I certainly will.
Always worked at physically demanding jobs so looking forward to putting the feet up when I reach 66
"Has no one got a partner and is delighted at the thought of going for lunch mid week glass of wine, bed for the afthernoon full sure you have done your bit and deserve this?"
Has no one got a partner? 🤷♀️
Bed for the afternoon?
I don't think anyone doesn't enjoy lunch and wine mid week. Other things you list can be done whether retired or not too.
But anyway, my friend's father is in his 80s and still working. Some sort of management consultant kinda stuff. Married, grandad, loves gardening, travel, a pint, concerts, extremely sociable. Loves his work too though - it's like another social outlet for him.
38 now, investing 27% of my salary into my pension, hoping to be able to retire at 55, or at least semi retire and pick up a hobby to earn on that instead, I quite enjoy wood working
It does yep, 20% from me, and 7% from employer,
Super! The AVCs really help, it should be hammered home in school
Speaking from the other side - I retired 8 years ago, shortly before my 60th. Best decision I ever made and haven't regretted it once. And haven't been bored or idle once. Still in great health and keep very active and look after myself, physically and mentally. In my 50s I put a decent amount of time into preparing for retirement, thinking about what was important and what wasn't and getting my fitness regime sorted out. And a bit of financial planning also proved invaluable. I loved my job (most of the time) and enjoyed a lot of job satisfaction and success. But I wasn't wedded to it and was more than happy to close that chapter and wave it goodbye. My advice to anyone looking at their future, especially in their 40s and early 50s, is to think about what's important, set a target and work towards it. In general, I think 60 is a good point to go, I've had a great time over the last 8 years and there is plenty of life left in me still, and my to do list is longer than ever.
And one word of advice for this who do want to hang on:
Definitely definitely move away from managing and in particular managing people if you can. It's the most stressful. Some sort of solo role where you can just do a job for x hours a day and then go out the door and not think about it till 9am the next morning might be manageable. But dealing with mountains of e-mails, corporate politics, incessant teams meeting, and all the people management stuff is what takes many to an early grave.
Good luck to you all whatever retirement route you decide to follow !
No pockets in a shroud, as my Dad says. He has us all well warned us not to expect a giant cash windfall when he and my mam pass on, money is for enjoying as far as they're concerned and I totally agree. The house and two commercial properties will be our inheritance. I have a friend whose parents basically put their own entire lives on hold so they could leave as much as possible to their kids and I would hate if my parents had ever felt the need to do the same. Like, they didn't go on a foreign holiday for about 25 years so they could save for their kids' inheritance. Her dad has since passed, only in his early 60s, and her mum has started travelling a lot more since, but I often wonder does she regret not doing it with her husband while she had the chance.
I'll be 68 in May, absolutely love retirement but you must have something to get up in the morning for, a hobby, interest or part time job. Don't do what my grandfather did, a civil servant, retired at 65 no interests at all, got up sat on the sofa until lunch, ate his lunch & went & sat back on the sofa. He was dead a year later, atrophy of the brain they said.
To wake up in the morning & say to yourself what will I do today is priceless, enjoy your retirement gents.
It's really down to personal choice.
Not everyone will have a property portfolio.
For the majority it's a house and some cash on deposit for a rainy day.
Most older people I know will keep a bit put away for contingencies and get comfort from knowing it's there if they need it.
If there's a bit left over when they pass away that doesn't bother them as much as the thought of running short while they are still here.
You will need something put away for contingencies. If something goes wrong, with a roof, with your health, you don't have the capacity to work or borrow to pay for it.
As long as they're not living a parsimonious existence, just to give something to their children, its bit like retired people saying I'd do without to keep my private health insurance, the public system is not that poor that someone would live a parsimonious existence just to have health insurance. There is something else going on with people like that.
I hope to be long retired by 66. Target at the moment is 60, which means 18 more years. That sounds manageable.
I might work to 61, just to reach 30 years employment with my current company. But that will be the end of my professional career.
I look forward to waking up, deciding to go for a dip in the sea. Go for a walk. Grab a coffee. Wherever the day takes me.
Also hope I'll be able to do some volunteering, or pick up some part time hours working in something that provides value to the community. Be it groundskeeping in a public park. Lollipop man, who knows.
Then, a couple of years later the wife will hit retirement age. Probably a good time to let her know that I too, am retired
From my experience with older people that bit of financial independence is invaluable to them.
Like some of the posters above, if I wasnt paid to be doing my job I'd be doing it for free as it's on of my hobbies also and something I've really enjoyed doing since I was a kid ( IT Nerd ).
With remote working, I've no commute and could see myself working past 66, maybe reduced hours/days, if brain holds out.
Some people are just naturally thrifty and it suits them to continue that in later life.
