Stick it out for 20mths til retirement or ***k It and leave now and live on my savings

[booboo57]

I have just had enough of my relatively well paid but stressful job.
Last couple of years have been so difficult with Covid, wfh etc but now we are back in the office pt it is no better. Don't get me wrong, my job is no where near as hellish as some who post on here but i have just had enough.

Can't motivate myself to get my arse in gear, things are slipping, I'm forgetting to do things. Feels more than the usual up and downs as i've had this feeling since June.
One of the reasons for taking this job on was the extra money i could save for my retirement, i manage to save nearly £1k most months (I know, I'm really lucky). Some of this has been spent on home improvments and v expensive holiday in a Cornish spa hotel this summer (so worth it but did nothing to improve my attitude to work).
DH rekons I'm mad to pass up the opportunity to save more money for the sake of a few months. Looked at going part-time or changing roles but the thought of starting again in a new role is so depressing.
My current plan is to give my 3 months notice next month. Have six months off over the summer and if i really hate it look at a temping or such in Sept. next year.

What do you think? I feel I'm being a bit chicken giving up and not "leaning in" but on the other hand I deserve some time to myself.

Do you can’t go part-time in this role? Have you had a discussion with your employer about staggered wind-down towards retirement? As part of that you’d be expected to be delegating more as time went on in order to transition the team so perhaps start there? Would a concrete plan make things feel better?

@vivainsomnia

Is your husband happy to support you during that time? Is he happy in his job?

OP, I'd say go for it and enjoy the freedom it brings. We've had an awful lot of bereavements in the last few years and it made me realise that life isn't about work. So I handed in my notice and have loved every moment of our new life since.

OP hasn't said how old she is I don't think? As surely that makes a difference, is she's 50 or 60. The comments about forgetting things, no motivation also make me think menopause - if not already treated for this I would suggest looking into it!

Can you go part time? That will give you more time to think and rest, but you won’t be eating into your money as much.

I was going to early retire at Christmas 2022 and my dp April 2022.
But I have decided to retire at the end of January 2022 instead. I'll get paid until the middle of March.
I could carry on and save more and more money but I have had enough so I'm giving up. I have rental income, savings, pensions, no mortgage, I've planned and invested and put aside money for emergencies like the roof and a new car.
I have enough and I won't let fear of not having enough stop me.
Only 3 months now and I can't wait.

In my organisation (local government) people heading towards retirement get mandated reduced hours - they go down to 4 days and then to 3 over the last year. This doesn't apply to early retirement, just to folk who are coming up to 65. Does yours offer anything like that? It's always struck me as a nice way of easing into retirement. I imagine that this policy must be fairly widespread in the public sector, so it isn't some niche perk. Could you use it as a model and think about reducing your hours? Although tbh if the money aspect stacks up for you I would just retire now. I knew someone who handed in his notice at the age of 61, just in time to miss a round of redundancy which would have given him a good pay off. On paper that was bad timing, but actually he died 3 years later, so the time he got was invaluable.

I did this, for exactly the same reasons. Stressful job, difficult during covid and feeling dismal at the thought of returning to office life.
I had my pension consultation and found that I wouldn't lose as much money as I thought if I went early, and I was off.
Admittedly, I had less time to go than you do, but I didn’t have a big savings cushion, so swings, roundabouts…
I am so glad I did, it is great living a life of sloth and hedonism!
I have less money but the most precious commodity is time, really.

I would hand in my notice. It's a 3 month notice period so that's another 3 months of saving. Life is too short to spend it in a job you dislike if you don't absolutely have to. Or as a compromise hand it in Jan so you leave just as the weather starts to perk up.
I'm approaching my maternity leave and cannot wait to have a year away from the stress (second child so I do understand it won't be a stress free year off).

If its too much can you talk first about lightening your load to work?

Is the job to much for one person?
If so say it and insist your load is lightened.
What can they say?
Insist.

If they are not happy, let them offer to pay to get rid of you.

If not, check out a bit of contract work and then make your decision.

Life is short and 20 months of stress won't do your health any favours.

Assuming you're not in a life-or-death type job I'd probably stick it out but really half arse it

If it affects your pension- stick it out. When you retire you do not have the same income and it definitely makes a difference, more so now with price rises for food, council tax , fuel bills all looming on the horizon.

Yes, especially with price rises i think it would be silly to give up a stable income.
Although on the other hand it would free up a job to a hopefully younger person that needs the money more!

