Average monthly expenses in retirement (conversation, housing, payment, benefits)

[NCN]

Well, our computer just gave us our September report. And I have sat down many times and tried to figure out what is medium amount of expenses. It is not going to happen. We save some money by paying for most things once a year. We eat basically what we want to. Our monthly expenses are charity, water, telephone, cable, electricity, gas for the car, health club (My husband says that is like another pill that we take every day, but cheaper.) yard maintenance such as fire ant poisoning, time share maintenance, etc. My monthly expenses will be different from yours.

Once a year will be property taxes for things we own, house and car insurance and medicare and his supplement and medicine policy. My retirement includes the supplement and medicine policy, but I am already seeing that medical will be more expensive in retirement than when we were working.

Every three months is life insurance for my husband, medicine for both of us, etc.

I just realized it is too expensive to live, but somehow we do it. God will provide for his own, so don't worry about it, although I think it is our responsibility to be responsible and work as long as possible. My husband and I both did that, so we have no guilt feelings about not doing more.

I just saw on the stock channel that the dollar is being devalued and that will bring about inflation, I think, so things will be changing to make what we have set aside worth less. This is supposed to be good for the economy, but not so good for retirees.

Diversity is good where finances are concerned. Play a few games of monopoly and see how it all works.

[Robyn55]

Originally Posted by NCN

Well, our computer just gave us our September report. And I have sat down many times and tried to figure out what is medium amount of expenses. It is not going to happen. We save some money by paying for most things once a year. We eat basically what we want to. Our monthly expenses are charity, water, telephone, cable, electricity, gas for the car, health club (My husband says that is like another pill that we take every day, but cheaper.) yard maintenance such as fire ant poisoning, time share maintenance, etc. My monthly expenses will be different from yours.

Once a year will be property taxes for things we own, house and car insurance and medicare and his supplement and medicine policy. My retirement includes the supplement and medicine policy, but I am already seeing that medical will be more expensive in retirement than when we were working.

Every three months is life insurance for my husband, medicine for both of us, etc.

I just realized it is too expensive to live, but somehow we do it. God will provide for his own, so don't worry about it, although I think it is our responsibility to be responsible and work as long as possible. My husband and I both did that, so we have no guilt feelings about not doing more.

I just saw on the stock channel that the dollar is being devalued and that will bring about inflation, I think, so things will be changing to make what we have set aside worth less. This is supposed to be good for the economy, but not so good for retirees.

Diversity is good where finances are concerned. Play a few games of monopoly and see how it all works.

Hope you don't mind if I go a bit OT. The falling dollar right now doesn't matter a huge amount for most people in the US - since we basically earn and spend dollars (the major consequences will be things like higher energy costs - dollar goes down - cost of commodities goes up). We're at a level of the dollar we've seen before - and I hope TPTB keep things in control and don't turn us into another Argentina or the like.

A much more important consideration IMO is interest rates. Which are at levels I've never seen before in my lifetime - and they still seem to be going lower. A lot of people - not only retired people - would like safe low don't have to worry about it interest rates. But I don't think 2% for a 3 year CD is what they had in mind. Robyn

[mathjak107]

inflation is caused by to much money chasing to few goods..while a weak dollar under the right circumstances can create infationary pressures you need the back drop for that and we are far from it.
with almost all of us taking wage cuts and the unemployed to much money isnt an issue and probley wont be for quite a while yet. wec are more at risk for deflation.

i know it will be a few years yet until my earnings are even back to where they were before the downturn and job changes.

if prices on somethings rise its at the expense of us not buying something else. its more like we buy this or that and not this and that right now.

