Retirement Planning / Pensions

[mjmooney]

30 minutes ago, cheltenham_villa said:

That's what I thought. Maybe it's a generational thing. He's just so used to being around people and feeling useful he didn't want to stop. I think he's also got in his head that my grandad went downhill when he stopped. He's happy and enjoying his partial retirement so maybe he's got it right after all. 

Well, I'm his generation, and I certainly did want to stop, and so did all my mates of similar age. Maybe it depends on what your social peer group do. 

Having said that, I do have an (unpaid) 'job' with the grandchildren, so it's not like 24/7 leisure. 

[delboy54]

1 hour ago, cheltenham_villa said:

I've been sorting my dad's pension recently. He's retired last year having waited until he's 67. He and my mum are mortgage free and live quite comfortably on the state pension. We've taken the tax free limits out of his pension but I doubt he'll spend them. I've look at annuities but the rates are now so low it just doesn't make economic sense. Current plan is to keep the money in a fund, take a small amount out each year and wait until I need to spend it all on one of them going into a home. 

He's got so bored he's taken a part time job to keep his brain ticking over. 

I have lots to do outside work, but I intend to volunteer at my local hospital for a day or two per week as a way of putting something back in to the NHS, following my stay earlier in the year.

I totally get the fact that you have to have mental and physical stimulation when you retire, otherwise its daytime TV and the slippery slope to an old folks home....

[mjmooney]

I just swore I would never have to answer to a 'boss' again. Apart from the wife, obviously. 

[lapal_fan]

I'm just 36 and I've moved jobs quite a bit.

I think I'm on my 7th or 8th company as if July!  As an energy/sustainability professional, I've been made redundant 3 times and moved 3/4 times.

As such, I've got absolutely no idea what my current pension state is, and I assume I've got little pots everywhere, but never receive any details about it.

I'd say I'm on a good salary for my age and when I came to my now job (only 12 months ago), I opted to pay more into the pension than is required.

But now I'm moving again (mid July), my new job only allows up to 4% matched pension, which isn't as much as I'm paying now (7% I think), even though I'll be on more money, potentially mitigating that issue.

My ultimate goal in my 50s/60s is to be freelance, offering companies advice on a consulting basis.

I quite enjoy a lot of the work I do, so I can see myself "retiring" in my mid 60s, but doing a bit of freelance, should anyone need it, for some fun tokens.

I've thought about speaking to a financial advisor, but its one of those things you think about but never ultimately do.  

I also need to think about investing so I can make my savings work a bit for me, instead of having it sat there doing nothing, but again, I dunno where to start.

I'd like to move to a bigger house, but currently see absolutely no value for money in the housing market, so that won't happen.

[choffer]

14 minutes ago, lapal_fan said:

I'm just 36 and I've moved jobs quite a bit.

I think I'm on my 7th or 8th company as if July!  As an energy/sustainability professional, I've been made redundant 3 times and moved 3/4 times.

As such, I've got absolutely no idea what my current pension state is, and I assume I've got little pots everywhere, but never receive any details about it.

I'd say I'm on a good salary for my age and when I came to my now job (only 12 months ago), I opted to pay more into the pension than is required.

But now I'm moving again (mid July), my new job only allows up to 4% matched pension, which isn't as much as I'm paying now (7% I think), even though I'll be on more money, potentially mitigating that issue.

My ultimate goal in my 50s/60s is to be freelance, offering companies advice on a consulting basis.

I quite enjoy a lot of the work I do, so I can see myself "retiring" in my mid 60s, but doing a bit of freelance, should anyone need it, for some fun tokens.

I've thought about speaking to a financial advisor, but its one of those things you think about but never ultimately do.  

I also need to think about investing so I can make my savings work a bit for me, instead of having it sat there doing nothing, but again, I dunno where to start.

I'd like to move to a bigger house, but currently see absolutely no value for money in the housing market, so that won't happen.

That sounds a bit like where I'm at although I'm 13 years ahead of you and haven't moved around as much. I think I've two final salary pots or about 5 or 6 years worth of contributions and my current DB where my employer puts in 15% and then matches another 5%. I've no idea what that means in terms of retirement age or how much I'll get when I do. For some reason, I've never really considered myself lasting long enough to worry about it. Maybe an IFA should be my next port of call. 

I'm looking at a career change in the next couple of years though which will mean a year or two of study and then probably becoming self-employed so I should probably work out the financial implications of that before I get too deep into it. 

