Your Retirement
The secret to a happy retirement is to take the time to think about what it means for you. It is important to create a retirement vision so that you can focus on the things that will be important to you in this next phase of your life. You have the opportunity to make sure that the choices you make now will allow this vision to become a reality. For some this might include paid work or volunteering, for others it will be about pursuing a new hobby or craft, or maybe even taking on some childcare responsibilities. And for some it might be the familiar picture of relaxing and slowing down.
Part of retirement planning is about the money but it’s also about planning a lifestyle. Our specialists financial planners will work with you to build a retirement that you can have confidence in.
What should you consider?
Security and flexibility
Retirement can last 30 years or more depending on when you retire and how long you will live. Estimating how long your retirement will be is difficult and none of us have a crystal ball, you do need to bear this in mind when thinking about your retirement savings—they may have to last longer than you think. Once you’re 55 you have complete freedom over how you use your pension, but you do need to balance this flexibility to ensure you have enough income throughout your retirement to make ends meet.
What have you got?
Most people have more than one source of income in retirement, its really important to look at the whole picture and consider your state pension, any defined benefit pensions you may have, old pensions from previous employment and any other investments or rental properties.
How much will you need?
As you move into the next phase of your life your spending patterns are likely to change, for example your com muting costs are likely to reduce but if you spend more time at home your household bills may increase. You may also have some large ticket items such as a cruise planned.
Our expenditure calculator can help you define your needs and it might be helpful to think about it in terms of the essentials, such as food and household bills, lifestyle expenditure for eating out, cars etc and finally discretionary life’s luxuries such as holidays and gifts.
Health and longevity
People are living longer than they used to, did you know a 65 year old woman has a 75% chance of living to 82 and a 14% chance of living to 100*.
*source: ONS National Life tables – life expectancy in the UK 2017 - 2019.
Inflation
If you think back to what you could buy thirty years ago with £10 compared to what you can purchase now then the impact of inflation seems obvious. Prices are measured by RPI but this rate doesn't reflect the real spending patterns of those in retirement Silver RPI published by Age UK shows a much steeper rate its important that you take this Into account when thinking about your savings and income requirements.
Inheritance
You may want to leave a legacy to your family and or provide an income to your dependents when you die. This may affect the retirement income options you are considering and may mean you have to accept a lower income in retirement.
Your choices may also be influenced by the way that any pension savings or income you leave your dependants is taxed.
*Source: ONS National Life tables - life expectancy in the UK 2017 –2019
What do you need to do?
First steps planning for your retirement:
- Think about how you want to spend your retirement— are there skills you want to learn, charities you’d like to be involved in?
- Gather together your pension statements and details of any other investments. Sign a letter of authority for every plan.
- Trace any lost pensions using The Pension Tracing Service. Contact them online, by phone or in writing. Find out more at gov.uk/find-pension-contact-details
- Obtain a state pension forecast gov.uk/check-state-pension?
- Contact us for an initial meeting to uncover your goals and objectives.
