Countdown to retirement

Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share
941

Update on that: I actually was semi-forced to start taking that, last year when I turned 65. Well, I didn’t HAVE to take it, but the amount wouldn’t increase any further; if I’d taken it before 65, I could have gotten a lesser amount.

I didn’t know that I needed to start it, so when I did the paperwork and they processed things, I got something like 4 months worth as a lump sum.

I also started the annuity from their “newer” plan (defined contribution, all company money, but 401(k)-like). I was concerned over the political situation causing markets to tank. All in all it’s about 750 a month after income tax withholding. I’ve got that going to an account we don’t use much, as we don’t need the current cash flow, and it’ll help us budget for a big trip we are planning in a couple years. I set it up so that my husband will get either 50 or 75% of it if I predecease him.

My company’s plan is currently a defined contribution plan (no longer into the 401(k) via matching) and it’s a few hundred a month.

942

It doesn’t have to be that bad. My wife is a writer, and before I retired she wrote at home, though nowhere like 40 hours a week. It worked out fine. I had enough vacation so that doing things wasn’t a problem. Now it was better when I retired (since we could do errands during the week when things weren’t crowded.) It all depends on how self reliant you are.

Before I retired I made a spreadsheet of things I wanted to do around the house and elsewhere. It had about 70 entries. When people asked me what I was going to do when I retired I mentioned it and they shut up.

Not having to get dressed until after I read the Times in the morning is a big plus. We wrote a book together. (She has three under contract now.) We’ve taken cruises and road trips. We’ve taken over the local writing club. There is a lot you can carry over from before retirement.

Today is my wife’s birthday, and the card I gave her was about looking forward to weekends with her - with my addition that every day is a weekend when you are retired. It’s been over 7 years and so far, so good.

943

Show her a spreadsheet with different annual contributions and returns.

Put in $6,000/year at the S&P average of 10.5% and in 30 years that’s $1 million. And while past returns are no guarantee of future performance, from August 1995 to August 2025 it’s CAGR is 10.42% with dividends reinvested.

I’ve never had trouble keeping myself happy. I recently took one of the bedrooms down to studs (1940s wiring and insulation made it the right thing to do) and rebuilt the whole thing myself. There are plenty more of those in this house that could use doing.

I’m currently building sliding closet doors for that room since the opening is a non-standard size and custom doors were $2400

I once decided I had nothing to do on a Saturday (admittedly I was in my 30s then) and so started the process of converting a 150ft long slope into a dry stone retaining wall. Two years and 20 pallets of feildstone later it was done.

The Old Oldsmobile’s 425 needs rebuilding (saw signs of bearing material in the oil) and so one of these days I’ll pull it, rebuild it, and finally put a 700r4 transmission, which will give me overdrive so I won’t be spinning at 3500RPM on the highway (which, for an engine like that, might be why I have bearing material in the oil)

I’m pretty good at keeping myself busy. I find almost everything in the world fascinating. I only get bored with something when it gets easy.

944

You’re surely doing it right.

In my case wife #2 was a hasty ill-considered decision from the git-go. That might have worked out for both of us with extreme luck, but we did not have extreme luck. Oh well. Live and learn.

Were my late first wife still alive and healthy, we’d almost certainly have had an experience akin to yours. She too had a highly variable career that she could dial down or up to accommodate togetherness wherever whenever in whatever quantity.

It happens this week is the 2-year anniversary of my retirement. And I’ve enjoyed every bit of it, but especially once #2 was out of the way. Which is ~18 months now. I can’t say I’ve max-performed every minute, but after all that went before a certain amount of sloth is refreshing. The next 6 months ought to be pretty darn wonderful. We’ll see.

945

I’m glad it’s going well. I’ve found a good mix of deadline stuff (volunteering, my column) and non-deadline stuff which I can put off if I feel like it.

Another secret - we both have offices, so we can isolate or not isolate as we see fit. It was great during Covid.

946

Yes, we have an obnoxiously large house for just the two of us (it hadn’t been updated since it was built in 1940, and my wife decided I needed a project). But the nice thing is that we have common areas, and we each have areas that are sort of our own.

947

Well, that’s sort of us. COVID let me work from home. And to be perfectly honest over the last year I’m semi-retired. Work knows to not give me any big projects, some of which can take years to complete.

