Things you should have known or counted on re: retirement finances but didn't (move, spouse)
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I should have paid more attention to the state income tax on my pension before I retired. I live in one state but worked in another (typical NJ to NYC commuter) and so my NYS pension is not taxable in NY but it is in NJ.
While working you first file NY then NJ, because the NJ income tax is lower than the NY, and you get the credit for what you paid to NY so it zeroes out the NJ. But in retirement, there is no tax on the pension in NY so it was all taxable in NJ.
The first year I figured fine, I'll just put money away and pay it when it comes time to file. Little did I know that I was supposed to be paying quarterly estimated taxes, lol. I discovered it when I did my state tax at the end of the year and found I owed a penalty for not paying quarterly estimated tax throughout the year. Learned that lesson and set up estimated tax payments for the next few years.
Then in 2018, the state decreed an exclusion of up to $75K on out-of-state pensions if the gross income was less than $100K and the taxpayer was 62 or older. That worked for me in 2020--I turned 62, and with COVID shutting the city down, I only made about $12K through my post-retirement part-time job, which added to my pension, kept me under $100K.
The penalty the first year wasn't huge, but I felt stupid because I should have known that it wouldn't be so easy as just paying what I owed at the end of the year.
The change in the law has given me some time, however. The plan was always to move either to NYS or some other northeastern state where my pension wouldn't be state-taxed after my mother was gone. She died in 2020. MA has a reciprocal agreement with NY, so that's a choice. I really wanted to move to VT, but they would tax the crap out of my pension. NH is another choice. Now with this exclusion in place in NJ, moving is not so urgent, although I plan to do so eventually anyway.
You are in my prayers, Dazzleman. Went through cancer in 2019 but then retired in 2020, after treatment was over. Knock on wood, follow up this week was clear.
Glad to hear it Riley. My aunt (who my father adored - she came to see my parents many times in their last years) was just diagnosed with pancreatic cancer. They found it very very early which is a pretty rare thing, so we all are hoping that she will have a couple of more years. She just had surgery last night...so far so good.
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you seem like a fair and reasonable person, just wondering if you wished you had given your first husband a 1/4 of your pension / retirement accounts? He probably could use the extra money now.
Cute.
Divorce is a negotiation. I'm sure gentlearts isn't the only person ever who regretted not asking for what she was entitled to.
When I divorced my first husband (the abuser) I wouldn't accept even a dollar in alimony. Even the judge was taken aback by that since I was virtually penniless. But the abuser terrorized me repeatedly after I left him and I wanted nothing more to do with him. I figured he probably wouldn't pay alimony anyway, given that he'd forbade me from working during our short but hellish marriage.
I have heard this although is it possible if you have insurance.
Medicare and a supplement as well as most regular plans have put of pocket maximums.
How do bills exceed that?
I think that a lot of people get blindsided by fine print. A out of pocket maximum per incident is different than one per year. Some policies have no cap, but are enticing enough with trivial cost reductions that they seem a better deal at the time.
TBH, I sometimes wonder if some of the posters here with money to burn would last a month if suddenly poor. Never having the experience of the school of hard knocks can make for some strange priorities and decisions.
Divorce is a negotiation. I'm sure gentlearts isn't the only person ever who regretted not asking for what she was entitled to.
When I divorced my first husband (the abuser) I wouldn't accept even a dollar in alimony. Even the judge was taken aback by that since I was virtually penniless. But the abuser terrorized me repeatedly after I left him and I wanted nothing more to do with him. I figured he probably wouldn't pay alimony anyway, given that he'd forbade me from working during our short but hellish marriage.
Same here with child support. I didn't want to bother because I knew he wouldn't pay anyway. The lawyer told me that it isn't my choice--the state requires a parent to be responsible for their child. On paper, anyway. He sat there in divorce court complaining to the judge when she ruled that he pay a whole big $50 a week that he wasn't working. She said too bad, so sad, that's what you pay now and when you get a job, your ex-wife can take you back to court and ask for more.
I just laughed. I knew he wasn't going to pay. HE knew he was supposed to though, so every few months he'd hand me maybe $100, and say, "You'd better be writing down that I gave that to you!" LOL.
