Would you pay all the bills, to allow DH to retire?

[retirementislooming]

I'm really torn as to what is the right thing to do here. Would love opinions.

Been with DH for 17 years. He works in a high stress, life or death job, and to be honest, he is close to burn out. It's shift work. He is knackered most of the time. He would like to retire at 55, which is about 2.5 years away.

He would have a lump sum to invest, of circa £72k. But his monthly income from his pension would only be £900pm.

I am going to draw my pension at the same time as him (I'm older). This is a pension I had from an employed position for 27 years, but I am self employed now and will carry on working.

My lump sum, plus other stuff coming to fruition in a couple of years, will mean that by then, I should have £165k lump sum, which I plan to put into NS&I. My pension income will be £1000pm, which I will feed into the NS&I.

My self employed business brings in around £2500-£4000 a month (seasonal).

Our household bills will be £500pm, plus food and alcohol, so about £1000 a month. No commuting, as I WFH, and mortgage will be finished.

So, my question is, even though we have never combined finances, should I support us both with the income from my business?

On the one hand, I feel that if he paid half of the bills, then he would probably have to put in £500pm, only leaving him £400pm left to play with, and this might push him back into work (which I definitely don't want), on the other hand, would I be crazy to pay all the bills from my ongoing self employed business?

I should add, that my business is not hard work particularly, and with him at home, and helping me with it, I would feel semi retired myself.

I feel like I can't see the wood for the trees.

A - he should retire and your business should cover all bills & food

B - he should contribute

Another salient point, is that he is due to inherit substantially in the future. At which point we could go back to 50/50, but this won't be for many years yet (by the looks of things).

Lastly, we do not share children. Mine are grown and flown. He has none.

You don't want him to get a job so you can travel so it seems reasonable to help with the costs of that. You also say he will help with your business which will make your life easier so can you look on it as paying him for his help? Giving him a salary could be tax efficient for your business.

There are ways round that!

Seasonal work, fixed term contracts, locum/temp/bank type work, self-employed work, digital nomad type work.

Or he only joins you for part of the time when you travel abroad.

Yes, I like this way of looking at it. I don't need help really, however, him giving it would make my life easier, so there is that. It will be nice to have the company as well, because at the moment I am alone a lot! When he is on annual leave, and we are not going anywhere, this is how we operate, so I know what that would feel like day to day. We do not get under each others feet. Tend to do the business part, then spend time in different parts of the house to do our own thing during the day, then get together at about 6pm for dinner, and spend our evenings together watching our favourite shows/talking/listening to music etc.

If he's on 50k now, what on earth is he doing with all that money?? Is he squirreling it away into his pension to give himself more in retirement?

He can leave the job & defer his pension & take at 60 or his normal scheme end. Unless he is in special classes? Get a different job instead. Or he could do bank / temp work or a zero hours contract somewhere so that you can go away when you like still.

We spend a LOT on holidays just now. And yes, he puts a lot in to his Pension. For a PP, I know the figures are accurate, I have been into his account and looked at all the figures.

Quite a lot of people financially support their partner at some stage of life (women and men). It isn’t wrong in itself, just think of the longer term consequences and how will he be prevented from overspending. Agree upfront the tasks he’ll take on at home so that the quality of life improves for both of you as a result

I’d support him to take some time out and recover with a view to getting some sort of part time work to supplement his income

DH and I kept separate finances until we retired. It just stopped making sense at that time. Our outgoings and goals are all joint and we can only do them if we are equal.
I would think some sort of flexible employment might suit him though, exam invigilator is a good option for low stress and ad hoc / suit yourself / not all year round and don't need to worry about holiday allowances.

Why are you posting about this again?

Not sure why it's a discussion you can easily afford for him to retire, he can do a lot more in the house, I don't know what needs doing, but in my house there would be decorating, minor work to do, cooking, cleaning, a big garden to keep under control, grow veg and fruit, looking after the cars, sorting out all the bills, etc. And helping out with your business. I expect he has some interests he would like to get more involved in as well. Plus you are both going to be holidaying a bit, go for it and both of you enjoy it.

Your husband can retire from the stressful job and take on another less stressful one, not lounge around at home whilst you still work.

A friend's husband retired from the fire service in his 50s then got a part-time local government job.

Yes I would but I'd be clear that any of the frivolous stuff he wanted ( that I viewed as a waste of money) would have to come out of his own pension money.

In the context of your income, an extra £500 on bills is not a huge amount to be paying. Given the risks and stresses of his job, I'd be supporting him to retire, but I wouldn't be paying him a lot for help in your business if you don't really need him. His pay could be you paying his share of the bills and for holidays.

