What would a retirement on £3,145 a month look like?

[serin]

DH has retired. He is 10 years older than me and wants me to retire as well. His reckoning is that if I work another 10 years he will be 77! Just 3 years off 80 and it won't give him long to have the freedom to travel much as a couple etc.
If I retired tomrw our joint income would be £3145 per month. If I took my small private pension it would be £3800 in total.
Does that sound like a reasonable amount to live on or am I deluded?

We own the house outright and do have some savings. Our DC have flown the nest.
I grew up in absolute poverty and even whilst our children were small there were times we were really struggling. I think this has affected my attitude to money and I'm terrified of not having a steady income and returning to egg on toast every night.

Does £3800 seem ok as a long term situation? My friends are of a similar age, some retired and some not, money is never discussed so I have nothing to compare with.

Cripes - that's my income for THREE months!!!

I think you need to accept that your food and other costs are extremely low compared to other people. You're single, OP is a couple.
We are not extravagant with food, everything is cooked from scratch, neither of us drink and we don't eat out or buy takeaways.
Our council tax is now over £3K pa, close to £300 a month.
Water is a significant cost, gas and electric close to £2Kpa etc etc.

£50 a week if that includes all your meals and lunches, laundry products, loo rolls, personal care products, cleaning products, etc is low - but do-able.

Just a heads up, we cut our water bill from £60 a month to £27 by moving to a water metre. We are just a couple at home too. It’s law that if it doesn’t work for you, you can change back free of charge within 2 years. Might be worth considering.

But the thing is, other than food, all those costs are within the amounts I put up thread? I understand my costs are low - which is why the costs I put together as reasonable for a couple were a minimum of 75% more than mine with an upper threshold of 160% more than mine!

Council tax even of £3300 per year is £275 per month, which is within the £150-£300 range I put in.

£2000 for gas and electric is about £180 per month, so within the £100-£300 range, so I just don't understand why you're insisting my estimates up thread weren't realistic?

Council tax even of £3300 per year is £275 per month, which is within the £150-£300 range I put in.

It’s £330 a month over ten months. February and March are joyous - no council tax to pay.

It was the food and lots of other things that you'd not thought about like dentists, (I pay £70 4 x a year for hygienist) hairdressers, clothes, gifts, inevitable car stuff (even just tyres rather than massive bills). You missed out loads of things that are necessary.

But some of those costs are incredibly generous and not reflective of a retired couple who are happy to live modestly, especially as it gives them the freedom to not work.

Very few people consider £280 a year with a hygienist as an essential cost. It's disingenuous to say council tax is £330 pm while ignoring the two 'free' months because it doesn't reflect the average cost over the year - you can pay it in 12 monthly instalments if you like - we pay ours monthly on the last day as it's a payment option our council gives. We use hardly any of the services it covers so let them wait as long as possible for their money!

Why do you need to see a hygienist 4 times per year?

Because some people experience a high level of tartar build up on their teeth, however much they floss, which needs to be removed every three months. My dentist recommends three monthly visits for me and I go.

^^This.
Hard water area!

Plus an annual visit to the dentist for a check up.

Presumably you don't consider looking after your gums as necessary?
Gum disease is linked to heart disease and of course tooth loss.
I'd rather forgo a weekend away or meals out than have rotten teeth and gums.

You can also opt for dental insurance and most policies cover 2 hygienist appts a year. But it is often cheaper to pay as you go.

Council tax- my post was £3K+ per annum. It's now going up at least 5%. Not sure why you're quibbling over how it's paid. Most people do pay it monthly.

Freedom not to work if it means a lower standard of living is not something it's cracked up to be. Being 'poor' (er) in old age is no fun.

We are retired and are living well on much less than that. Savings from lump sum payments. Save my pp every month. Don't spend all our other income each.month. Travel a bit, did long haul last year. Planning at least three trips this year.
But are you ready to retire? Have you got lots of activities to keep you busy? If anything happenec to dh, coukd you manage? Part time might be the solution but id get advice first

Of course looking after teeth and gums is necessary but most people don’t need to pay anywhere near as much as you do.

But that's the MN way. Take the most expensive version of everything and then claim you need huge amounts of money for a 'basic' life.

£70 is pretty standard for a scale and polish by a private dentist and, given that NHS dentists are as rare as rocking horse shit, there’s no choice. I pay £65.

This is how often I need them doing. How many people do you talk to about this? You do seem out of touch.

Show me a private dentist where they charge considerably less than £70 for 30 mins scale and polish. In the SE.

I've worked bloody hard for 50 years and if I want to / need to spend money on the health of my teeth I'm not going to be criticised, thanks!

Well done op. I’m in a similar position and still pondering when, probably going to quit work in April 27 ( completing the tax year for pension purposes) I may well work in the future but we want to travel etc like you

You cannot work full time if you earn around £1100 a month.
The state pension is almost £1K a month and it's very hard indeed to live on that alone.

Presumably you don't consider looking after your gums as necessary?

Christ I was just asking a question!

I pay £88

I'm in the SW and to see a hygienist it is £100. Dentist won't do a scale and polish so we see the hygienist. £100 is pretty standard here.

Thats more than DH and I live of , paying for 3 teens, a mortgage of £1000 a month and 2 dogs.

We can all argue over what is and isn’t essential.

I have an NHS dentist (yes, I know I’m lucky)

They haven’t recommended the hygienist to me at any point in the last four years. Just regular flossing etc. pretty sure I have had some tartar removed and paid only NHS banding.

This leads me to question whether private dentists are over-recommending gold standard services from their associated professionals when good enough will do just fine for most people.

But @HopSpringsEternal I do boggle at how you can live off £600 a month after mortgage with two teens and a dog. Do you pay no bills or insurances at all aside from food?! Does no-one ever need clothes, transport or vet treatment?!

Eta , sorry , realise you are referring to the higher £3,000 figure! I thought it was all getting a bit implausibly “Mumsnet chicken doing for 4 family meals”!

There are no hygienists at my practice, the scale and polish is done by the dentist. It has occurred to me that perhaps she’s being over zealous then I remember that my NHS dentist had me in every three months over 20 years ago so probably not. Anyway I’m 72, still have 30 teeth (apparently incredibly rare at my age) and haven’t had a filling for over 20 years so I think I’ll just go with it.

No, they are not.

My private dentist is fantastic. They under-treat / show caution rather than overtreat. I know this because one issue was monitored for 2 years before an X ray showed action was needed. I paid over £500 for the specialist treatment it needed.

Build up of tarter and gum disease is personal and depends a lot on water (ours is full of limescale), your salivary glands, age, teeth and if they are crowded, etc etc. The absolute minimum is supposed to be 2 x a year for scale and clean.
NHS won't offer it as they don't have the time or the money to employ hygienists.

This is going slightly off topic of the cost of living when retired, but it does show that sometimes if you're sailing close to the wind with a pension, you might need to dip into savings.