[Davkaus]

20 minutes ago, lapal_fan said:

 

As such, I've got absolutely no idea what my current pension state is, and I assume I've got little pots everywhere, but never receive any details about it.

Just in case you don't know, once you identify these pensions, it's trivial to consolidate them - assuming these are your typical defined contribution schemes.

If you can't dig out any of the details for the old pensions, I'd personally start with reaching out to your old HR as it'll probably be quicker, but there's also the pension tracing service https://www.gov.uk/find-pension-contact-details

Once you can login to each of them it's a form that takes a few minutes to fill in to port the fund over to another pension, and have it all in one place - you won't always want to do that and in pure economic terms it's best to look at the fees you pay in each pension, as it may be cheaper to leave them where they are than move them to your current pension, but IMO the ease of management almost always outweighs this if you've got loads of little pots, as the fees are generally fairly similar.

Edited June 2, 2023 by Davkaus

[cheltenham_villa]

33 minutes ago, delboy54 said:

I have lots to do outside work, but I intend to volunteer at my local hospital for a day or two per week as a way of putting something back in to the NHS, following my stay earlier in the year.

I totally get the fact that you have to have mental and physical stimulation when you retire, otherwise its daytime TV and the slippery slope to an old folks home....

That's where he started as well. A couple of days a week in a charity shop helping clear homes. They then offered to pay him so they could guarantee his hours a bit more. Was funny as he didn't tell me for ages, knowing I'd moan at him for not taking it easy. 

I'm sure a part of it is he's spent his life working and he's not used to financial security although he has more than enough money. 

Not suggesting it's everyone experience, just a perspective I thought worth sharing. 

[bobzy]

So hard to think about retirement/pension etc when you've got a mortgage, kids and nursery fees to pay.  Our general outgoings each month are around £2.8k before you factor in food etc.

 

The older ones with no mortgage as they bought their houses for £30k can get in the bin  

[mjmooney]

2 hours ago, bobzy said:

The older ones with no mortgage as they bought their houses for £30k can get in the bin

Sorry not sorry. 

[Xela]

5 hours ago, choffer said:

That sounds a bit like where I'm at although I'm 13 years ahead of you and haven't moved around as much. I think I've two final salary pots or about 5 or 6 years worth of contributions and my current DB where my employer puts in 15% and then matches another 5%. I've no idea what that means in terms of retirement age or how much I'll get when I do. For some reason, I've never really considered myself lasting long enough to worry about it. Maybe an IFA should be my next port of call. 

Isn't that a DC pension? Anyway the contribution of 15% and further match of 5% is excellent nowadays. 

[sidcow]

5 hours ago, bobzy said:

The older ones with no mortgage as they bought their houses for £30k can get in the bin  

One day there will be some whippersnapper in VillaChatGPT who will start ranting about all the posters (who may or may not be real) who only paid £300,000 for their houses. 

[bobzy]

1 minute ago, sidcow said:

One day there will be some whippersnapper in VillaChatGPT who will start ranting about all the posters (who may or may not be real) who only paid £300,000 for their houses. 

Your house is worth £500k!

[allani]

This doesn't really help on the pension planning side of things - but I have seen a few people comment about wanting to keep busy rather than just looking at the same 4 walls every day.

I would recommend looking at something like www.workaway.info.  It is basically a volunteering scheme where you exchange work for board and lodging.  We are actually hosts on the site and have had over 100 "workawayers" stay with us over the last 5 years from the age of 18 through to 71 come and help.  It is a really good scheme that I wish had been around when I left uni.  As with all such sites it definitely pays to research your hosts - some are definitely after "slave" labour and the working / living conditions are questionable to say the least, but many are great people just looking for an extra pair of hands or two.  Good friends of ours retired and basically decided to use Workaway to travel the world for a while as it stretches the budget a fair amount, gives you a reason to visit places you might not consider and keeps you busy rather than just doing the same thing every day.  It covers a wide variety of countries and a wide variety of "needs" - for assistance with building, DIY, gardening, farming to house sitting, pet sitting, etc.

As hosts it has been brilliant - we've meet people from all over the world.  My eldest daughter is thinking about using it to travel before going to uni.

[allani]

8 hours ago, Davkaus said:

Just in case you don't know, once you identify these pensions, it's trivial to consolidate them - assuming these are your typical defined contribution schemes.

