What are the basics of planning for retirement with a partner / spouse?

[hollyblueivy]

If you have a partner or a spouse, how are you planning for retirement together?

Do you know the nature and extent of your partners pension scheme and what they contribute and what they stand to receive? Or do you each separately sort your own pension with little to no discussion?

if one partner has a good pension and the other has a small or no pension, is it assumed that you will both live on the other partners pension? Otherwise how will that work?

Depends if you have joint money or separate finances.

We have joint money with one partner having a big pension pot and the other not but have built up dividend income. Income will continue to be shared and we're aiming to have similar-sized pots over time.

If you have separate finances, I assume that you are each responsible for retirement income.

At the very least you both need to sit down and discuss retirement and decide if you can both afford to retire or if one might need to work a bit longer or even both to reduce hours to work 1 day a week or whatever. If you have shared finances this should be easy but if separate finances one might be comfortable but the other would struggle. DH and I have separate finances. I retired at 57 he worked on until 60. We waited until mortgage was repaid and most big household items were new or replaced before retiring. Eg. We had new boiler and radiators replaced and 2 bathrooms refurbished before retirement because we knew after retirement there would be less money for things like this. You need a spreadsheet and work out outgoings and incomings.

Thanks - we have separate finances and both contribute equally to joint bills account.

I would think with separate finances then it does need a sit down discussion as it will all depend on the partner with the income wanting to share?

Otherwise income will be on state pension, any personal pensions and any benefits. But I think benefits are based on household income, regardless of the actual split.

I don't think there's any assumption generally, it's personal to the couple.

The personal to the couple but is what I want sure of. As it doesn’t seem to be something that is widely discussed.

an element of sharing is absolutely fine, but if the lower pension person can do more to boost their pot, then they should. As in, don’t use the bigger pot as an expectation.

Depends on your age and really you're asking a different question, which is do I need to subsidise my partner?

We have a spreadsheet and have been planning retirement for pretty much our entire relationship, so there are no surprises. If there is going to be a surprise for your partner, you need to be discussing it now.

Agree it’s personal. DH and I have pretty much always combined finances. I was a far higher earner and always saw savings as being for the family’s benefit. I have a DC pension, and he has a DB pension both of which are now ‘our retirement money’. Makes it pretty simple tbh.

The number one thing is communication! Where you have separate finances and different pension amounts you need to talk about how you will manage this. We have recently, I have a small final salary pension, state pension and two modest private pensions which will help a bit, dh (second marriage) has very good provision and now retired early (I’m younger) I’m going to max out my state ni contributions then quit, living off his money for most costs but have £60k in savings so I don’t need to be asking for money for smalls things.

We have always had totally shared finances and treated retirement in exactly the same way. I think you use your existing model as the retirement model.

I think you also need to negotiate when you retire and what that will look like. Will you want to do the same things ( travel, hobbies) and what implications does that have on finances?

We planned a lot and took steps to both improve our situation but it was a real ‘joint enterprise’.

We have had a joint pot from the start. Much easier

We share all finances and there is no "mine" or "yours", everything is one big pot with shared CC, spending coming out of one (joint) account and savings going into whoever has some spare ISA allowance. PB winnings go straight into the current account, regardless of whose bonds have won.
With pensions we tried to make sure that we both have healthy pots. We both have a mix of DB & DC schemes however we are both named beneficiaries on each others schemes.

I retired at 57 and are already drawing my pensions whereas my OH is 3yrs younger and still works PT before retiring completely in a couple of years. My pensions and his wages go straight into the current account although almost all of his money is then paid into a pension as we have more than ample to support us and indulge in our hobbies, pastimes etc.

Works for us.