certainly Voyant Go are suggesting that's the case. Together with the house, the kids are going to do well!

Kim1965

Organgrinder said:

[Deleted User] said:

Well In have just done a quick exercise to estimate how much I would need to live on my own in my current house. The figure comes out at about £19700. This includes everything apart from holidays. Using savings for holidays just for period up to July.

Essential Bills come to £9500, Personal Spends £3600, Annual Bills and Expenses £6600 (This includes Car Service, MOT, Road Tax, Car Insurance, House Insurance, TV Licence, Christmas, Clothes, Birthdays, House Maintenance and garden.)

My current income from small annuity and works pension is currently £20796 after tax so that's ok lol! I actually save the difference at the moment into a S&S ISA.

From July annual income after tax increases to just over £30000 so I will able to finance some travel add once again to savings.

Always helpful to see other people's figures and indeed the manner in which retirement plans come to fruition.

Your income seems very much like my own will be. 

My latest review has changed my predicted income somewhat in that the sipp i've been building up to supplement my teacher pension in the years before state pension now looks like it won't be touched. Even with no growth it's going to be about £100k which I intend drawing down on IF i need to. 

It actually caused me an unexpected dilemma. I'll try to explain.

The initial plan was to draw down on my pension for 6 years. It's become apparent I may not need to. So I started to look at buying additional pension.

Omg, what a minefield. I could change the accrual rate, buy out early retirement reductions, buy additional pension, buy an avc.

In the end I decided to stick to the original plan as it's looking to be a pot of approx £100k with no real terms growth and maybe £120k in real terms with very moderate growth.

Taking 3% annually if need be gives me the same additional pension as I could purchase but also means there's savings/lump sum to leave to family. 

At 61 our pensions and savings will give us a combined after tax income of some £31k without touching my SIPP with the potential to add £5k per annum to this is need be from other investments. At 67 this increases after tax to about £47k per annum. Weirdly this is about what me and Mrs O have now!

Throughout this whole period the £100k goes untouched and we should inherit a similar amount too.

It's lead me to believe our whole pensions industry is geared towards the wrong goals.

Indeed there's threads on the pensions board talking about THE figure. There's more than one figure! There's what you need whilst in work. There's what you need between retiring and SPA. There's what you need post SPA.

Agree, many people who have made some provision, have the problem of bridging the gap to state pension age. 
 With DC pensions in mind it comes down to how you play your hand and how you view inheritance. At sp age my core expenditure is easily covered by sp and db, the next 7 years are the tricky ones.