I would expect him to get bored retiring at that age though, so looking in to seasonal work, bank or temp work would definitely be a good idea and still allow him the flexibility to travel with you in the winter. It would also keep his foot in the door of the employment market on the off chance you got run over by a bus (for example), because that scenario would leave him in trouble if you're leaving everything to your kids.

Yes do it @retirementislooming ! None of us know how long we have left or what health problems may curtail our plans. Make the most of being able to have some quality time together.

No, I read your other thread and I don’t think it is a good idea. He needs to support himself. It is definitely not a good idea to take your pension to support your husband.
It is usually not a good idea to take your pensions before state retirement age. I have said this many times on this forum, but working beyond retirement age and taking our pensions late has done wonders for our finances.
I know quite a few people who have retired early from their original jobs but they have always got another job, even for just a couple of days a week, in a lower stress job.

It would also not be tax efficient for you to take your pension while you are still working as you will loose a lot in tax. All your allowances will go on your employment.

You could look at it another way. What would the advice to him be? DW wants me to give up work so we can travel and see her children who live overseas. It's true my job is harming my health, but I could work PT, but she doesn't want me to do that because it would restrict her travel plans.

I'll have a small retirement income, but will largely be dependent on her to pay the bills. She'll have much more disposable income than me and she's not keen to pay for me to accompany me on the trips, so I'll have to find that from my reduced income....

I generally hate posts that say if he were a woman, but in this case, advice would be not to give up financial independence for someone who's not sure they want to support you. In his shoes I'd want to be sure I wouldn't have to be begging OP for money to support the lifestyle she wants.

Its the Autumn years isn’t it. Everyone carps on about life expectancy being so long but how many healthy years because expected healthy years are late sixties. Plus the burn out, how real is it? My friends DH retired at 55 but so many of his colleagues died on the job late fifties he just thought let’s go or I may die, this is corporate America. I know that’s not going to elicit sympathy especially on MN but they were dropping like flies.

Your only issue is the way he wastes money which I remember from your previous thread. As much as not drawing pensions for as long as possible is good no one knows when they are going to drop dead. We took ours at 55 and 56 and will be travelling because we can. Had a chat to a woman today, no one will insure her due to developing health issues in her late sixties.

@retirementislooming
In my opinion, if he retires at 55 he should aim to do some kind of part time work and contribute to the household bills (even if his contribution is less than yours). I’ve seen that you’re not as keen on him working part time because he’s less available for holidays/trips abroad. I’ve thought of some suggestions of part time work he might be able to do, while still having more flexibility for holidays:

• Have you considered if he did some part time work linked to education, something that works to school term time only. That would give him 13 weeks off a year. This could be roles like teaching assistant, school admin/kitchen/lunchtime/after school club staff. Or some university support staff jobs run to term time.
• Perhaps he could look for work that’s zero hours contract?
• Seasonal jobs - there tend to be extra temporary jobs at both summer time and Christmas time - like extra shop or supermarket jobs at Christmas, selling ice cream in summer, teaching beach sports in summer etc. I’ve even seen jobs advertised for people to work as Santa Claus and Christmas elves to staff Christmas grottos for kids!
• You said he’s in emergency services, what about getting a job to train new recruits to the profession part time? Like teaching students in police training/or teaching nursing/medical students. If he’s in a medical job, there’s also jobs for medical staff to examine medical students in their university exams.
• If he’s in a medical job, possibly consider changing to work as PIP/Universal Credit medical assessor to assess benefits claimants health needs.

HTH

My guess is he's a police officer and if that's the case not all roles in the police are life and death or shift work.

I'd tell your DH to look for change within his organisation and change his role.

There's no way I would be happy with this without him exploring all options rather than just early retirement.

It sounds like OP wants him to retire so they can travel though? She's just not sure she wants to pay for him to do that?

Well she can't have it both ways can she. Either he retires and they travel together, which she pays for. Or he pays for himself but that's going to require some supplemental income for him, which might mean he can't jet off at the drop of a hat for longer periods, if he can't find a role to accommodate that.

If he’s NHS he can go on the staff bank and take shifts as and when it suits him.

However, I still think he’ll be massively struggling for cash, particularly to fund long holidays. How much would one of these trips cost per person? Say you went away for a month and his share of the costs were £2k (utterly no idea what’s realistic). That would mean he’d need to save £300 for 6.7 months. That means that for more than half the year, he’s not living on £900, he’s living on £600. It’s just not particularly realistic for anyone, never mind someone used to living on £50k a year and with spendthrift habits.

Quite

UABU to not want him to get a part-time job. You can’t have it both ways, either he doesn't work and doesn't contribute equally, or he works part-time and contributes (and is less free) . There are more seasonal part-time jobs that may tie in with your plans.