To think we’re sitting in a pensions time bomb

[Iwanttobe8stoneagain]

I have been thinking more and more about my retirement I reckon I’ll have a pot (pension and other investments) equivalent to about £300k when I retire. But looking st what return I’ll get on this it’s about £11k year (plus whatever state pension still exists). My DH will prob have a little less. I thought we were doing quite well saving and certainly can’t afford any more. AIBU to be panicking over how we will be able to afford retirement and I suspect lots of people will have even less of a pot.

I think a lot more “retired” people will work part time in the future

Retired people have always worked part time. The issue is, will there be enough part time jobs?

This is the issue really, yes I don’t think we will be in a position where we won’t be able to eat/ heat the house but, I don’t want to just sit in front of the fire scoffing for 20-30 years having worked hard. Trouble and uplink Just out of interest, how are you funding the £40k pa? I’m still 25 years off retirement and thinking about how I can up my savings. I’m not sure traditional pensions are really the way forward. I want to enjoy retirement not just survive til I shuffle off this mortal coil!

Outgoings will be a lot less OP, especially once you reach an age where you're unable/unwilling to travel abroad and have nights out etc. £20k is on the low side for a 65 year old, I'd say, but ok at 85. My parents are 80+ and they spend very little these days compared to 20 years ago when they first retired.

UK residents can find out how much state pension they'll get, and when they'll get it, here~
Www.gov.uk/personal-tax-account

bubble it works because it’s council housing. So some of that is council homes and the money just goes in a loop from council back to council some are houses bought by them or family in the big sell off.
If it’s private renting that’s the issue (which if you look at numbers it will be), so landlords selling up pensioners moving with short notice, having to find landlords that will take housing benefit. The physical aspect of moving house, potentially every year. Eventually pricing out the area you know or community. The community nurse change. Having to move away from your family as rents have risen.
I rent as a family, it’s shit. But my word the thought as a pensioner is worse

It's going to be a nightmare for the country.

My dp and I have our heads in the sand as we're going to be buggered. He's self employed and I only started paying a pension aged 35. We're both in our early 40s. We both really want another child but I need to save for more for our retirement is stopping us. Once dd's nursery costs go down due to the 30 free hours, we're going to set up a pension for dp. But it's 20 years too late.

We're going to have to hope we're healthy enough to work until we're 70, and more importantly, that we can get employment.

Most of us will die earlier I expect, unhealthy lifestyles and all that, plus crappy future healthcare once the nhs is fubar

As this article implies you have to save £246 per month from age 25 to get a 20k pension (which INCLUDES the current stage pension), then I assume you have to put aside at least £500 per month to get £40k.

www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-38609422

Hmm nothingrhymeswithfamily I'm not sure that's quite the same thing really? If you pay the rent, via HB, of 10,000 renters and 5,000 are with the council and 5,000 are private-

All the rents get paid
The council rent is used for maintenance, upkeep, capital investment of the council homes those 5,000 properties.

The private rent is pocketed by private landlords and they do whatever they like with it.

There is a moral argument against the private landlords, and private landlords are often worse than the council, true.

But the cost to the tax payer in HB is the same

especially once you reach an age where you're unable/unwilling to travel abroad and have nights out etc. My parents are in their late 80s and still enjoying fabulous, adventurous holidays abroad, have a great social life - trips to London, theatre, meals out, run two cars etc etc - fortunately they have the pension income to support it .

I think that we will have to adjust our expectations of what retirement means.

My PIL have a 4 bed detached, holiday (modestly) 3x per year, have a new car every 3-4 years and live a budgeted but comfortable life. MIL barely worked in her life (a few years before first DC at 23) and FIL earned, in today's money, approx. £40K/yr max. and retired at 55 and took a part-time job until 60. They've had 15-20 years now of a very healthy, active retirement. They had a modest inheritance from one set of parents.

It wasn't an expectation our great grandparents had or we can have. They totally lucked out and we need to accept that as an anomaly rather than the norm and adjust our expectations.

My parents downsized from the 4 bed semi-detached (owned) to a 1 bed rented (poor financial decision late working life) with almost zero savings. They were fine too. HB paid for their rent. There were no holidays or new cars but they were always warm and well fed.