Ultimately it's their money, their decision.
It's not necessarily an either/or situation though. You can be financially independent/have plenty put away without having to live like a monk for decades in anticipation of it. Obviously I get that people's financial situations and attitudes towards money vary hugely. But it's not a binary case of you either blow it all and spend your dotage in penury, or have virtually no life for a large part of your adulthood in order not to have to worry about running out of money as you age.
Or it didn't used to be, anyway. God know what retirement is going to be like for Generation Rent.
(Full disclosure: I started my pension far too late and have absolutely no retirement contingency whatsoever 😆)
my own tuppence worth,I retired at 65 and was surprised that thru welfare.ie both myself and wife were awarded the over 65 allowance without means testing.This was a huge help getting to the state pension at 66 and I wasnt aware it could be done,I thought I would be signing on so was pleasantly surprised.I now think 60 might have been too early for me as enjoyed last few years,work definitely gets easier when you feel you can walk away anytime and I totally agree with poster who suggested avoid reports to you for a stressfree final few years.2 years out now and enjoying it.
Just remember that if you are eligible for OAP either contributory or non-contributory if you are still earning a wage you will be eligible for PAYE on the combined totals less your tax allowance
How much would would people here need for a handy retirement.
I think we could get by nicely on about 4k a month after tax (maybe even 3k, but I think that would be a stretch). Thats assuming there is no mortgage left or any other loan at retirement time. Then at 66 the OAP would kick in to help.
I think that amount would allow us a very nice retirement and once im retired i dont want to have to turn up to work for anyone, not even for 1 day a week. I want to be retired.
Are you going to have health insurance?
30K,no frills,
40k annual holiday and nice car but tight enough,
50k bit of latitude for nights out,weekends away and more holidays.
60K comfortable.
For sure.
Bit depressing what you say there for most people in the private sector in the country, seeing as we are living longer on average nowadays. Only 60% of people in the private sector have a pension, and of those that do, The average private sector pension pot in Ireland is approximately only €111,000. That is the pot that has to do the whole retirement, so if you take 4% out of that per year it is only about 4,400 euro. 4400 per year on top of existing old age pension is not much.
The demise of the defined Benefit pensions means even those that have a pension will not have anything like the retirement provision their parents had.I think we are the last generation that in general don't look at selling our major asset ,ie our house and trading down to supplement our pensions.You sell in Dublin now for 600k and buy apartment for 400k and thats 15k per annum until your 80.
You can be busy and retired, just busy doing something that you like doing
Retiring early say 60 for example is dependent on whether my DC pension fund gets wiped out or not 😆😆
I will be very happy retiring at 60 and campervan-ing around southern Europe in winter.
I will also be very happy if I can work 3 days a week from 60 onwards. Tax free pension contributions up to 40% of salary is very tempting to keep on working in my 60s.
I didn’t realise it was that low. My fund will be worth about 180k when I retire in about a year and a half and that’s with me putting in 40% of my income for the last few years. I thought I was a bit of an outlier. Everyone posting on Ask About Money has pension pots worth hundreds of thousands and they’re still fretting about money!
Most people in the country do not live in Dublin and have a 600k house to desize from.
Even for those that do, solicitors fees, auctioneer fees, getting the necessary ber cert when selling, removal expenses etc would eat up 20 or 25k easy enough.
I thought half the people posting on boards were public servants or about to be retired public servants, with their average pension pot worth over a million. According to the Irish Times the pension posts of Gardai, teachers etc are worth well over a million each, if someone in the private sector was to try to buy one. Even if you went to a pension company with a million euro cheque to invest, they will not give you as good a pension as a Garda or a teacher. Nowhere near.
N.B. The Irish Times link is from 2017. Pensions are even more now of course.
When I work in Oz I observed a well established cycle of people hitting retirement, selling the house and contents, buying a massive RV and living in it until they get bored driving around the continent. Then they sell the RV on to the next set of new retirees and settle into a downsized retirement development, etc…
It's a matured cycle that been going for decades and Australia is better set up for long term RV living, but I reckon it's something that probably already happens a lot on the continent but we don't hear about it much as we're so caught up in the anglosphere media bubble.
I remember driving around Sicily years ago and there seemed to be loads of north European campervan overnighting in Lidl and Aldi carparks. They even had plug in slots for campervans!
I don't how I'd feel about driving around Europe in my sixties, driving a car in Sicily in my 30s was one of the most nerve racking experiences ever!! I'd probably just eurorail for a few months at a time and do it in comfort.
Planning on 61 and down to counting on one hand. I've put significant thought into it and already prepped certain things. The basic plan is to be already actively engaged in the key activities that I intend to do in the early years of retirement. Then when retirement start, it's more a case of doing more of those activities rather than 'what do I do now'.
