Pensions - how prepared are you for retirement? Do you know how much you're likely to have to live on?

[littleredsquirrel]

Just curious really. I am currently trying to plough my way through all the paperwork to work out what my likely income levels will be when I retire.

I have a pension which I paid into for ten years but nothing being paid in at the moment. Trying to work out whether its worth putting more in or look at other forms of investment.

Currently my pension fund is projecting I'll have 24k pa (or £14k in real terms taking inflation into account.). I have 20 years to go if I want to retire at 60. Looks like we'd definitely be selling the house!

What arrangements have you made for retirement?

Oh, and thank you littlered as well :) it does make sense.

Beast, I had a massive thread some months back after my dog bit dh. About 300 people telling me I was irresponsible if I didn't put it down and another 100 telling me I needed to do more to help the dog.

I try not to mention the dog anymore for fear of stirring up one side or another so shhhh.

I guess they do have to die - but right now it's their money to spend (and my Dad certainly does, Mum not so much), and not mine to inherit.

DH's parents are reasonably well off, but you never do know - and his Mum's aunt died earlier this year at 102 years old, so we may be waiting 40 years if she follows that trend. (Think indestructible little old Welsh ladies and you get the picture...)

Geeky pension knickers at least means you will be able to afford new knickers, wash and dry them when you are retired... I'll stick with geek, thanks!

For me it's about the holy quartet and not putting all your eggs in one basket.

I think you need all of the following if possible or a combination if you haven't got the means.

Pension
Savings
Mortgage paid off
Inheritance
(State pension)

I'm 28 so probably a little naive in thinking i can get all these. Me and my partner both work for the NHS so have been paying into pensions that "should" at the moment payout ok.

We have started an ISA 3 years ago that we pay into each month.

We over pay on our mortgage

Both our parents are kind of ok in the money department so anything from them would be an added bonus but fingers crossed its while away yet.

I've got various small pensions, which will provide peanuts, one semi-decent one & I'm paying into another semi-decent one at the moment. I definitely don't have enough to live off comfortably yet. However, I will definitely be able to downsize and release some capital, plus I don't see myself retiring particularly early, so I'm hoping that by working well into my 60s (as long as my health holds) that I'll reduce the number of years I'm dependent on a pension alone.

I really fear for so many women currently in their late 30s & 40s who have literally nothing in terms of pension provision and who have taken long breaks from jobs where they might get a pension or earn enough to contribute to one - particularly those without husbands.

DH and I have had no help with none to come.
My family have nothing. Dhs family have a reasonable amount in the form of a paid off mortgage and savings but they have written us and our children out of their wills.
I think my very poor background has made me determined to try and leave my children some stability.

I had a letter this week saying my state pension age is now 66. All well and good but I am currently having to apply for early retirement due to ill health and would be delighted to know I will be collecting it at 66.

Thats why I'm posting really, my (potential) current pension plus one from my late husband will probably add up to a reasonable amount but not what I originally expected. My plan was to spend my 50s going full time and saving my socks off. Not going to happen now so please all of you have a think about Plan B in case things go tits up at any point!

I just don't know what to do. Keep the house I've inherited and rent it. Try and invest all the money. Blow it all on holidays and doing the house up! I really should be sensible but as I've just seen my dad become terminally ill and die at 64 I sometimes think fuck it about planning for retirement.

I have savings but no pension
do not intend to get one
I plan to carry on working (part time, alternate months) till I drop

Viva - do a bit of both. Have a mad moment but do something a bit sensible too. Best of both worlds then.

We have some savings and should have paid off the mortgage in eight years since we overpay on it so hopefully we will have the house to fall back on. Its a reasonably expensive property too. The DSs won't be impressed though, they've already staked their claim on the house!

I doubt we'll have much in the way of inheritance. Both my parents and DHs parents have houses worth a couple of hundred thousand but if none of them need the properties to fund care I'd be very surprised.

I have asked DH to get a pension projection so that we can have a proper look at what we might have in the way of pension income. I think he has images of us spending our retirement skiing and travelling and so he might have a bit of a shock in store!

charleybarley what is it you have to do re pensions lifetime allowance? Not heard about that.

www.hmrc.gov.uk/pensionschemes/understanding-la.htm
getting anywhere near the lifetime allowance is an utter pipe dream for 90% of the population
having £1.25 million in savings is unlikely to happen to most of us after all.

charley lowering the pension lifetime allowance sum from 1.5 million £ to 1.25 millions is not going to affect me :). But it is good to know :)

I will look up the junior ISAs, thank you.

That would be lovely but unlikely to affect me.

I didn't know about the CTF and the junior ISAs and that is good news. I was feeling very hard done by being stuck with a CTF for both DCs.

This is money website says that the changes haven't yet happened and aren't guaranteed to happen re CTF and junior ISAs. The government are just consulting on it apparently.

as per that link, 360,000 people will be affected by the change.
the rest of working adults - around 36,000,000 (ten times as many) will not.

the average public sector pension is under £8,000
not the £56,000 the Torygraph is faffing about
bear in mind that half the adults in the country get less than £19,000 when they are working, let alone as pensioners.

DH doesn't know what a boring night he has ahead of him. We are definitely sitting down and discussing this!

Viva, invest a bit in some real life financial advice. You need to talk through the whole situation with someone qualified. W shouldn't take guesses as what you ought to do, there will be many facts offline that we are not party to.

Blimey I'm quite shocked DH has just texted to say that he's asked a financial advisor he knows to set up an appointment for us. Think he was kicked into action by the £14k prediction.