Retirement: A Full-Time Job

Guest Post: How to Retire in a High Cost of Living Area

I'd like to introduce you to a fellow retirement blogger, JP over at The Money Habit.  She retired at the age of 28 after working at an investment firm for seven years.  She shares tips for getting to your retirement goal at her blog and has contributed this post about how to make it happen even in a high-cost city like New York City (my own favorite city, as most of you know).

 

One of the biggest conversations in early retirement circles centers around location. Many plan to move to a lower cost of living area when they retire. That’s a fantastic move and it can serve a lot of people well.

But me? I adore big city living.

The food! The people! And best of all, every kind of class, workshop, and hobby group to pursue my interests.

The one downside is the incredible cost.

Fortunately, you can counter this issue with some judicious compromises. I’ve lived and worked in New York City since I graduated college. At 28, I’m retired and still living in the Big Apple.

Here are the strategies I use to keep my costs low.

Housing

Housing is the perfect place to start, given that it’s generally the largest expense line in the budget.

The trinity of factors in housing are price, location, and size.

General advice says you can have any two, but you cannot have all three.

My decision to live in New York City was about valuing the amenities. Because of this, location was paramount in my decision. As early retirement has long been a goal of mine, cost was the second most important consideration. That’s how we ended up in our current apartment.

It is a 325 square foot unit. Many people would cringe at the thought of two people and a dog sharing 325 square feet. We have lived in the same building for five years, and it’s been very pleasant.

The thing I’ve realized is that most people (including myself!) are bad at living in efficient spaces because we have had very little practice, and we have not learned how to optimize the space.

Just like any skill, it takes investment. Here are some space-saving tips I learned from Hong Kong and Tokyo magazines:

• Loft the Bed – That’s 150 cubic feet of storage instantly
• Fill Suitcases – You doubtless have a few bulky items like suitcases to store. Make sure you fill them with other items that need to be stored
• Thin Hangers – You have no idea how much space they will save you.
• Shelving – Pick up floating shelves and extra shelving for your cabinets at any hardware store.
• Expandable Everything – Inflatable mattress for guests, expandable table for company, you want anything that can expand.

Food

• Ethnic Grocery Stores – One of the benefits of living in your super expensive city is the diversity of grocery stores--your local ethnic stores are where the best deals can be found. I go to Chinatown for all my produce, meat, and seafood.
• Value Grocery Stores – Trader Joe’s is my lifeline. This is where I pick up everything else (frozen meals, milk and eggs, cereal). Between the Chinese grocery store and Trader Joe’s, we eat like kings for less than $450 a month.
• Regular Cafe/Coffee Trips – Part of the reason I live in the city is my enjoyment of the ambiance, and there’s nothing like writing on my laptop at a local mom & pop coffee shop. For $4 a week, I can make this a regular occurrence. There are an insane number of unique beverage-focused locales to soak up ambiance. Places that only focus on ciders, roof top bars, beer gardens, wine bars. When I want ambiance at a lower price tag, I opt for something on this list. Not cheap, but definitely workable into the budget. It’s also great to use coffee shops as the venue to catch up with friends over restaurants.

Purchasing on Craigslist

When you are making a purchase, you can use the advantages of your city (density, diverse incomes) to scout for great deals on Craigslist.

One guy who bought a PC part from me told me he always tries to buy his stuff from the fancier neighborhoods--you’ll find steals in the thrift stores in the fancy neighborhoods.

Discounted Entertainment

One of the huge benefits of living in your fancy city is the amenities, so use them! I’ve had my eye on Hamilton tickets, which have an insane scalper market snatching up all the inventory. If you check secondary ticket sites on the day of the event, though, you will see that when it gets to within an hour or two of the event, you can get reasonably priced tickets.  

Your entertainment options on Groupon and Living Social are going to be vast and varied. As long as you check the deal against yelp reviews to ensure good quality, these are worthwhile considerations. There are also a million completely free things to do like walking the Brooklyn Bridge, free museum nights, and new bands to check out.

