Motivation and Inspiration pre-retirement

midinoon

Hi @LateStarter /all,

I do wonder about what you describe (not enjoying work but not moving on) quite a bit a present as I have been in a job for a good number of years and have always enjoyed it and wanted to do well for my employer. 

However, a management change about six months ago has altered, at least temporarily, my viewpoint on this. I’m in my early 50s and have been fortunate to have been relatively well paid.

I presume there may be a lot of people in their 50s, in a similar position, not too far away from being able to retire early, who decide to ‘hang on in there’ whilst not totally happy or fulfilled to tick away a few months/years of salary sacrifice rather than look for a move and start again elsewhere (with the uncertainty that brings and needing to find the enthusiasm and willingness required in a new role).

I’m just beginning to look at a plan regarding my numbers and retirement but, in the case of the job for the time being, I don’t have to make a decision so I won’t and just let things pan out for a bit whilst considering options.  

Albermarle

midinoon said:

Hi @LateStarter /all,

I do wonder about what you describe (not enjoying work but not moving on) quite a bit a present as I have been in a job for a good number of years and have always enjoyed it and wanted to do well for my employer. 

However, a management change about six months ago has altered, at least temporarily, my viewpoint on this. I’m in my early 50s and have been fortunate to have been relatively well paid.

I presume there may be a lot of people in their 50s, in a similar position, not too far away from being able to retire early, who decide to ‘hang on in there’ whilst not totally happy or fulfilled to tick away a few months/years of salary sacrifice rather than look for a move and start again elsewhere (with the uncertainty that brings and needing to find the enthusiasm and willingness required in a new role).

I’m just beginning to look at a plan regarding my numbers and retirement but, in the case of the job for the time being, I don’t have to make a decision so I won’t and just let things pan out for a bit whilst considering options.  

The other problem with moving in your 50' s from a well paid job, is that any new job will probably not be so well paid.
Unless you are maybe working at a very high level/CEO etc 

LateStarter

@Indout96 , @Nebulous2, @BrilliantButScary

Thank you all for the time you spent on your thoughtful replies - I knew there wasn't going to be an easy answer, but I am learning a lot and trying to adjust some of my thought patterns. To answer some of the questions:

• Yes we've gone through our expenses, it's very rough as OH doesn't like keeping track of spend. She doesn't have debt, so is happy living that way. Our plans includes her maintaining the same level of income after retirement - quite doable as her income is pretty low, so will be covered by State and LG pension. She has a SIPP to bridge the gap to SP.
• We intend to retire at approximately the same time. As she works in education, she has experience of being home alone for weeks, and doesn't find it that enjoyable. (I, on the other hand, think it would be amazing to have a few months home while she works  )
• Expenses won't change that much in retirement - we both work within 5 miles of home, and don't spend much on food or clothing specifically for work. The biggest change will be holidays, as won't be doing them during school hols FINALLY.

It's sort of led me to think of financial expectations as we both grew up "poor", but we have a different attitude to money. She enjoys the freedom money can give, and will spend every penny she earns without going into debt. Me, I guess there's always that background worry of "do I have enough?"  Which is different to my initial question about staying motivated.

Alnat1

Indout96 said:

LateStarter said:

For the people who say they spend a lot less than they thought, and yet have multiple holidays abroad  a year - HOW? Honestly genuinely, not being sarcastic. We're 2 people, with 10 year old cars, who spend a bit on food and drink (but certainly not Michelin dining), and our annual spend is over 40k. 

Its not a sarcastic question really as 10 years ago we would have looked at our situation and thought exactly the same  but it comes down to no debt and priorities basically and without stating the obvious living up north, our 3 bed bungalow down south would be 4 times the price.

Our total income after tax is 37.2k / year so £3100 /month, total household bills including food come in at £850 for a 4 week month and we have sinking funds for car / Birthday / Xmas presents 

Holidays this year we have been to :  
March - Madrid 5 days
May -  Tuscay (Luca) 7 days
June - Dresden 4 days
July - Vienna 5 days
August - Dancing holiday in St Annes 3 days 
Sept - Istanbul & Antalya 7 days
Oct - Marrakesh - 3 days
Dec - Wroclaw - 3 days
These are all 3/4 star hotels, mainly traveling via low cost Airlines or whoever is cheapest. Quite often we set off from Yorkshire at midnight to be at Stanstead / Luton for 4.00am for a 6.00am flight although this year Manchester seems to have been cheaper than previously so saves traveling time.

This all came in at a total of £11,500 including spending whilst there.

We don't eat out ever (unless on holiday) we don't have takeaways (maybe once every 3 months) I drink occasionally wife never. We go out dancing 3 nights a week at a cost of around £5 each plus petrol and we walk a lot (6/7 miles a day normally)

I'd say we live a similar kind of lifestyle to Indout96. We've never had big salaries, so no big expectations.

House is mortgage free, fairly modern so no major upkeep costs and fairly well insulated. We have solar/battery and an air source heat pump, the summer export credits cover the winter bills.

Hubby drives, I don't, so that cuts down on transport costs with only running 1 car.

