Yesterday we met with our FP and he has given us a 3-5 year recommendation for retirement. We went out and celebrated by having lunch at a restaurant we like but that is closing after this month (sad). I'm guessing we could do it sooner too if we were really motivated but I think taking time to prepare will benefit us and only position us for less worry.
It's a bit weird because I feel too young and while I will certainly miss aspects of my job, as we all know...there will be some that I won't. I just feel like with how life is speeding up and nothing is guaranteed (a cousin recently had a really sad diagnosis which is forcing a retirement due to medical reasons with a grim future). We want to have adventures now while we're probably the healthiest we will be and eventually settle down after 5-10 years of fun.
I also feel like we're going to end up dealing with some folks who might be envious or something after seeing us retire. Has anyone dealt with that? I think because of covid, there's already been a disruption in friends and etc and so this makes it feel a bit worse but I guess this is just a bigger change in life and it's how it goes.
November 12th, 2021 at 05:55 pm 1636739752
November 12th, 2021 at 07:16 pm 1636744568
As long as you know what you are retiring to, not just from, do it and enjoy every moment. I hope to do so myself in the near future.
November 12th, 2021 at 08:39 pm 1636749542
In the non work world, people who knew me knew my job was high stress and that I had the money to retire so no one questioned it.
When you have free to me, you may find people with similar time and interests, or it might be like when you are part of a friend group where dynamics change due to marriage or parenthood. Your interests and availability diverge and you have to make more friends. I struggled a lot as I became the only single person in a group, and people just weren’t available to ‘play with.’ Retirement is kind of like that.
November 12th, 2021 at 09:02 pm 1636750922
I retired at 55. I had planned that, saved for it, and chose to take a cut in my pension for early retirement simply because I felt it was more important to retire than make a few extra bucks. Yes, I received some snide remarks. Many were along the lines of: "You're too young to retire." Honestly, it wasn't any of their business and like Wink, Disney Steve and Lots of Ideas commented, most were due to jealousy. Do what's best for you.
November 13th, 2021 at 12:32 am 1636763553
November 13th, 2021 at 01:19 am 1636766395
November 13th, 2021 at 01:56 pm 1636811761
And yes, there will always be people who are jealous and make snide remarks, but as mentioned above, it's always a matter of trade-offs and accumulated choices over the past 20-30 years.
Congrats on having this momentous milestone in view!
November 13th, 2021 at 03:26 pm 1636817184
I personally would prefer not to tell anyone when I retire. Which is probably fine with my plan to switch to part-time for a while. (It's no one else's business). But I don't know how realistic this is re: full on retirement. (It's easier to just not bring up if you are working less hours, but I don't want to actually lie about it). This probably stems how weird people have always been re: minor financial things (being debt-free in our young 20s, my spouse staying home with kids, etc.) If people are *that* jealous and weird over the smaller things, I just don't want to say anything about not having to work at all for the rest of my life. I am personally going to tread very carefully. & the "who cares what other people think" is all fine and good, but I do worry about being targeted and would prefer to keep our wealth extremely private. Because having a couple million dollars is a little different than deciding your spouse can stay home with kids "for a few years" (because you are used to living on a shoestring in your early 20s). We maybe had a positive net worth, but we didn't have much, and people were super weird. I just can't even fathom what that weirdness looks like when it comes to actual wealth. Good luck navigating that minefield.