The world is your oyster, even in a high cost of living area. Hopefully these tips will help others who are considering taking a job or retiring in a high cost of living city.

The Money Habit is a blog that believes anyone can retire decades before the average. The blog focuses on the 20% of money management techniques that will deliver an 80% impact to get you there.

Adjusting to Full-Time Marriage in Retirement

(Photo Details:  Wedding on the roof of the Canary Hotel, Santa Barbara, May 2011)

I want to take an opportunity to introduce you to another retirement blogger.  Diane has been retired, and blogging about it, for two years now.  She has a great post on her blog summarizing the joys and challenges of the first couple of years of her retirement.  I can relate to the part about how increased exercise doesn’t just happen automatically in retirement, and also the part about being picky about what kinds of jobs or volunteer work we’re willing to devote our time to after we retire.

After retiring from her 30+ year career in the banking and insurance industry, she didn’t just have to adjust to life after work, but also to life 24/7 with her husband, Mike.  For the last three years of her working life, she and Mike commuted 500 miles between their homes to see one another!  After retiring, she sold her place in Des Moines and moved to Indianapolis where she now enjoys living WITH her husband and much closer to the rest of her family.  Even if you didn’t live 500 miles away from your spouse, adjusting to more time with your partner can be a bit of a challenge in retirement.  Here’s what Diane has learned:

It’s your dream.  Retiring together.  Traveling. Enjoying hobbies.  Volunteering.  After all those years of working hard and saving money, it’s finally your time to kick back and relax. 

And then you realize that you’ve never been together 24x7 during all those working years.  And maybe more than once you think, “honey I love you, but you’re making me crazy”.

It’s been two years since I retired, and ever since, I’ve been learning how to live full-time with my sweetie.  Here’s what I’ve learned, usually the hard way…    

Top 10 List-How to Live Together 24x7 in Retirement

10.  Bite your tongue and don’t verbalize those snippy comments that may flit through your head.   Take a deep breath, and if something is still bothering you tomorrow, it’s time to talk

9.   Don’t work on projects together. Unless you are a saint, this usually results in lots of yelling.  When we were selling my house, we found that if we each did separate tasks, we got more done and were much happier.

8.  Decide how to divide household chores to avoid resentment.   And don’t expect a thank you for every load of laundry or every meal you prepare or every oil change or tire rotation.

7.   Do not spend every waking minute together.  You don’t want to lose yourself especially at a time when you are already on shaky ground of creating your new retirement identity. 

6.   Give yourself permission and time to enjoy your own hobbies.  If possible create separate hobby, office or man cave space so you can get away to enjoy these activities. 

5.   Cultivate your own friendships, and don’t object when your partner wants to hang out with friends.  Life is more interesting with a wide variety of friends, and we really enjoy sharing experiences and conversations we’ve each had with friends.

4.  Keep your own sleep schedule.   My sweetie is the energizer bunny and gets by with limited sleep.  I can’t keep up with his energy, and he doesn’t do well with my 8 hours of sleep.

3. Agree on your financial plan and how you will spend money.  Have some discretionary funds for each of you to spend without asking permission.

2.  Talk often and get your feelings out in the open.  Even though we may be doing our own thing, we touch base often throughout the day and find out what’s happening with each other. 

1. Laugh often.  Some of our best times are when we laugh at crazy things that happened in our day.  And for some reason we have a lot of those. 

Every day I continue learning how to live with my sweetie 24x7.  It’s an ongoing challenge to learn what works and to make changes along the way, but I’m definitely having far fewer “you’re making me crazy” kind of days.  And the fun and laughter I expected in retirement comes much easier.

 

Related Posts:

            Retirement Fantasies

            Is This Marriage Surviving Retirement?

            Will Retirement Give Your Marriage More Quality Time?