DH and I have earned more than both sets of parents and started pension/overpaying pensions young. Our income is significantly above average yet having one child was a financial decision (in part). I think the future is shit compared to todays standards and we need to think more about the future generations with our decisions. We'll be fine. Our ONE child will be fine - beyond that...

Don't worry, Corbyn will be in glorious power from 2022 for at least 20 years and we will all have indexed pensions of about £40,000 per annum. Or was it £168,000? Or £33,000?

Christmas we have one child too and although this has been as result of heartbreaking secondary infertility one of the benefits I’ve often thought about is how he will have. A much more secure financial future with the savings we and grandparents have been able to put aside for him which should give him a deposit for a house and the fact he won’t have to share in any inheritance. Working hard just doesn’t seem to pay anymore

The millions of people who are renting now, will become millions of pensioners who will be claiming housing benefit. It is a time bomb!

Why don’t the govt. allow councils to start building smallish, nice housing which are cheap to heat and maintain. The councils could rent them out now thus covering the building by costs, then when the renters become pensioners they can live there for free.

But I fully expect fuck all will be done!

I consider myself quite fortunate - I had the last of the ‘gold plated final salary schemes’ - started work for a bank at 16, left at 38 and so had 22 years pension contributions before I even hit 40. I expect to receive a pension of £9kish, index linked, DH similar, perhaps a little more. Plus the state pension.

However, I have a friend (and there will be 100,000s like her) who has worked in NMW type jobs most of her life. She has no private pension and a house currently in negative equity, unlikely to increase in value and it is so tiny she couldn’t downsize. When she retires in 20 years time, I expect the state pension will be very, very small and her standard of living will be very low. I think we’re going to have to accept that as the new normal 😕.

Also we’re both self employed and have very little pension provision. We do live in a very expensive area and our mortgage will be paid off in two years when we’re 54. So we will downsize at 55 and invest that money and save like crazy for the next 10 years.

Another thing to consider is who is going to be able to buy the houses when the homeowners want to downsize given that less and less younger people are able to get on the property ladder.

I feel sick about all this stuff all the time (other thread on outgoings).

I can't afford to put more in a pension and we earn a decent amount.

It's just head in the same time for me/us.

It will be possible to retire early once our mortgage is paid off. It's our highest expense which is why we are overpaying. But I think of a mortgage as a form of saving.
We've never rushed to pay it off and now have more equity than friends who bought, never moved and paid off their mortgage asap.
When retired we won't be saving money anymore or having any work related expenses.
We will be able to live on DH's pension, mine will be for holidays, car and going out. The savings we have built up are for all the other stuff. Altogether, two pensions and savings it should be £30k+ but not 40k and will be a reasonable life.
Can't imagine how renters will manage Tbh.

Lizzie that's exactly what the gov put in place with the recent November budget - I suppose we'll have to see if it works!

I'm disabled and on a low income.

No savings . Rent . Have no chance of saving and can't increase my income due to multiple disabilities .

I'm well and truly screwed when it comes to pensions .

I've decided not to worry about it and hope that by the time I retire , voluntary euthanasia will be an option.

Did they Bubbles I must have missed that! I knew they’d allowed some money for council house building but I read it was around 5000 a year which is nowhere near enough.

It’s good to plan, but, you have to get to pensionable age first. No one knows what is round the corner, try to live in the moment.

OP - you should be fine with your mortgage paid off and roughly 20k pa between you and your DH.

The councils are never going to be able to build more properties for rental whilst right to buy exists. What is the point of them using up their money to make new homes that can be sold and they don't get the market value for them, so they don't have the money to buy new land and new properties?

It's also frustrating that it isn't compulsory for people earning over a certain amount to pay into a pension scheme (I have seen people on over 50k opting out of good pension schemes). It also doesn't help that in many schemes, if you pay in less than 2 years contributions, you have to have a refund rather than being able to transfer to another pension pot, so cannot grow a pension.

The being able to take all your pension money at 55 (in the hopes that you invest it wisely) was also another stupid idea by the government, which will just mean that once it has been spent on holidays or given away to the church (yes people really want to do this), they will be on benefits because they have nothing to live on.