How much to live on

Savvy_Sue

I do appreciate the encouragement about the Auris. I did enjoy driving it, albeit briefly. And I think I'm quite relieved not to have to get my head round charging ATM: the car died at the start of a really busy weekend (don't they always?) followed by a week where DH was more out than in, so having to research and make decisions was not straightforward. As it was, he described the car on offer, and I said "I think we bite his hand off, don't we?"

Only worry now is that DH has been quite poorly over the weekend (cough / achey / there's-a-lot-of-it-about-itis) and he's due to visit his mother tomorrow, an all day trip. If he's not fit I shall have to go, and he's certainly not picking up our / my new car if he's not concentrating properly! 🤣

Yes, this car is MINE! Obviously he'll be driving it, just not as much as me (he never has …)

tooldle

I guess I’m lucky then as my battery level can be read without needing to subscribe to additional services.
Last year the charger developed a fault and as part of the diagnostics, Ohme needed screen shots of the car display to check the car settings were not causing the charger to switch off. I don’t have the option of setting charging thresholds in the vehicle. My set up seems more simplistic than most.

middlewife

I've always used the car (Kia e Nero) to schedule the charge, set to 80%, although when my mum was dying, set it to 100%, then ticked schedule off peak rates and tell it to charge between 00.10 and 05.20, I've never used the podpoint app , I don't have solar to integrate. Currently on holibobs, and so far finding a charger has been a doddle, albeit if you're using an app like electroverse it can take a while. It's also amazing how much the charge rate slows down when someone else plugs in. The real test will be bank holiday Monday when we travel from great Malvern to Falmouth, and will need to charge during our stay over half term week, but so far, so good

Organgrinder

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82002168#Comment_82002168

I can read the battery level in the car's app, it just won't allow me to specify a percentage. Rather annoying as the new models do without having to subscribe!

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82002237#Comment_82002237

I'd be interested to know how you get on. I've not used a public charger yet. The rates seem extortionate though!

Savvy_Sue

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82001943#Comment_82001943

I have the car, and I like it, although the media touchscreen is a nightmare and I couldn't get Radio 4 to start with - not could the chap in the garage, so we blamed low-lying location.

Unfortunately I've now got DH's lurgy ... He complained I hadn't sent a photo on getting home! 🤣

I also haven't told him that GC replaced the exhaust (FOC): I commented that it sounded quite noisy. There were no holes in it but he said it sounded as if the baffles had gone.

As for our old car, he's hoping to move parts from a similar model with rusty bodywork to ours and get it going again, then use it as a spare courtesy car!

middlewife

Going back to the how much to live on, We've just worked this out, hubby gets his state pension in November, currently using redundancy money and my NHS pension plus small salary. Current plan is to purchase an RPI linked joint annuity, hang on to the tax free lump sum for future big ticket items and downsize next year.

Fortunately OH does a detailed monthly spreadsheet with 20 categories of spending, so it's been a relatively easy if time consuming exercise to work out 3 levels of budget, modest, adequate, luxury.

Our numbers work out as monthly income

Option 1 £2500 modest lifestyle,

Option 2 £3300 adequate lifestyle

Option 3 £4500 luxury lifestyle

Happily we have a little more than adequate, not enough for luxury lifestyle, but I've never fancied a cruise anyway.

To facilitate cashflow control, we will operate

1x incoming joint current account for bills, standing orders to savings accounts and food,

2 remainder will go to a linked savings account to cover other expenditure

3 individual pocket money account for small gifts, haircuts, massage etc

4 separate savings accounts for holidays; birthday and Christmas; car maintenance; replacement white goods and emergencies; a "slush" fund where any excess will go

Holidays we go a week in shoulder season UK somewhere with a pool/sauna/jacuzzi; 5 nights in Cornwall to visit son; alternate years 2 weeks in Europe in shoulder season. We also do the odd festival, this year it's the little orchard cider festival and OH does love supreme.