We don't eat out much, maybe once a month and that's often lunch. Rarely have take away as we both enjoy cooking. Supermarket shop (Lidl) is normally £60-£70 a week, which includes cleaning products and toiletries.

Our holidays abroad are European, this year 7 days in Majorca, 4 in Budapest, a week in Greece and plans for a September week. We do pick places where there's somewhere nice to walk/hike or interesting places to visit. Defo not the lay on a sun lounger with a beer all day type. UK holidays include a weekend in Beverley, a week near Hadrian's Wall, 2 nights camping at a music festival and a couple more breaks booked for later this year. Once retired you don't have to fit in with a "holiday list" and 28 days a year, you can grab cheap flights and last minute bargains.

At home our lifestyle includes lots of fairly local walks with the dog, a few with coffee and cakes. We don't subscribe to any TV packages and find enough to watch through the Freeview players. I'm a library member and also use the Libby app to read books. I pay a monthly gym/pool sub of £35, which I use around 4 days a week.

I think to put it very simply, we have a "jeans/shorts and hoodies/t-shirts" lifestyle and don't crave anything more.

BrilliantButScary

Just a few more thoughts.

You seem to be clear about what you don't spend money on, but still not clear what you do (or is it your wife) spend money on, and £40k is a lot of money.

I am assuming you are mortgage free, you have 10 year old cars, so no car finances, no excessive commuting costs, no work related costs.

How do you organise your finances?
Do you have a joint account?

My personal feeling is that money gives you the freedom to choose, whether that is to spend more selectively, so that you can retire earlier, or carry on spending what you do and have to work longer.

You and your wife need to decide what your priorities are, and this could be challenging, as you acknowledge that you and your wife have different attitudes towards money.

Indout96

Not sure if I can mention it on here but if you don’t know about it then the Rebel finance school is brilliant and totally free, no upsell whatsoever, there is a Facebook support page and the main course which they are on week 8 via zoom but it’s all on YouTube as well so you can do it anytime.
They won the Kings award last year for it.
i have learnt a lot about investing from it and coupled with our Dave Ramsey zero based budgeting we are in a far better place than we ever expected in retirement. (Semi retirement in my case)

Albermarle

We've never had big salaries, so no big expectations.

Not sure having a big salary always leads to big expenditure/ big expectations, at least not amongst many contributors to the many MSE forums.
There was someone on the Pension forum, who as a couple had a joint income of £245 K pa ( before tax), but only spent £30/35K pa 

You seem to be clear about what you don't spend money on, but still not clear what you do (or is it your wife) spend money on, and £40k is a lot of money.

I would say when taking 8 or 9 holidays a year and with recent inflation of 20+% on pretty much everything, then £40K seems about right. 
If it can be easily afforded, why worry about seeing if it can be reduced by a few grand?

BrilliantButScary

Albermarle said:

We've never had big salaries, so no big expectations.

Not sure having a big salary always leads to big expenditure/ big expectations, at least not amongst many contributors to the many MSE forums.
There was someone on the Pension forum, who as a couple had a joint income of £245 K pa ( before tax), but only spent £30/35K pa 

You seem to be clear about what you don't spend money on, but still not clear what you do (or is it your wife) spend money on, and £40k is a lot of money.

I would say when taking 8 or 9 holidays a year and with recent inflation of 20+% on pretty much everything, then £40K seems about right. 
If it can be easily afforded, why worry about seeing if it can be reduced by a few grand?

It was not the OP that was going on 8 or 9 holidays a year.

The OP was expressing that they felt that they could not yet afford to retire. My comments were made, in the hope that, by knowing what they actually spend money on now, they would have a better idea what they need in retirement. This might facilitate a change of
mindset and earlier retirement.

LateStarter

Objectively, I know that 40k is quite a bit of money to spend, even for 2 people. But we're comfortable doing that and (for now) wouldn't be happy retiring if we couldn't maintain our lifestyle. Being retired may make some things like holidays cheaper, but that may just make us want to have more holidays.

Still looking for inspiration while working though.

Organgrinder

There are some great retirement tools out there. Eg guiide and James Shack's retirement planner 

https://james-shack.co.uk/retirement-planner-download

You can put all your figures in. Income, savings, investments pensions etc, play around with growth rates, inflation and so on. Well, up to a point.

So many people make (in my opinion) some really basic mistakes in planning their retirement. Eg they forget that maybe they have lower housing costs (eg no mortgage) or they forget about the state pension.

I made this mistake myself, thinking I'd have to work until 67 as I'd be paying off a mortgage. Then I realised I could commute some pension. (Gave up about £2,500 I think for about £70,000 lump sum). Being effectively mortgage free lowered my needs a lot. Taking some pension early allowed me to go part time (I know you can't). All in all it's meant I've been part time from 56, will retire fully at 60 and never have a lower disposable income than when I was working full time.

At 55 I thought I'd be working full time for 12 years. I now have a better quality of life and a planned retirement date. This was only possible because I sat down and planned it with my own trusty spreadsheet, the ones I've mentioned here and some advice I took.