50+ without a fat pension pot....

[lechatnoir]

Come on it! Share your plans or just be thankful you're not the only one who didn't or more likely couldn't squirrel away £££ every month.

I've got the grand total of about £40k in my pension which will give me pretty much fuck all! Retirement is a long way off for us (both on pretty low income in an expensive part of the country) and we just don't have spare cash to put away.

Ive just started paying into a company scheme but only the minimum so will be a bit more so accept retirement won't be fine dining & luxury cruises and will probably just draw down money to go on a last hurrah holiday, down size to release some capital and rely on state pension and a bit extra.

What are your plans (if any?) Please don't post worrying that a £30k annual income won't suffice - this is not the thread for you!

Hi OP - I'm in a similar situation. I'm 54 and have saved around £40k pension. I'm on less than £30k per year before tax. I'm also about to get divorced from my higher earner husband, so my household income and standard of living will take a massive nosedive. My plan is to try to buy a tiny flat from my share of the house equity when we sell, to be as close to mortgage free as possible, as that's the only way I can see to keep my head above water financially for the rest of my life, on my own. I imagine I'll also need a part-time job after retirement age too. But I grew up skint and I know how to budget and make the most of nothing, so I'm hoping I'll be ok.

That's not true unless you mean for housing costs. If you get the full state pension you won't qualify for a penny in pension credit.

My pension pot is a pathetic £25k, which I think equates to about a grand a year. I am pretty sure my best financial option is to drop dead in my 60s.

I can't understand why my late mum was getting 300 quid a week in state pension and pension credit ? Is it likely she has been overpaid ? Her payments equate to more than the current state pension of 800pm

My mum gets similar amount….it’s part of my dads pension….did you lose your Dad early?

No he died aged 87 in 2020, I think mum has been overpaid. I'm dealing with her estate as she passed away in Feb.

Based on your dads age your mum was probably receiving a widows pension on top of her own entitlement. There will be letters outlining the breakdown of her payments.

The only people with decent pensions are the very rich and public sector workers. And its the public sector that bleats about being poorly paid

Hi, thanks, I can't find anything that breaks it down, it just shows state pension and pension credit. What complicates it is that my mum owned land that she didn't declare when applying for PC. I'm in the process of administrating her estate and its turned into a headache for a number of reasons

Very similar to you. My pension pot is zero. My savings waver around 20k but I constantly dip into them to help out DC. I work freelance and always have so never had a company pension and just didn't get around to setting up a private one.

Plan is to downsize, keep working p/t and live off the surplus from the house sale.

Because I will have to pay for private surgery if the NHS wait is too long as I prefer to live and be poor than deteriorate on a 2 year waiting list.

@ScierraDoll Yes the rich and some public sector workers have good pensions. Pensions and salary are not the same thing. Some public sector salaries (particularly those at the lower end) are woeful and have been subjected to austerity for years. Instead of buying the media hype that pitches different types of workers against each other. We should all be banding together to get a better deal for everyone.

Don't hate public sector workers too much. It's no walk in the park, highly stressful and many sadly won't live long enough to enjoy their pension in any real way. By the time a lot of us are retiring, the age of retirement will probably be 70 or even older.

The thing is if she moved she'd be leaving all her friends and activities behind. Unless she's really sociable and up for making new friends it can be hard as you get older to start afresh far away.

PIP carries on after your state pension age provided you claimed it before 66.

I quite like the idea of relocating for retirement - a new adventure. I have a small house but courtesy of it being in a home county it is worth above the average UK price and I could buy a similar sized house in plenty of SE coastal towns and have capital available. I don't need parking and would prefer a courtyard so plenty of choice, at the moment at least - my retirement age isn't for another 20 odd years.

Alternatively, I think about moving back into London. I'd only be able to afford a 1 bed somewhere like the dodgy parts of Croydon but, again, at the moment, I'd get the freedom pass and there's a lot that can be done for free in London so hopefully I wouldn't get bored.

Being mortgage free is vital for me in old age. I think a lot of renters, who are currently paying into pensions, are going to find themselves the same or even worse off at retirement that those who didn't pay into pension (whether out of choice or necessity) because of how pension income will be treated versus housing benefit/council tax etc. Plus housing benefit if seldom enough to cover full private rent (5 years ago I had to apply for housing benefit and our local authority thought £800 was sufficient for a 2 bed place. You can't even rent a room in my town for that).

I've always worked part time since ds's and mine is small. I've raised my contribution many years ago, but the effect is minimal.

I knew nothing of pensions.

I didn't start a pension until my 30s for this reason, really. I feel strongly that pensions need to be taught better - or maybe there is better information now than when I was younger because of the internet.

No one ever told me it gains you free money via tax breaks and employer contribution. I think if I'd understood this I would have started sooner.

I also failed to appreciate how compound interest can add up. It was only when my earnings were enough I started to need my own tracking tool (excel!) and spent the time forecasting how my pension savings might go that I started to realise the power of them.

I really wish my parents had been able to share this with me but they also didn't have such a strong grasp of it so I never saw how important it was until I was older.

Not a particular complaint about my circumstance but more to show solidarity with everyone who grew up with a similar lack of insight into how pensions work and why.

I’ll have a small NHS pension plus the state pension. I also have small amounts in various private pensions but probs about 10k max. So it won’t be huge.
I’m planning to rent out my house and travel. I went to India when I was younger and I’d like to go back to explore.

I’ll always have my house to come back to.

I started a pension at 50! Self employed private pension. It's only 4 years old and will be a nice top up to state pension.

Also trying to max out isa every year, definitely going to add a to a stocks and shares isa for the long game... as it's tax free income with no capital gains!

I have really started to do a lot of research into investments, pensions and savings this year . Strict budgeting, and saving as much as I can. It is starting to pay off and I feel a bit better about impending retirement.

@Freetodowhatiwant
There is a ‘side hustle’ thread in the Work topic that is quite interesting.

I got my state pension this year.

I have sympathy with the WASPI cause because for the huge majority of my working career (in the charity / voluntary / arts sectors) there was no employers pension contribution and my employers didn’t introduce one until the last legal moment and at the lowest legal rate. (Everyone on MN protests about contributing to charities’ overheads, right?)

There was not the discussion and awareness of pensions as there is now. No MoneySavingExpert.

Anyway, once I no longer had financial responsibility for D.C. I saved every penny I could and paid as much as possible into my pension. I only had a short time.

I am lucky to have no mortgage / rent to pay, live in London so have a free travel card, I do run a modest car, my tastes are not extravagant and I have a good life topping my state pension up by about £400 pcm. I could budget more tightly and still be ok. I have gym membership, a burglar alarm contract, Netflix, NT membership, Picturehouse membership (easily pays for itself if you like cinema), and drink 6 bottles of wine a month. And go out with friends at least once a week.

Save into your pension as much as you can. If you don’t take your 25% tax free as a lump sum you take it as 25% tax-free of your drawdown, so you don’t lose out on your tax free amount

My DH and I have bugger all really. He's presented a pension pot of about £30k and that's it. We are different ages though, he's 61 and I'm 44. He loved his job as a coach driver so we are trying to save and should have the small mortgage cheated in 3-4 years. Then save like heck, about £500 a month towards a kitchen update, refresh the bathroom and a deposit/purchase of a small motor home to tour Europe. We don't have champagne dreams thankfully and we have always been poor but happy!

I'm not sure how his state pension works at retirement with me being younger and in sickness/PIP though? We are lucky that our little priest is futureproof, fully disabled access and wet room, ground floor two bedrooms etc. so that will help.