If you can't dig out any of the details for the old pensions, I'd personally start with reaching out to your old HR as it'll probably be quicker, but there's also the pension tracing service https://www.gov.uk/find-pension-contact-details

Once you can login to each of them it's a form that takes a few minutes to fill in to port the fund over to another pension, and have it all in one place - you won't always want to do that and in pure economic terms it's best to look at the fees you pay in each pension, as it may be cheaper to leave them where they are than move them to your current pension, but IMO the ease of management almost always outweighs this if you've got loads of little pots, as the fees are generally fairly similar.

Also once you have moved everything into one place there are usually more options in terms of managing your pension fund (i.e. adding more risk / diversifying / playing safer in terms of the actual funds where your money is invested).  That doesn't mean that you need to be an investment / financial expert but more that your pension fund manager can then check that your portfolio properly matches your attitude (and aptitude) for risk and can tailor your pension pot for you.  Whereas if you have 5 different company pensions funds you might find that combined they are not working for you as well as you might hope.

My situation is a bit different in that I have left the UK and now live in Europe (Italy) - so I have moved all of my UK private pensions out through QROPS into a single "pot".  This gives me complete transparency on the value of my pension and gives me the chance to talk to my pension advisor as my "pension needs" change.

Edited June 2, 2023 by allani

[delboy54]

6 hours ago, bobzy said:

So hard to think about retirement/pension etc when you've got a mortgage, kids and nursery fees to pay.  Our general outgoings each month are around £2.8k before you factor in food etc.

 

The older ones with no mortgage as they bought their houses for £30k can get in the bin  

Haha exactly what my daughter says

[Sid4ever]

So simple question.  I have 2 pension pots, one still active and receiving a monthly employee and employer payment, the other is dormant and I don’t want to transfer across.  Main reason being that I am 55 shortly and want to use 25% of that fund tax free.

If I do does that mean that I am limited to what can be paid into the other pot?

[choffer]

3 hours ago, Xela said:

Isn't that a DC pension? Anyway the contribution of 15% and further match of 5% is excellent nowadays. 

Yep. That’ll be it. Like I said, I’m largely ignorant of such things 

The pension is excellent but also a massive impediment to moving on. Last time I had a sniff of another new job, the salary was marginally more but the pension was only 3% matched. All of a sudden we were miles apart. 

Edited June 2, 2023 by choffer

[KentVillan]

The way I see retirement planning in your 30s / 40s is... instead of fixating on the actual retirement age, think about the amount of panic starting now saves you when you're in your 50s and 60s.

I also think the more you accept the loss of cash now, the more it just becomes a normal part of your life.

I know it's not achievable for everybody, but if you're lucky enough to be able to tuck some cash away, it's worth it. Initially it's painful, but over time it gives you some peace of mind.

The best place for good advice on how to save and invest sensible, minimising taxes and fees (all IMO of course... not financial advice) is Bogleheads... https://www.bogleheads.org/wiki/Getting_started_for_non-US_investors

Quote

Bogleheads emphasise regular saving, broad diversification, and sticking to an investment plan regardless of market conditions. We follow a small number of simple investment principles that have proved over time to produce risk-adjusted returns far greater than those achieved by the average investor. They have been further distilled and explained in thousands of posts on the forum. Although there will be significant differences in taxation, available funds, and regulations, investors worldwide can apply the Bogleheads investment philosophy.

 

[tinker]

11 hours ago, cheltenham_villa said:

I've been sorting my dad's pension recently. He's retired last year having waited until he's 67. He and my mum are mortgage free and live quite comfortably on the state pension. We've taken the tax free limits out of his pension but I doubt he'll spend them. I've look at annuities but the rates are now so low it just doesn't make economic sense. Current plan is to keep the money in a fund, take a small amount out each year and wait until I need to spend it all on one of them going into a home. 

He's got so bored he's taken a part time job to keep his brain ticking over. 

I'm no expert but can't you pay back into a pension, at reduced amounts , and get tax relief on it even if you are drawing on it?  I'm certain the amount has been raised recently from £2800, if the money is sitting around getting poor returns then it might be an avenue to explore. 

[magnkarl]

Invest, save and pay off your mortgage and credit, it’ll literally make the last 20-30 years of your life the best you’ll ever have.

Did I say that now is a good time to put away £100 a month into a solid index fund (emerging markets, 500, Europe index) to get going on becoming financially worry free by the time you retire?

If you are young, start listening to Dave Ramsey’s podcast (if you can get past the hallelujah stuff) and cut up your credit cards. I wish someone told me to do it when I was 30.