The Retirement Thread

3 lurkers | 176 watchers
10 Jul
9:32am, 10 Jul 2024
12,682 posts
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cathrobinson
I’ve only just paid ours off, but it’s already a lovely feeling knowing there’s no big mortgage payment going out this month.
10 Jul
9:34am, 10 Jul 2024
32,513 posts
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Rosehip
ours wasn't a huge payment anyway, but I was glad we didn't have it when the interest rates started to go up again.
It's the flipping council tax that takes the biggest chunk of my pension each month - we need to fix that by downsizing, if we can ever offload the boys
10 Jul
9:37am, 10 Jul 2024
50,433 posts
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HappyG(rrr)
Looking forward to paying off our mortgage in next 11 months. We were in a good place with interest rates until a year ago, but this year we have paid 3 x the interest of previous years (and our mortgage payments are huge! So that's a lot of interest, so amount of capital being paid off was way smaller. Very annoying!). Will be a big weight off mind. Our mortgage is 8x bigger than the next biggest monthly bill - which is council tax. Argh! :-) G
10 Jul
9:39am, 10 Jul 2024
19,328 posts
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Mandymoo
Paid ours off when we moved 8 years ago. We were £2k short so my dad lent us the money and paid it back within 2 months

Had 5 years working with no mortgage and a very healthy "free cash" balance every month. In hindsight maybe we should have saved more but we certainly enjoyed ourselves.

Am much less likely to waste money on trivial things now though
10 Jul
9:55am, 10 Jul 2024
55,845 posts
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EvilPixie
I think a lot of people “wasted” money during lockdown and whilst wfh
Hot tub sales etc went through the roof!
We saved the money we didn’t spend!
10 Jul
10:03am, 10 Jul 2024
6,298 posts
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TheScribbler
We paid off ours on our flat a few years before we moved, then had to take out a smaller mortgage almost 4 years ago to buy our current home.

Our fixed term rate ends next year, so we need to look at whether we can pay it off (take a hit on our savings now) or get a reasonable rate and keep paying it a bit longer while we’re working.

I don’t want to risk waiting until we retire to enjoy what we’ve earned. Equally I’d like a comfortable and active retirement with lots of options for travelling while we can.
10 Jul
10:39am, 10 Jul 2024
69,796 posts
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Velociraptor
We managed to save enough during lockdown to fund the 11 months between me stopping work and taking my NHS pension. I'd gladly whip anyone who claims that made us "pandemic winners", though. It was no fucking consolation for not being able to travel, see family, socialise and race.
10 Jul
10:41am, 10 Jul 2024
42,806 posts
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Ness
Exactly the same here Vrap.
10 Jul
11:56am, 10 Jul 2024
7,530 posts
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bigleggy
Paid my Mortgage off in 2018. Can't say I miss it :-)
10 Jul
1:10pm, 10 Jul 2024
23,121 posts
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geordiegirl
We have been overpaying our mortgage for a few years so reduced the term considerably - this house was always a retirement/pension investment so we'll pay it off and downsize in a few years time.

We have enough in savings to pay it off now, but advise was put what we can into our personal pension pot, gain the tax incentive and then after 55 (in OH pension so end of Jan) we can take the tax free lump sum to pay it off then... it is what he is doing for their pension. Scary thing is he is younger than me and looks 5yrs older! oops.

We're on holiday next week and the laptop is charged and all our finances will be scrutinised one of OH's personal pensions (started many moons ago before most people our age even thought about it) is apparently worth keeping as it is due to the associated benefits which we thought would go into the drawdown which is making us now worry will mean we maybe cannot afford it just yet but who knows. I hear more and more that you don't need as much as you think you do when you retire and we always have my work pension we are trying to leave out of the mix for now.

It feels surreal I am sure I'm not old enough to retire despite banging on about it for years! haha. I'm sure I will get there. My time is now being spent looking at campervans and I've just ordered a book about the islands of Britain for us to explore in the coming years.

Thanks for all the chat it is helping me/us for sure.

About This Thread

Maintained by Sigh
A place for baggy spaciousness: "The quality of time, soft attention and ease that we could enjoy 'doing nothing' "
(thanks to TheScribbler for the term (p1516)!)
( see also: neilthewriter.co.uk
and
darkangelswriters.com )

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