My wife still needs to go to the brick and mortar building, but can work from home a little bit.

I can do a lot more working from home. Walk the dogs at lunch, cook whatever. This works out very well for us.

Now, my wife will retire for real in 6 weeks, I’m closer to 12 weeks.

We both talked about the new house we bought. We will both be at home a lot more so want more space for each of us. And we have room for a live in caretaker if it ever comes to that.

Maybe this works so well be cause we never combined our money. She has her savings and checking, and I mine. Sure things blur a little bit. They are separate but together in that if one of us needs a boost, we just write a check, no questions asked.

If one of us needs to buy a car, we do it, with perhaps help from the other. Of course a big purchase like that get’s talked about.

We’ve been very fortunate, we never argue about money. Being successful and marrying a little later in life might be why.

Tonight we listened to some tunes and played chess and darts.

948

You both being mostly homebodies certainly helped during your semi-retired years. As did living so remotely, where the temptation for e.g. you go out on the town late when e,g, she had to get up at 5am tomorrow to get ready for work simply did not exist.

And here in a couple months you’ll both be 100% retired.

But I certainly agree, and it matches my experience, that marrying a bit later, marrying your best friend, and having more-than-adequate money for your tastes, certainly makes it a LOT easier to have a harmonious life of togetherness.

949

Yes, and thanks. I think it’s important to have plenty to do. I’m looking forward to leaving my work responsibilities behind though.

Also important to have things you share and things that only one of the couple does/enjoys. Don’t be joined at the hip.

Now that we live in ‘civilization’ the temptation to just go out to eat is great, but we are getting that out of our blood, and I’m going to start cooking more. But it sure is nice to have some great restaurants close by.

950

I like to cook, but didn’t have much of a chance when I got home at 6:30 or 7. One of the things I did right after I retired was to go through all our cookbooks and note recipes I wanted to make. I’m still using that list.

When we go to restaurants it is usually for lunch. We both like the food we make enough to prefer to eat in.

951

Likewise. Eat outside. But winter is coming. Soup season. Need to find my chili cheese chowder recipe. And mulligatawny.

But we are still in Colorado where a 70 degree day in January isn’t that unusual.

We usually each get two drinks, so it gets expensive fast. But we almost always have leftovers.

952

I’m watching my retirement and investment accounts grow and I’m living comfortably on my social security. I’m realizing that I probably could’ve retired a couple years earlier. It seems like jinxing myself, but I’m at the point where I’m worrying more about how to distribute the money I’ve accumulated than about running out.

When I first retired, I said I’d miss the work, but not the people. But now I don’t even miss the work. I think back on the SAP conversion, and think about how data is changing with AI, and I’m so glad I don’t have to adjust to all the new tech.

StG

953

Same here man. I was gonna wait another 2 years. But I just can’t go through another conversion or application development. And with AI in the wings… ummm.

I like the work, but it can be very frustrating.

The people where/are fine.

Also, I’ve turned into a glass ceiling. I’ve encouraged others to grow, and I’m gonna get the hell out of the way. That’s another reason I’m gonna retire. We have a great team right now.

My wife works in a department that works very closely with my department. She retires Oct 15. They are going to throw a party for her. Both departments will be there. So since I retire Dec 15, we are just gonna do a combination party. Oct 15th.

I didn’t/don’t want any party, but this combination will be good.

My wife and her boss went out to get her retirement gift. Very specific (It’s a photograph of the ski area). They got it, $500. I just want a map that my department made of the county. They can just run that off on the plotter. I’m easy, and apparently, cheep :slightly_smiling_face:

954

My countdown is quite extended, but it sure is pleasant to have selected an expected date - albeit 2 years in the future.

I intend to retire 2 yrs from the end of this year - some time in December 27. No real particular reason to pick that date. Just sorta seemed like a good one. I could retire today if I wanted, but each year I keep working is that much more that I’ll pile into retirement funds, and the funds will continue to grow instead of pulling money out. Plus it increases my eventual pension.

I’ve got a buddy who is a teacher. They are encouraged to name their retirement date 4 years in advance, so he’s been counting down the years - freshman…sophomore…. He is currently a senior. So I am near the end of my sophomore year. But I have to give my work calendars 6 months out, so I’ve already been planning my junior year.

