How much to live on

Organgrinder

jackieblack said:

savingpennies said:

helensbiggestfan said:

Tomorrow is the 11th anniversary of my husbands death.  Always a bittersweet time for me.  Relieved that his suffering came to an end, but still miss him, more than words can say.  

The thing about losing a life partner is not just losing someone who meant the world to you, it's that your whole world changes.  Your future is not the one you had envisaged and planned for.  That is especially true when it comes to retirement.  I'm just glad he got to tick so many of the items on his bucket list. 

He had always wanted to go to China. One day I impulsively booked his dream trip without telling him. I just surprised him when he got home from work. His face was a picture.  That was 2002.  In 2005 he got sick.  If we had waited "just a few more years" he might never have made it. 

The moral of the story.......don't put your lives on hold, waiting for "when" because "when" might never come.  

This really resonates with me.  I lost my husband last year in September, so coming up for the first anniversary of his death.  Miss him terribly but, like you, relieved his suffering ended.  Your world certainly does change; I recently went to see the Rev.  Richard Coles and he talked about how when his husband died, he didn't just lose his life partner but his future as well. 
Like you, we ticked off a few bucket items - China, Peru, Southern Africa.  Last April, he had just finished planning our next big trip to NZ when he was diagnosed and we never made it.  Next year, my eldest daughter and I are off to NZ to fulfil the dream he never realised.   
We often think about how we will do things later, or assume that we have loads of time.  We always thought that we would have 10 good years health wise, once we retired, and then get decrepit. 

The time we have is now, enjoy it and live life to the full.
 

100%

Money comes and goes, and there is nearly always a way to get more in time, one way or another, but time is something you can never get back

Absolutely. And every single moneymaking scheme I do is geared toward ensuring that at retirement myself and Mrs O can enjoy it to the max.

Sure I could go earlier but the thought of not quite having the funds available is something I'm not keen on and it only takes one major expense to wipe out a lot of savings etc.

What I did find surprising is how I've managed to bring the retirement date forward by a year, mainly from an unexpected sum Mrs O has plus the amount of extra cash I've built up since starting my retirement journey. 

I've recently signed up to Snoop too. It gives a decent enough 4.6% easy access rate plus it gives insights into all of your spending. Pleased to report my grocery spend has come it more that £1000 lower than budgeted over the last year.

helensbiggestfan

savingpennies said:

helensbiggestfan said:

Tomorrow is the 11th anniversary of my husbands death.  Always a bittersweet time for me.  Relieved that his suffering came to an end, but still miss him, more than words can say.  

The thing about losing a life partner is not just losing someone who meant the world to you, it's that your whole world changes.  Your future is not the one you had envisaged and planned for.  That is especially true when it comes to retirement.  I'm just glad he got to tick so many of the items on his bucket list. 

He had always wanted to go to China. One day I impulsively booked his dream trip without telling him. I just surprised him when he got home from work. His face was a picture.  That was 2002.  In 2005 he got sick.  If we had waited "just a few more years" he might never have made it. 

The moral of the story.......don't put your lives on hold, waiting for "when" because "when" might never come.  

This really resonates with me.  I lost my husband last year in September, so coming up for the first anniversary of his death.  Miss him terribly but, like you, relieved his suffering ended.  Your world certainly does change; I recently went to see the Rev.  Richard Coles and he talked about how when his husband died, he didn't just lose his life partner but his future as well. 
Like you, we ticked off a few bucket items - China, Peru, Southern Africa.  Last April, he had just finished planning our next big trip to NZ when he was diagnosed and we never made it.  Next year, my eldest daughter and I are off to NZ to fulfil the dream he never realised.   
We often think about how we will do things later, or assume that we have loads of time.  We always thought that we would have 10 good years health wise, once we retired, and then get decrepit. 

The time we have is now, enjoy it and live life to the full.
 

So sorry to hear that you recently lost your husband.  My sincere condolences.  It's early days yet for you but I wish you every happiness. I am glad you decided to go to NZ. I hope you have a wonderful time.  

Smudgeismydog

savingpennies said:

helensbiggestfan said:

Tomorrow is the 11th anniversary of my husbands death.  Always a bittersweet time for me.  Relieved that his suffering came to an end, but still miss him, more than words can say.  

The thing about losing a life partner is not just losing someone who meant the world to you, it's that your whole world changes.  Your future is not the one you had envisaged and planned for.  That is especially true when it comes to retirement.  I'm just glad he got to tick so many of the items on his bucket list. 

He had always wanted to go to China. One day I impulsively booked his dream trip without telling him. I just surprised him when he got home from work. His face was a picture.  That was 2002.  In 2005 he got sick.  If we had waited "just a few more years" he might never have made it. 

The moral of the story.......don't put your lives on hold, waiting for "when" because "when" might never come.  

This really resonates with me.  I lost my husband last year in September, so coming up for the first anniversary of his death.  Miss him terribly but, like you, relieved his suffering ended.  Your world certainly does change; I recently went to see the Rev.  Richard Coles and he talked about how when his husband died, he didn't just lose his life partner but his future as well. 
Like you, we ticked off a few bucket items - China, Peru, Southern Africa.  Last April, he had just finished planning our next big trip to NZ when he was diagnosed and we never made it.  Next year, my eldest daughter and I are off to NZ to fulfil the dream he never realised.   
We often think about how we will do things later, or assume that we have loads of time.  We always thought that we would have 10 good years health wise, once we retired, and then get decrepit. 