 

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An Almost True Week in the Life of a Retiree

Several months ago, I sent around an email to all my retired friends and family and asked them to be a guest contributor to my blog.  I encouraged them to share their stories about retirement, the challenges, the rewards, how they spend their time, what they look forward to.  My father-in-law contributed a great post about retiring when it wasn't really his choice.

Since all of the others on my list are too busy (or too shy) to contribute, I decided to just begin doing their guest posts for them.  The first guest post by me for the guest is "from" my mother-in-law.  It would go something like this:

Dear Sydney:

I would love to be a contributor to your blog, but unfortunately, I simply do not have the time.  My life in retirement, as it happens, is just much more busy than it was when I was working; I barely have the time to send you this email!

Tomorrow, after I go to the gym, I have my bridge club (no, not the couples bridge club, that is not until Saturday night), this is the one I go to by myself.  On Wednesday, we are having lunch with some friends and then going to the Hollywood Bowl to watch the open rehearsal of the LA Philharmonic.  Then Thursday we pick up the grandkids from school and take them to their tennis lesson and then out for dinner.  On Friday morning, I go to the gym and then Friday night we're going out to dinner with our couples group (no, this is not the one that likes the fancy restaurants, that group is next Thursday night).  Saturday is the couples bridge group--it's a pot-luck so I will spend Saturday afternoon making our contribution (after the gym, of course).

On Sunday, we were invited to see the sneak preview of "The Kite Runner" so we'll go to a late lunch with those friends first.  On Monday we have guests coming from New Jersey, so we'll be busy with them until Wednesday (I'll have to skip the gym for a few days).  The day after they leave is the dinner club that likes the nice restaurants.  Luckily, we have no plans on Friday because we need to pack for our cruise that leaves on Saturday.  This one should be much better than the one we went on last month--more interesting ports than just beaches.

We had to exchange our tickets for the ballet since we will be gone, but we will go the Friday after we get back from the cruise.

Anyway, maybe next month I'll get to your blog . . .

Love,

Mom-in-law

(Note from editor:  I already know I'll get in trouble for leaving out at least half of the things they really did, frankly, I couldn't keep track!  Note to mom-in-law:  I know I got it all mixed up, but wouldn't you say I captured the spirit?)

At What Age To Retire - That Was Not Our Choice To Make

(Thanks to my first guest contributor:  DD (Doug's Dad))

How the working world has changed.  I remember when no one talked about retiring in their 40s.  My experience was pretty typical of those of my generation who worked for big corporations.  The time from age 40 on up was like a crapshoot - who would get the axe and who would live until another round of cutbacks.  No one thought, hmm, it would be nice to retire at 40 or 45.  Will I have the money to do it?  That answer would have been emphatically no.  By the time I was in my late 50s and the axe fell on me, I was in a financial position to be retired thanks to the generosity of the severance plan that my company offered.

Money wasn’t the problem.  Being unceremoniously kicked out the door was.  We, of my generation, fully expected to work until age 65 or thereabout. It was a blow to my self-esteem to be jobless. I now marvel at, and am a little envious of, the young people who can contemplate, plan and actually carry out retirement in their 40s.  The diametrically opposite psychology of the two generations is amazing.

After I was retired, I would wake up at the usual early hour that I had become accustomed to for all those years and realize that I didn’t have to go to work and wasn’t that awful.  I didn’t know what to do.  I tried getting another job, but at my age (59) and with no really specific skills, it was a frustrating and fruitless search.  I felt pretty useless and unhappy. Finally, I found a volunteer job where I could use my coordinative and managerial skills.  This made me feel much better about myself.  After about six months I began to realize that the corporate job that I had hadn’t been so important after all and I now had time to do many other things at a reasonable and, perhaps, inefficient pace.  But, hey, this is my life and I don’t have to answer to the corporation anymore. It’s been 13 years now and I certainly don’t regret getting out early anymore.

DD (Doug's Dad)