In December 27 I will just have had my 67th birthday. And I’ll have 41 years with my employer (but that will be increased a few months to reflect unused leave.) I’ll start collecting my pension right away, but don’t intend to collect SS until 70. Between my pension, our SS, and what we draw from retirement accounts/investments, we should easily have similar income to what we currently receive. In fact, if the market doesn’t tank, we may need to figure what to do w/ RMDs. One reason I’m working a couple of more years is to allay my wife’s uncertainties. She gave up her fulltime career when we had kids, so the bulk of her retiremet funds will come from my earnings. If I die before her, she’ll only get 1/2 of my pension. She would still be fine IMO, but with some more in the retirement funds, she’ll be finer.

I get zero satisfaction from any aspect of my work. It is unpleasant, but not unbearable. And it pays well and allows considerable flexibility. I only have to clock in for 80 hours every 2 weeks, from 530 am to 1030 pm, with the majority from home. I set my own schedule (albeit 6 months in advance) so I can take whatever vacations and play as much golf as I want. So I’ve added in an additional weekly round of golf to start working up to retirement! :wink:

I don’t anticipate any difficulty with boredom in retirement. I figure on playing more golf and music than I currently do, and filling the days with reading and puttering around the yard. We’ve been doing some more travel the last couple years to see if that is something we want to do more of, but we are not convinced that we do. At least not on a major scale.

I’d prefer ZERO acknowledgement at work of my leaving. It would be perfect if, several months after I left, someone said, “Has anyone seen or heard from Dinsdale lately?”

955

69-72 Cutlass has always been my dream car, tho I favored the Rocket 350!

My wife still works - teaching at a college part-time, 2-3 classes per trimester. She’s not sure whether she’ll keep on after I retire or not. Brings in a little cash but, more importantly, keeps her mind active and keeps her in touch w/ younger folk. OTOH, she sure feels ancient on campus.

956

That’s easy. You can put the RMDs, after taking out the tax, in similar investments, or use them to rebalance. I put some of mine into cash to keep a buffer I can use if the market tanks, but mostly we live on social security and if necessary interest and dividends from our portfolio.

I’d take some money out of your IRAs before RMD time, depending on what it will do to your taxes. We did on the advice of an accountant, and it helped reduce the bite when I hit 72.

957

Yeah. I get that. The kind of “problem” you want to have.

I feel somewhat conflicted in that I have often said I do not begrudge paying my taxes and that I support a robust range of publicly funded services. Yet here I am thinking about how to manage my tax liability - in a minor way as folk far wealthier than I regularly get away with. For one thing, I was wondering if we wanted to be more generous to our kids NOW, giving them money that would be more meaningful to them in their 30s than (hopefully) 20 or so years down the line. And we are converting to Roths with an eye to current brackets.

So, yeah - we are very fortunate. I would be VERY surprised if a lack of money was a significant worry of ours in our retirement.

958

I’m a big believer in that technique. Yeah, it seems silly to pull $X out of your IRA and pay ~25% of that to the IRS voluntarily when you don’t need the money. But the leverage on that in your out-years gets huge.

The worst case is the married couple where one makes it into their (probably her) late 90s with a huge balance and correspondingly huge RMDs.

959

I am absolutely planning to do this. People in my family tend to either die really young or live a really long time. My mother was 60 when her father died at 89. I’m 62 and my 85 year old mother is still here - living to 100 is not unprecedented in her family and if I inherit anything from her when I am 78, it won’t do me any good at all.It won’t do my kids much good in to inherit in their 70s either, so I’m planning to start giving them money in the next year or so.

960

I’m sort of wondering the same thing, only I don’t have kids. I have nieces and nephews. My problem is, those that I trust with money, don’t really need it. Those I know will blow it on stupid stuff, well, it doesn’t do them any good in the long run.

I’ve been thinking of contacting a well-respected local dog rescue and slipping them cash now, with the written guarantee that they will take my dogs upon my death or incapacitation. I figure if I gave them $5K per dog now, I’m not likely to miss the money ($25K) and would be able to have written instructions on what to do with my animals in case of emergency. Previously, I’d told one niece that if she promised to look after the animals, she could have my paid-off farm. But land has gotten so expensive, that would be about 1/3 of my estate value. I have 8 nieces and nephews. Plus there are charitable contributions I’d like to make. Estate planning makes my head spin.

StG