[rjm1cc]

You did a good job of analyzing your needs. If you are working until age 70 is your spouse also workin? If not your spouse could file for SS now and you could put this money into an emergency fund. If your spouse can not qualify for SS you can file for SS at age 66, spouse files on your account and then you suspend your payments so they continue to grow until 70. This is called file and suspend. You have to do this in person at the SS office and not on line. Don't know if you can do it by phone but I would try if you are not close to an office. You do not mention a land line phone but if you have one you might want to look at Google voice for a free telephone number and an internet phone company. Good luck

[rjm1cc]

refers to nicet4 post of expenses and income.

[Bideshi]

A devalued dollar will make everything we buy at Walmart, etc, more expensive. It will absolutely affect retirees.

[mathjak107]

you cant predict.....it all depends on so many things... what happens to other currancies in relation to ours... are the vendors hedging their currancy fluctuations thru futures contracts?

alot of the largest companies do so much business overseas that they benefit more from the weak dollar and profits are so good that they may not raise prices..

suppossedly the weak dollar should have made flat screen tv's more expensive but the truth is the more billions of dollars that were added to the trade deficit by the purchasing of flat screen tv's the cheaper the technology became and so prices actually fell as the trade deficit rose and the dollar weakened.

there are sooooo many variables you cant make a blanket statement.

[Zarathu]

When I held a lot of Swiss Francs(which I bought when the dollar was at all time highs), and I was using them to pay for my kids college educations, I wished for a weak dollar. But now that I no longer have any of that left, I would like to see the dollar rise again so I could buy more Swiss Francs for a new cycle of falling.

[Bideshi]

Originally Posted by Zarathu

When I held a lot of Swiss Francs(which I bought when the dollar was at all time highs), and I was using them to pay for my kids college educations, I wished for a weak dollar. But now that I no longer have any of that left, I would like to see the dollar rise again so I could buy more Swiss Francs for a new cycle of falling.

It's great when you guess right. I've been hammered by guessing wrong on the Euro vs Dollar.

[mzfroggez]

Originally Posted by Robyn55

I don't think of the government as an employer - more like a public t*t. Especially in retirement Very glad to know the people in those systems don't live with the rules most folk live by . And politicians wonder why ordinary taxpaying folks in the private sector are mad these days . Robyn

This is an older thread but has some great info on how people are budgeting either in retirement or in planning for retirement. Jotted down some notes from it as a matter of fact.

I did have to respond to the "government as an employer" comment that was made. After MadManofBethesda commented that federal government employees could opt out of Medicare and keep their Federal health plan benefits instead, he drew some undeserved fire. Perhaps I read more into it than is deserved.

My dad worked for the federal government pretty much all his life including wartime for WW2. He did get to retire in his mid-50's, had a decent retirement and health benefits. But he paid over 400.00 a month in premiums for health insurance after retirement/had a deductible of probably 1500-2000 for my mom and himself/paid co-pays. expenses that were not covered and had an out-of-pocket requirement of 6000.00 before anything went 100%. He also never collected a dime of social security money nor Medicare and when he died, my mom only received a reduced pension based on his salary, and none of the social security/medicare benefits many of us routinely expect. That is true for a lot of federal employees so I'll speak out in their defense. They can keep their federal plan, where payment for services is capped just like Medicare, in lieu of Medicare. Why would that bother anyone?

So considering employment and benefits received by federal employees as suckling off the public teet is an insult to a good many people. Government employees, whether local, state or federal actually do work /the services-benefits-protections etc that ARE provided by government are the very same things that "ordinary taxpaying people" expect to receive and would rise up in a revolt were they taken away. In fact, my parents were also "ordinary taxpaying people" - exemption from taxes is not a federal employee benefit.

I have no love of government and do feel it is way too big and out of control, but frankly I have no love for corporate giants, the entertainment industry and many others who perhaps enjoy obscene salaries as compared to the masses and outlandish benefits. While you may argue that the "masses" don't pay their salaries through taxes, we all pay for everything one way or the other.

Don't fall into the trap of calling firemen, policemen, teachers, the military heroes while belittling the many unseen industrious contributors to a better world who most certainly earned their salaries from Uncle Sam and gave their best as well.