Appreciate this is probably more than some people get and less than others, but it's been an interesting exercise. Hair and beauty treatments I get at the local college, clothes in charity shops or V1nted. Food shopping mostly L1dl or top up posh stuff in Wa1tr0se. We have NT life membership, And RSPB membership, so tend to go midweek. Local leisure centre is £30 a month to swim, choir £28 a month and hubby volunteers at local amateur theatres, hospital and when recovered I'll go back to voluntary driving plus working 6 hours a week. So far so good.....

Organgrinder

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82003806#Comment_82003806

Cars are becoming ever more complex. I have so many "features" and yet all I want to do is listen to the radio, turn on the climate control and watch my speed/range.

Well not quite. But the old analogue days were so much easier ......well apart from not being able to start the thing on a cold day, leaks, breakdowns and the obligatory crackly radio. ;-)

Organgrinder

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82004160#Comment_82004160

To me, that looks excellent planning. I like the fact that it's your version of adequate or luxury. Everyone is different and lifestyle choices are very personal.

It's got me thinking about what me and Mrs O want and whether we can get everything we want/need. Time to do a spreadsheet update!

helensbiggestfan

Hello everyone. Fascinating chat about cars.

It's now my third week car free., I'm keeping an open mind. After 50 years as a car owner it does take some getting used to. One needs to be disciplined and organised - no more just "nipping in the car" at the drop of a hat. I suppose, as with everything else, there are pluses and minuses.

Last week I started looking at new cars but tbh I find it all very baffling. As Mr 0 says, cars are so complicated nowadays. I genuinely don't know if I can be bothered any more. I would much rather be a passenger these days. If I do bite the bullet and get a replacement I will have to get my youngest son to organise it all for me. He won't mind. But for now I am going to continue the experiment of being car free. I am now more or less committed to online grocery shopping. It's easier on my old bones and I have been pleasantly surprised to realise that I am actually spending less…..no more cheeky top up shops, no more impulse buys.

Nice interesting post Middlewife….. it sounds like you've got it all pretty much sorted.

I had early retirement more or less thrust upon me due to my late husbands health issues, so very little time to prepare financially. I have come to the conclusion, that, from a financial perspective, choosing the optimum retirement age is a bit like choosing the best time to start a family. In other words there is no perfect time. We may fear that we don't have "enough" and yet we pull it off. If we wait until we feel rich enough we might never take the plunge.

I have one of those cheesy wall plaques that says "If your dreams don't scare you, they aren't big enough" Naff but true. 😂 Some of my financial decisions scared me silly at the time but I just listened to my instincts and jumped right in. Guess what, they turned out to be the best decisions of my life. 🥂

Sometimes we just have to take a leap of faith.

HUSKYPAL

Hello all,

I've been monitoring and budgeting our costs for years, and planning to retire at Christmas this year (age 57). Breakdown of costs below for info.

Fixed (includes energy/council tax/water/TV licence/house insurance/car insurance & maintenance/pet insurance/broadband/house maintenance - £1270/month

Lifestyle/discretionary: includes gym/TV packages/life insurance/charity/mobile packages - £470/month

Food - £650/month (couple and dogs)

So £2390/mth £28680/annum

Retirement income for both together should be about £4200/mth nett (combination of DB, fixed term annuity and drawdown) - leaves about £1800/mth after costs for fun stuff including holidays.

When state pension kicks in, should be able to maintain this (index linked) without then needing to touch any more of the SIPP, so will have SIPP money left over for top ups if needed or emergencies.

Worked hard to get to this point, I know we could likely cut back a bit if needed, but probably don't need to, this level of spending/free cash is actually more than we have been living comfortably on for the past 8-10 years, but plan on enjoying some nice last minute holidays in UK/EU. Looked last week our of curiosity at what we could get if we just wanted to get away for a week (with 2-3 days notice) - some lovely little cottages available in Devon/Cornwall for £400-500/week, or £400 each for a week somewhere warm. Plan on using these opportunities to get away away for 8-10 weeks/year (1 or 2 weeks at a time).

I've been stashing as much away into my SIPP/company schemes for years to get to the point where we can both stop and relax.

Finally nearly there, 7 months to go, time seems to have slowed down though now i've made the decision!

Having some night time fights with my chimp/lizard brain though that seem to think it's a crazy idea to give up a well paid, secure job, presumably not alone in having this fight?