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Like life, retirement is just another chapter. Every day is a gift.
I was a disaster on investments and was totally wiped on the tech stock thing. Those Edward Jones, etc advisers were all wrong. I subscribed to Smart Money magazine for years but it was like reading Greek or Chinese. My good luck was having TWO ex-husbands who died and left me money. It was like winning the lotto twice. I swear - true story. Who would have ever guessed.
My retirement income is almost double of what I earned the day I retired from a university after 25 years of employment. Thus, my tax burden is higher and I enjoy a better standard of living now. So you never know.
My pension is about 70% of what I was making. DH's is around 65% but his 15-year deferred incentive compensation puts him at about 90%.
When we start drawing SS, we'll be well over what we made our last few years of working, plus we'll be taking mandatory distributions. All said and done, when we turn 70, we'll be in the highest tax bracket of our lives.
Factor in that we're no longer setting aside 15-20% savings for retirement, and it makes for a nice bump in our standard of living, one we never saw coming. Like you said, you never know.
Re; aging in place. Look at ADA rated appliances. Microwave in a drawer, dishwasher with easy access controls. Consider everything as if you were in a wheelchair or scooter. That microwave above your range would be impossible to reach from a wheelchair or imagine that you've lost strength in your hands and a scalding pot falls in your face. Its not just about grab bars in the shower. Elevated toilet seats, walk or roll in showers, wider door frames., all things to consider prior to needing them.
LDG, I hear you; mom keeps pissing off her advisors, what a racket. Is there such a thing as an advisor who isn't just generating income for their firm?
Agree, Jolie, I hate over the range micros. Senseless.
I certainly agree with the first section of OP. I didn't follow this advise and we have moved crap around several times. It's just too overwhelming to tackled. And it's painful to realize the hobbies which once meant so much to you are not doable now so you hang on to things hoping "I'll get to that again one day".
Guess what? Your kids don't want your grandmother's china set for 12. They don't care about chafing dishes or stamp collections or stained glass tools. They laugh at your sterling silver flatware collection and your Hummel Figurine collection. None of it means anything to them and they have no idea what it is worth. They will curse you after you die for leaving them with all this mess to handle because they will have to leave their jobs and/or families to handle it. Sell or give it away now and use that money for something fun or to add to your savings.
i certainly agree with the first section of op. I didn't follow this advise and we have moved crap around several times. It's just too overwhelming to tackled. And it's painful to realize the hobbies which once meant so much to you are not doable now so you hang on to things hoping "i'll get to that again one day".
Guess what? Your kids don't want your grandmother's china set for 12. They don't care about chafing dishes or stamp collections or stained glass tools. They laugh at your sterling silver flatware collection and your hummel figurine collection. None of it means anything to them and they have no idea what it is worth. They will curse you after you die for leaving them with all this mess to handle because they will have to leave their jobs and/or families to handle it. Sell or give it away now and use that money for something fun or to add to your savings.
When my husband told me when he hit 60 that he never planned to retire I had to face some not so happy facts. We would not have the life of travel and fun I had always envisioned. He is rather a loner engineer type who does not enjoy socialization anyway so even if he had retired it would never be what I envisioned.
I floundered around a bit looking for meaningful business and activities but nothing made me happier and satisfied me like being a hands on mother. After 3 months of foster parenting training we realized that was not the course for us so we decided to adopt again. We had one son in college and an adopted daughter a senior in high school and on her way to college when we adopted two infants only 4 months apart. We were 55 and 63.
I can hear you now.. don't bother ..we've heard it all before. We had enough money for this venture and decided we would rather invest in two lives which might otherwise be filled with poverty and hardship ( they are from Vietnam) than a second home and more material things. So here we are with two healthy and loving 12 year old girls, DH has just this year retired -although he still does some technical writing for his employer part time. His health is excellent and mine is so so. But our resources are firm and steady and we have 4 children we are very proud of.
So yes--retirement looks very different to many of us. One size does not fit all.
I certainly agree with the first section of OP. I didn't follow this advise and we have moved crap around several times. It's just too overwhelming to tackled. And it's painful to realize the hobbies which once meant so much to you are not doable now so you hang on to things hoping "I'll get to that again one day".
Guess what? Your kids don't want your grandmother's china set for 12. They don't care about chafing dishes or stamp collections or stained glass tools. They laugh at your sterling silver flatware collection and your Hummel Figurine collection. None of it means anything to them and they have no idea what it is worth. They will curse you after you die for leaving them with all this mess to handle because they will have to leave their jobs and/or families to handle it. Sell or give it away now and use that money for something fun or to add to your savings.
OMG have you ever got that right! I have writings some of which has been published (who cares?) and tons of longhand never put on the computer. Keep ("some day the New Yorker will want this" LOL LOL) or toss? Toss. Artwork I'll never frame. ("some day after I'm gone one of my kids will do a retrospective exhibit, LOL LOL). Toss. But it's so hard, this is my little "identity." But I can say that the more I toss, the better I feel.
This week I'm going through all my computer files (tons) and purging left and right. I was up till midnight last night doing this and I'm doing it all day today and tomorrow. Everything from the past is coming off the computer and onto disks.
As for collections, I have a coin collection with lists (sell now or keep for the day when they're worth millions and my kids can cash them in, LOL). I cannot seem to motivate myself to do anything about this. I remember my mother saying "always hang onto this, it's going to be worth something some day!" That included her Hummel and Depression glass collection. I don't even know what we ended up doing with those things, I know we didn't sell them. And the full set of silver, I thing I gave those to the nuns. Just couldn't deal with it.
Your post makes me want to purge even more. But boy is it a lot of concentrated work to purge and reorganize a lifetime of stuff.
are you sure you won't be needing it yourself someday?
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