Has anyone quit the rat race?

[Superwomann]

Would love to hear from anyone who has actually just moved off the grid/ stopped being part of the sick rat race!! How did you do it? Did you live your new life or wasn’t it what you thought?
Our situation; 2 full time working parents, 2 kids, primary and nursery and I hate this life: The stress every morning to get everything ready, the cooking, the cleaning, the tidying etc etc. Weekends full on with kids activities or seeing friends. Trying to get exercise in ( usually in the gym for 6am). We have no time as husband and wife. We have a cleaner but I still have to tidy, wash clothes, fold them, you know the drill.
The pressure of money, I want nice holidays and good quality food, furniture and clothes, so how can I work less and still enjoy some good things?!
Has anyone actually quit and just said it’s enough?! I can’t help but think if I moved back to my home country and stayed in a small village, life would just be simpler. We wouldn’t earn much money but I think people wouldn’t be as obsessed with materialistic things there and perhaps I wouldn’t care about it either.
On the other hand, does anyone actually enjoy this life as I described or at least it doesn’t bother you much?

This is great! Well done for doing it and your dd sounds v reasonable! It’s hard when you constantly are reminded of what “what everone else has” and you feel like you’re worse off.

Yep, I love the city life and the rat race. I' keep trying not to – because it seems it's not the done thing – but I do 😬

My daughter has just resigned from her high pressure job to concentrate on her two little boys. Her husband has a decent salary but his job isn't high pressure and he can wfh with only going into the office once a week and does the morning school run.

We've given them another lump sum (first one was for house deposit) so they have a 'float' to minimise financial stress. This is the surplus equity from our downshifting house move about five years ago. Our house is in a much cheaper area with much less land so it works for us. And crucially only twenty minutes from them. They have a small modern semi which is well insulated. Life is short, the children are little for such a short time - we wholeheartedly support them. She's started a little side business which seems to be growing slowly, which will give her an outside interest but isn't stressful and she can control how and when she works on it. I look after the baby for her when she needs to see a client.

Yup, chucked in my well paid job, sold everything that had a value and pitched up in central Portugal with my dog, a few bits of furniture and no clue what to do next.

This is great! I know I shouldn’t compare our life with others! I really need to change mindset

I get exactly what you mean! As I said, the time when kids were small was horrible for me. (it included moving from London to a smaller city "to have a better quality of life" which was even more miserable!). But then I had a terrible marriage as well. Now I'm divorced, working in interesting things (haven't reached the financial security part yet), meeting loads of interesting people and trying new things.

If you have a good relationship with your partner, there are lots of things you can do to make life better that don't cost that much (that's usually when people start discussing open relationships, but there are other options too!). If you need excitement and travel, I guess living off grid watching the grass grow won't make you happy.

Ah good for you! Of course you shouldn’t try not to, just be happy you like your life!

Yeah I’m worried about pensions and being able to save for the kids too. I can’t have it all unfortunately

For resources on some of this stuff Mr Money Mustache blog or a book called Your Money or Your Life are a good place to start.

They are imperfect but good steer in right direction.

Yes I definitely need to stop thinking about what I’m supposed to have and do.
That is such a good advice- what would give us more options and what will be good for us. Thank you!

Could you put a long term plan together? You might have to be in the child rearing trenches for a little while longer but in, say, 5 years what would you like to be happening?

My DC are in their teens now and I still haven't escaped! I think about it all the time though.. the plan is to pay off the mortgage in 2 years time, I'm going to take some vocational training courses during these years that might lead to a part time job that will cover bills etc.. you have to be much more creative without money too - but it's going to be part of the fun.

I actually think primary school is really hard for keeping up with the Joneses - the chatting at the school gate tends to be about holidays/stuff/kids activities/house renovations etc (as well as seeing what everyone else is wearing!) and you are constantly reminded of what others have AND you don't want to go too far outside the mainstream incase your DC suffer - secondary is so much easier in this respect

It sounds like you need to think a bit more practically and a bit more long-term.

While rushing around to clubs etc. is tiring, it's just as hard (if not harder) to be budgeting constantly and worrying about finances.

Obviously there's probably a balance to be had between the two extremes but it's worth thinking about how you see your fifties and sixties in terms of income and work/life balance.

I know a few people who kind of "opted out" and are now having to work silly hours and shifts in their fifties in order to fund their retirements.

I took redundancy from a rat race job in 2013, and started my own dog boarding business. I do day care and holiday boarding in my home. I have no overheads, no commuting obvs. I make a very decent salary from it. You do need a licence from your local council, and sometimes they won't give you one with kids under 5. Best job ever, and no one to answer to.

It's a fantasy. I had a very good friend who tried it with thee kids and all she did was exchange one stressful situation with another. And I lost count of the number of times she asked if she could borrow money, none of which I ever saw again.

Eventually they had to start all over again and she went back to working bank shifts on the NHS while her husband stacked shelves at Sainsburys.

I guess it's possible if you're young and fit with no kids, maybe.

I agree. Friends of mine opted out in their 30s, moved to a lovely semi-rural lower cost area and took on self-employed lifestyle jobs. They then downsized in their early 50s to be mortgage free. However, they are still working (quite unhappily) in their 60s because of their lack of adequate pensions, one of them has some serious health problems and they are looking at equity release.

I think their dc found it quite difficult as teenagers because there was no money for the kind of things their school friends had, and now they see their parents struggle financially.