But one good thing about WHEN I divorced him was that we had only been married 11 years. The lawyer told me that under NJ state law, he'd be entitled to something from my pension if we'd been married 13 or more. Oh hell NO. The very idea gave me chills and made me angry. You've already taken so much from me emotionally and financially. You're NOT going to get what I am working for all my life.
We also owed a few thousands dollars to the IRS when we got divorced. He was supposed to pay me half of that back. That was in 2001. Still waiting, but not really.
Just getting rid of him was financial relief. And no, the marriage didn't start out that way. He went downhill around the time I became pregnant. Somehow that set off something in him that put him on the path to becoming the same abusive drunk his own father had been. I'm sure there was something psychological in that, but it is beyond my understanding.
Yes, this was news to me about the dog costs. I've always had horses and they were way less expensive. One vet check a year with vaxxes. Hay is cheaper than dog/cat food. I guess that answers my occasional desire for a pet in retirement.
One unanticipated expense we've had in retirement is appliance failure. They were all less than 6 years old.
Turns out a lot has to do with rust from the sea air and more importantly, South America gets the cheap, low-quality version of international appliance brands. 3 split-unit a/c failures due to rust, dryer failed, and we are on our 2nd stove which is now shocking us, lol. Another electrician. At least service people are cheap.
I guess this is what you get with no Underwriters Laboratory control or gov't intervention.
I also wish I had understood the advantages of the Roth better when it first came out....Now it will be my son who ends up paying taxes on all that money when he has to withdraw it all within 10 years of my death.
This is why we are doing large Roth conversions and paying the taxes now.
By large, I mean over $1M over a 6 year period.
We want to spare our daughter and our grandsons the tax payment problem.
I never miss a chance to suggest that people consider older pets (and make plans for their homing if something happens to the owner). Did not mean to derail the thread though!
Yes, and buy a whole second additional separate house to house a Veterinarian Tech so that when you pass away the multiple senior rescue animals (4 or 6 of them) can go live with the Vet Tech in the second additional house you bought just for the senior dogs to reside in after your death. (like you've done)
And paid $5000 just to have 2 senior rescue dogs transported by a person from Boston area to Colorado for a move in a caravan of that car and then your car with 2 other senior dogs!
senior retirement expenses.....
Last edited by matisse12; 01-06-2022 at 11:13 AM..
I know this for sure. I found out I had cancer exactly a week after I retired. I was super healthy and active and 2 months later, I was clinging to life in intensive care. Now I am undergoing treatments hoping to have surgery. You never know when these things can hit like a bolt of lightning out of the blue.
This is true.
My health issues built up one by one, and sometimes one on top of the other.
In addition to the statements about health, this day in age, we now have to worry about things like pandemics that hold up both routine and other procedures.
Spouse was supposed to have serious back surgery on Nov 4, and they cancelled it ...on Nov 2!
Absolutely NO idea when it will be rescheduled. Gets worse day by day, some days spouse can barely walk or function, especially after standing for short shifts.
Wet days...any time of year, especially is painful...even when doing nothing.
(Same for my back problems).
The ONLY surgeries the 3 local hospitals were scheduling were brain and cancer surgery.
Recently on the news, California has called a halt to even cancer surgery!
That may happen here too, if it isn't already being planned.
We both went to the pain Dr the other day. We both get a procedure called Radio Frequency Ablation (RFA) every 6 mos. We sometimes get "trigger point" injections also, which can be done every 3 mis, but is not as effective.
The RFA is done in a small operatory, and a flouroscope is used in an ancillary building near the hospital.
At the appointment, we learned that hospital halted even those procedures!
I'm due again in Mid March, but I can't count of getting it...yet.
A hospital here in my state announced that if a heart attack victim came in and died, they would NOT resuscitate them.
They also stopped delivering babies!
And the local hospitals have picked up that theme apparently also.
My point here is, that since the start of the covid pandemic, one cannot even count on getting the proper health care at the proper time.
So health is an unknown, and can come with many twists and turns!
Best to all
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