The time we have is now, enjoy it and live life to the full.
 

I’m so sorry @savingpennies, but glad to hear you managed to tick off some bucket trips, and I think it’s lovely you are going to NZ with your eldest daughter. 

Completely agree with your sentiment that the time is now
x

angieb15edin

Organgrinder said:

When in Norway ten years ago every can or plastic bottle had a recycling label from memory, that if scanned at the recycling point gave you a voucher to spend in the shop.

Really easy and convenient.

Much like the self scan systems in supermarkets. I always use them in Tesco for my main shops. Tells you how much you've spent and automatically applies any coupons you may have. It doesn't automatically deduct the 10% discount with Clubcard Extra but it is a pretty straightforward calculation after all.

Years ago our local Tesco extra had a fairly large machine in the corner of the car park which gave you 10 club card points for every aluminium can you recycled in it 
it also accepted glass and plastic bottles but you didn’t get points for these
we actually paid for two first class BA flights to South Africa using the points and an American Express two for one voucher
happy days indeed
It was removed and is now a McDonald’s!,
pre Covid our local Iceland had a machine in the shop that gave you 10p for every glass plastic and aluminium item you recycled and gave you a voucher to spend in store 
i used to spend mine on ice cream 
so many people asked what I was doing when I was using it

tooldle

Tesco in my city are still running the reverse vending machine trial. Plastic bottles only I think and capped at max ten bottles (£1). Lidl have a pilot running in their stores across Glasgow. 

GunJack

MarzipanCrumble said:

Personally I love self checkout - I really only half understand why shoppers resist it.  Check the prices as you shop, pack as you want with no clucking about the time you are taking from the queue, loyalty card discounts automatically applied - what is not to like?

Don't want to go back to old fashioned way of doing things, tbh.  Chat boxes have their place, as does 'X' when dealing with companies.  AI will change our world yet again - exciting times!  Love it!

I play Bridge - the internet has absolutely opened up that world so that if you have mobility problems you can still play 24/7 and chat.  Clubs have their own 'closed' internet games, so you can play online against club members.

Love, love, love the internet - I remember being sooooooooo bored when a child.  But I did watch a lot of Sunday afternoon films on TV....

Any recommendations for online bridge sites??

MarzipanCrumble

If you belong to a local Bridge club often they have online sessions using RealBridge.  Otherwise people use Bridge Base Online or BBO which is mostly free and has players from everywhere.  Be aware that BBO is American but does also have ACOL option.
https://www.bridgebase.com/

No Fear Bridge is subscription (about £55 pa), offers self learn lessons/tutorials, quizzes on play and also playing solo curated hands that teach you someting.  It offers very limited online playing at prescribed times
https://www.nofearbridge.co.uk/

Sure there are others out there

annielyn

I've been looking back at old posts and found where I'd posted on this thread in May 2021. We were 4 years into DH's early retirement then after the job he had done for 40+ years became too much for him and we realized we needed to act before it was detrimental to his physical and mental health. I posted that our annual outgoings at the time were around £27k.

Once he had made the decision to leave work we started to plan.  Pension freedom was a relatively new thing at the time he left in 2017 and we took advice from an IPA. After working out what our  annual outgoings were, we were confident with taking some of the TFLS, the level of drawdown we arranged, and our savings, that we could live on this for the 8 years till SP kicked in.

I realize that in the context of this site, and the many threads there are about retirement planning, that this would have seemed irresponsible to many. We may not have planned for him to leave at that age but I have always been careful with our finances and we had already paid our mortgage off early after following advice on this site.

I have, over this time, also reduced my SE hours considerably so we could spend our retirement together and we have managed perfectly well on the reduced income.

The time following his retirement has had ups and downs. We have both lost parents during this time but the fact that he had finished work meant we were able to be there to help as their health deteriorated. I know if we had both been working full time this would have made dealing with this even more difficult than it already was.

There have been plenty of good times too. Spending time with family and being able to be on call to help out with grandchildren whenever needed has been a big bonus. We have travelled a bit as well and also spent a lot of time at our static caravan which has made for a lovely life balance.

We are now both a couple of months away from SP. Our average annual expenditure is now around 29k and looking back at our finances over this time, our total assets (pension included) are only 10k down on where we were in May 2021. Bearing in mind we have financed a good life during this period, and the external pressures on the markets, I think this is pretty remarkable.

We haven't obsessed over depleting the pension pot or worried too much about saving or leaving an inheritance. We are gifting to grandchildren when we can now and I know our family are not counting on a large inheritance and have told us to just enjoy life while we can.

I know we were lucky to be in this position and I have to say we have no regrets in doing what we did. It has worked out for us and I do think, if we had had a retirement plan in place, it would have been completely derailed by circumstances anyway.

In the words of a certain Beatle 'Life is what happens to you when you're busy making other plans'.

 

Smudgeismydog

What a wonderful post annielyn, thank you so much for sharing.

helensbiggestfan

Same here, Annielyn.  Lovely post.  So glad everything has worked out so well for you.  Love that John Lennon quote.  He was bang on with that one. 

I too retired early and unexpectedly (to become my husbands carer). I was too young to draw my pension at the time and although we did struggle financially I don't regret it for a moment. Some things, like quality time with loved ones, really are more important than money.  

If necessary, one can always find a way to get money, but time, once spent, can never be regained.  

Feeling quite autumnal here today......