I’m just book marking to read later. I’m in pretty much the same position, 19 months until I’m 60 when I get my pension. I’m planning on staying at the moment though I have just gone down to 4 days. I think it will fly past.

To be honest, the money contributed to your pension at this late stage wont have a lot of time to grow so is essentially your contributions plus tax relief and any employer contributions with (hopefully) a little bit of growth.

What you'd be short is the income from your job, and pensions contributions from your employer and any tax relief. This is likely to be the bigger figure but can be offset with not making pension contributions and the other costs of working e.g. travel and clothes etc and of course the benefits to your life of not working.

Do you have other pensions? e.g. anything sitting from previous employers? Might be worth looking at putting some into an income drawdown policy where you could take benefits now (assuming you are over 55?) to offset the loss of earnings. If you have other pensions coming on stream, you don't need to set any income from this to last until 100, just until you have other income due.

I think I'm going to be in a similar situation to you soon. I'm just back at work after being off with stress and none of the promises made as part of my return to work plan have materialised. I'm hoping to be able to continue but I'm not sure I'll be able to unless things change significantly.

Well yeh, the tax relief is a Biggie. Actually if OP can work and put all her wages into the pension pot it might be worth doing that way to make the most of it.

If you can afford it then leave. My DH put in extra years and died of cancer so he didn't get to see his retirement....not saying that will happen to you but life is to short to be unhappy at work if you can avoid it.

It appears the majority of people think you should stick it out, although from your last post it seems to have your heart set on going.
Have you checked how it will affect your State Pension? How far is your Dh off from retirement? Good luck.

OP can continue to contribute to a pension whilst drawing some benefits but she cannot contribute to a pension from pension income so would need to have another source of income to do so. There is a contribution cap and from memory it's about £40k or 100% of earnings if below this.

My dad died at 63.
I'm squarely away cash into pension savings. My aim is to save 10 years fun money (state plus a bit of old final salary pension will cover the basics). Looking at parents and grandparents, I need to plan for holidays and stuff til I'm 75.
I would not blame you on jot!

Of course you are not being a coward! At 65 I am the only one of my friends still working, most gave up at around 50. Unlike me they had inheritances which helped support them. I'm surprised to find how much I have struggled to put a sense of duty into perspective. I wouldn't have said I had any sense of duty to keep working until I suddenly found myself thinking that I needed to carry on because it was the right thing to do. Why?

Go for it op.

I'm currently condensing my hours into less days so I have flexibility to see family and friends and spend more time on myself and with my lovely dh who works opposite hours to me and to actually have a life.

Nobody said it's law to work to the grave.
Who made the rules that says we have to grind away till retirement when we are so knackered there's no energy left for anything else.

I've got another 25 years of working yet but I won't be spending it liming someone else's pocket and doing the same old drudgery.

I'm retraining in extra things after Xmas so eventually will be my own boss.

Can't wait.

Go for it

I retired at 60 and almost immediately my health crashed and burned much more quickly than my consultant had predicted. My pension is tiny and I have another year to go before I get my state pension. DH is also retired but he has been able to do quite a bit of self employed work so we are plodding along ok.
It is always a gamble, I know my pension would have been a lot more if I had kept working, but none of us know what our health will be like.
Definitely check carefully what your projected state and occupational pension will be before you make a decision.
That said, your physical and mental health is more important than money, as long as you have enough to live on.

What are your sickness benefits like? If your work is affecting your health (including mental health) that's what it's for. My employer pay full pay for six months and then half pay for six months. Take a break then re-evaluate. Twenty months saving £1k a month plus whatever else you salary goes on is a lot to walk away from

Can you save more for a shorter period? £1k pm for 20 months is roughly 13 months at £1500. What are you aiming to achieve financially in the 20 months? What is your goal?
I think you need to work out why you want to work the extra 20 months e.g. I don't want to have to spend £xx in savings to bridge to my pension then work out a plan.
e.g. I am fine with funding 6 months out of current savings but I would like to go 10 months early so need to save enough to cover 4 months earnings in the next 10 months.
or
I can meet my bills on 3/5 of my salary so I am going to request part time work for the last 20 months

I'd stick it out. What can they really do if you don't care anymore. Make you go through a performance improvement? If you don't care about what the outcome is, should it bother you? Just cruise along and do the bare minimum? It's not like you need them as reference for another job.