For my friends what seemed like dream jobs when they were able to make a choice are tarnished now that they are a necessity. In their 50s after 20 years out of their previous professions there was no option to return to higher paid careers, and during Covid they both had to take on whatever minimum wage jobs they could get.

Meanwhile those who felt a bit envious of their previous lifestyle, are mainly enjoying happy retirements with sufficient money to make it possible.

It's very hard where you are right now. I hear you. I too miss my selfish life pre-kids where I'd travel at the drop of a hat. But I had to make my peace with it sone years ago.

I decided that to have any kind of life I needed to be part-time (I work 3 days). Today is one day off & I've just been for an hour's walk in nature (I'm urban so make this priority to do on days off) and have a list if things to do: some adnin/ batch cooking/ planning some refurbs/ sorting the laundry/ clean bathrooms before I need to head back to collect youngest from school. I really, really don't think our lives would be manageable without my days off.

Life changed massively with DS3 who is ND & has epilepsy. Time with him is hard going & stressful, so I need time to de-compress. DP also reduced hours so he has a half day on a Friday. I still run around like mad on work days (I teacb), but the days off make up for it. He's almost a teenager now, but still needs huge amounts of time & care. DS1 & DS2 are at uni, but still need my time.

We have had to accept that we can't and won't go abroad holidays. It killed me for years, but I've had an acceptance now as I realise for the holidays I want (even solo wIth friends) I couldn't afford the 5 star experience or afford the time for the long haul I'd love. We have UK breaks & have a little camper van too, which keeps very outdoorsy DP & the older boys very happy. The older two are now adventuring abroad, of course, & it's amazing to see.

We have a lovely house (good investment) & I need a reliable, new car, so pay for that as it's priority (lots of miles to specialist school), but apart from that don't spend huge amounts on loads. We've had to cut our cloth, but still make sure pensions are sorted etc.

I'd seriously have burned out if something didn't give. Think about that.

Edited to say, our DC have always had what they need/ money for activities/ trips/ outings/ clothes/ do what their friends do. And we've saved for them since they were born (DDebit every month so was part of the bills). They were & are always priority over expensive holidays/ Flash things (FB marketplace has amazing things- I've had beautiful furniture on many occasions).

We love camping and I think we could definitely be happy with less “ nice things and less foreign holidays”.

i split when I was 3 months pg with 2nd dc I already had an older dc with same father

i had challenges financially but I was determined to always go on holiday

we had 3 /4 weeks in France Spain camping every year, it’s cheap as chips and fun

We did it in a very small way in that we moved out of London to a much cheaper city up north which freed up money and time hugely. We're certainly not 'off grid' or anything like that but the balance is much healthier I'd say. We didn't have kids when we lived in London and even so we were both always rushing around for one reason or another. We still technically live in a city now but we can walk to everything we need and there's much more of a community spirit. Plus we have lots of family close by for babysitting/general help and support. DH and I both work part time and DD will be starting nursery soon. We don't have lots of cash floating around and we have a very average income but is certainly enough to live a comfortable enough lifestyle.

I have not quite gone to the lengths that you talk about but I have been working part time for the large majority of my working life and I am content with what I have. The free time that allows me to pursue my own interests is worth so much more to me than the money I would get by working full time.

A lot of it comes down to changing expectations and stopping worrying about keeping up with the Jones.

I grew up in a big house in a nice area with regular holidays abroad and I imagined that I would have the same but I now live in a flat in a town that is not on anyone's most desirable list and go abroad about once every three years. But I am so much happier than I was when I was striving for the picture perfect life.
I have stopped caring about showing my success through material possessions and have friends who like me for who I am and not what I have. I don't think my son ever had the feeling of going without, he had holidays and nice toys for his birthday just maybe not to the extent that his friends did but he gained a lot by having a mother who was very present in his life and who wasn't dealing with the stress of trying to cram all the housework and admin around full time job.

I am systematically working to make this happen. Getting ready to “retire” in 18 months at the age of 51. Husband is 14 years older and already retired; I have been, and am, the main earner.

Main focus is housing security, so prioritizing paying off mortgage. We are very fortunate to earn well, but live well below our means month to month. All bonuses and extra goes either to mortgage or pension savings.

I notice we travel less than peers and I spend less on clothes than I used to. We have a nice flat, but vacation property or upgrading house is a no. I want to prioritize “buying my time”.

Retiring will not be stopping everything, but I want to have the ability to do freelance or part time, as well as volunteer. Maybe study part time (Open University) without the pressure of having to convert to career on a schedule.

Do you have an idealised view of your home country? I only say that as I'm not currently living in my home country and when I think about going back, I remember all the reasons I wanted to leave. Nowhere is perfect.

Definitely try and change your mindset not to be swept up into 'keeping up with the jones's' and see if you can adapt your lifestyle.

Saying that, Ben fogle has a great programme called 'lives in the wild' which may interest you.

The key thing for me was working out what I was comparing with who. Most people don't have the holidays and the house and the cars and the fulfilling job and the good relationships with families and friends and the nice clothes and the free time. You have to pick what matters to you and make those happen instead of aspiring to someone's life in some bits, someone else's elsewhere, and a third person's for the bits the others haven't cracked.

I still dream of chucking it in and moving somewhere warm though!

Yes this would be a worry, teenagers cost a lot and I would want them to have a happy life, not to say that you need a lot of money to be happy but it helps. Like someone here was saying on here “ it is hard worrying about finances too”, you exchange one stressor for another.

Yes I do need to do this! I can’t have it all unfortunately..
I would love to live somewhere warm, everything is easier without the mud, the layers and the rain 😅