DH surprising me with possible (very) early retirement

Did you read the OP? he doesnt want to spend more time with his kids- they are all gown up. He wants to "travel more" knowing the OP cannot go with him as she is working.

Do you not see anything wrong with this scenario because I can.....

What sacrifice is he speaking of? One his retirement will force on you, or the greater one you made, financially, in bearing and raising his children?
If he reckons the next few years will be very much tighter without his salary, don’t you fall for any guff about him paying less that half shares henceforth, all the same. You've been doing it on a very unequal basis til now.
Let him retire, certainly. But any ‘sacrifice’ needs to be his.
And it goes without saying that all housework will be his responsibility now.

If he has enough in his pot, unless his employer matches contributions it makes sense to turn off contributions to his and max out what you’re putting into yours for a few years to balance it out a bit. It should be household income and affordability for you both to retire or wind down, unless health or age is having an impact more on one of you.

that all said, we’re entirely joint finances and I would never have sacrificed my pension during the baby years. Different strokes and all that!

I don't understand why it's always pitched as a 'poor hard done by woman' when in fact it's 'damn that's so lucky being in a position where one of you can SAH and it was agreed it was the woman'. And because of that, he had to sacrifice family time, whilst the OP sacrificed earning capacity. There is always some way to 'shore up' the financial side. But not a way to get back missing out on family growing up.

Whilst I agree that the decision needs to be mutual. Always. Go in with your eyes open and ask about what happens later.

Maybe your DH wants to retire so he can spend quality time with his young adult children?

But he's not, thats the point!!! He has told the OP 'He says it will mean a sacrifice but it’s ‘doable’. It just means that we will have to do fewer things like takeaways and cut back a bit"

So basically, their lifestyle will change and it will become far more austere - which means that after working your entire life you have actually less leisure /enjoyment than you did whilst working.

Thats an utterly shit deal for the OP lol

I find it preposterous that anyone would retire before their mortgage is paid off. But I guess your selfish husband doesn't care about that because YOU pay the mortgage. How exactly did that come about? You paying all of the mortgage when he was the higher earner?

How many years are left on your mortgage and how much is left to pay?

Your DH comes across as very selfish, it hasn't even occurred to him that a married couple would make a joint decision on retirement. He seems not to care about the situation you'll be left in. Selfish, selfish man.

I'll still be working for 20 years after my partner retires.

His life would have barely changed. I daresay he would've got family to help or a nanny.

I’d want to see numbers. How much his pension will be. How much it could be if he was carrying in fir a few more years too.
Youd need to look at all possibilities es, incl you not being able to carry on working until retirement age. Or how to top up your pension at a similar level than his (which really you should have discussed when you stepped down work wise)

IF he can carry in keeping up with his 50%, then I’d very happily tell him to do that.
And he’ll be a SAH person, he can also take on all the cooking, cleaning, work in the house. Just like you’ve done before. Because he’ll be doing nothing (and this time properly nothing) and you’ll be working so …. 🤷‍♀️🤷‍♀️

Fwiw I feel that you need to separate how feasible it is first him to stop (so financial side) and resentment that you’ve given up a lot by stepping down work wise and it grates that he is getting benefit from it twice - once at the time by keeping his career and now by being able to stop much earlier whikst you’re the one who keeps the house running.
What you absolutely do not want is a situation where you’re subsidising him to retire…..

@Aggyagro Can you tell him you wish to do the same so there you need to sit down both of you and calculate when you can afford to both retire TOGETHER.

You should be working together as a team and that means making decisions together. He wants to scrimp now, so HE can retire earlier but knowing you can't. If you earn less, and haven't paid into your pension as much due to being at home with your children, why are you paying more towards the bills?! Surely by doing this, you're allowing him the luxury of being able to retire earlier!! My husband is nearly 53 and I've just turned 51, but when my husband retires, so will I!! My husband isn't expecting me to continue working for another year or so, whilst he retires. Quite honestly I think your husband is being an arse. If you'd been 15 years younger, I could perhaps understand you not retiring at the same time as your husband, but that's not the case.

It's not 'an excuse'. The care system is not fit for purpose, and people...women....save the country a small fortune by looking after parents. And pils.

But OP doesn't want a househusband. And she doesn't want to pennypinch. Which is fair enough IMHO.

You will probably end up at the least supplementing him financially if not fully supporting him.

Life isn't going to get any cheaper.

I think he's foolish to take an early retirement in this economic climate

There's something so deeply unattractive about people who don't want to work when they are working age. I would find it an utter turn off OP, a huge ick.

You need to look at the numbers OP. My DH is a chunk older than me and I’m the later age to access SP, so creates quite a big gap between us each getting our SP. We each have occupational pensions, some at 60, some at 67. He has a tough job, pays ok but stressful so he wants to retire very soon. I was always planning to leave work early because I wasn’t prepared to work a job I wasn’t really enjoying, full time for 15 years whilst he was retired. So we compromised. He is going later than he ideally would want, I am going early. It’s all about what’s affordable. You can buy your years worth of NIC contributions to make up your full ‘stamp’ for full SP, it’s not that expensive (you can only retrospectively buy six years). But you need to get into the numbers, what you will each get income wise and what year vs living costs. Stop being so passive!

I’m not sure if it’s relevant in your situation OP, but Martin Lewis Money Saving Expert has spoken about how people missing out on National Insurance contributions because of childcare responsibilities in the past can apply to the government to get NI top ups towards their pension. Some people have plugged gaps in their state pensions worth thousands apparently. Worth looking into for your own benefit if it may apply to you.

No.

He should be contributing to the mortgage until that is paid off and then you work out a sensible time for you both to retire, ideally within six months or so of each other.

This

Half his pension is yours too as you are a married unit! What age exactly does he want to retire at? Might it be worth meeting each other half way and saying he works another three years longer than he wishes (or other amount that works for both if you) but you both put money into an account to save to buy voluntary pension credits for you from the government. So you both retire maybe a few years early but continue to pay into a state pension for you so that at the official retirement age you will get a state pension.

Other ideas would be could you both take a career break for a year and go travelling and then go back part time for a few years? Whatever happens he should help with your pension contributions as how much you have will affect both your retirements - can you pay extra into your work pension now? I bought back some state pension years and my partner had a grumble that I was spending so much on my pension and he should buy some too but I pointed out that he still had more years of contributions than me and our finances are linked so we should be thinking of both our pensions as a unit, if we both continue to contribute we will get full pensions. He completely agreed when he looked at it that way.

Are the pension contributions 50/50 (e.g you are both paying in £500 per month)?

Why is your retirement pot smaller? (Have you funded the maximum you can in every year if your earnings are low?)

I couldn't be with someone who would wave me off to work every day knowing it was because I did more childcare. He's benefitting from your sacrifice.

Same! Although it wasn't a younger woman, it was a woman around his age who also took early retirement. I never found out whether it had been planned beforehand.

This. Higher earner contributes more!

My neighbour has done this. Their mortgage is paid off, he's retired early and his wife is still working full time (she loves her job & wouldn't retire even if she won the lottery!). Tbf, she pays very little towards bills etc, as house in his name, he wouldn't ever add her to the deeds, so she refused to contribute.

I suspect he's having a MLC or an affair, or both.