Made redundant at 55 and suddenly considering retirement with school-age children

[SportyGirlie]

I unexpectedly found myself being made redundant recently. I naturally raced at trying to find a new job (with all the stress this brings) as I still have kids who are school age and will likely need higher education funding (and I am the main bread winner).

In the last 2 weeks I have had another unplanned event. I may actually be able to retire (on paper). As none of this was planned I feel in a state of shock (with quite a bit of nervous worry). I will be 55 later this year (had my kids in my early 40s).

My worries:

1. I don't want to stop working too early and screw up my kids future.
2. What if I end up negatively impacted the money situation and want to return to work in 3 years time? It feels like this will be too late and a challenge.

I am less worried about what I will do with myself. I have 3 kids who will keep me busy and hobbies that have been in ice for years, since having kids. I am also privately relieved not to have to keep interviewing for roles.

Has anyone else found themselves in this position. Did you retire or return to work? Have you regretted it?

Is that retirement money going to be able to keep you going for 40 years That's what you need to consider. My parents retired at 50, but they had grown up kids and plenty of money but still had to make sacrifices like no more aboard hoildays etc. (They brought a caravan and hoilday all spring/summer instead lol.)

Since you and your children are quite young you need to consider what your annual spending would be and project forward. Can you afford your normal lifestyle and school trips and family holidays on your pension income? Is there a surplus to still add to an easy access savings account?
Is your home paid off? Will you want to pay for driving lessons? Chip in for first car? Help towards university? Help towards a wedding? Take your adult children on holidays? Help towards a deposit?

You don’t have to decide immediately. If the ‘unplanned event’ was a bereavement / inheritance take some time to get your head straight.

How much do you spend now? Look at bank statements, not what you think you spend. How much will kids cost on top of ongoing expenditure eg support at uni?

you can still keep applying for jobs if unsure, but worth doing the sums to know how you would be fixed if you can’t find something suitable

You don’t have to give up work completely. You could work part time, and maybe in a lower paid less stress role.

I was sacked last year. I'm in a lower stress role. Jokingly at home we call it semi retired.

I'm in a very similar position, OP, although my child is 19, he hasn't gone to uni yet and has had some struggles which have set him back a couple of years. I keep feeling that the job market is so crap the decision might be made for me! It is a bit scary.

I have been through your predicament. My work tailed off when I was late 40s and I retrained as a secondary school teacher in a field related, only to discover that nobody wanted to hire a 50yo NQT. Too difficult, too opinionated, and much easier to pick a malleable new graduate.

I’m in a similar situation. I was made redundant 9 months ago and have struggled to find a new role and I’m considering early retirement. I’m 50 and also have children at secondary school, and DH is younger than me, and he works incredibly hard and travels internationally a lot for work. Financially I don’t need to work, which is such a blessing so I’ve been volunteering part time and I also want to support my kids more with school and their interests. I never took much maternity leave after they were born so I’m sort of seeing this as my time to be “mom” for a while.

But equally I also wonder if taking this time out or retiring early will hurt my ability to be employed again in the future. I’ve not even got interviews from positions I’ve applied to since redundancy - I’m over qualified for everything 😔 I don’t have any hobbies and I’m not creative or a gardener so I also need to find myself again as everything had revolved around work. I do think I was burnt out from work and I needed this time to recover. I do feel guilty not working when I see how hard DH works. It’s hard to know what to do! So no real advice, just sympathy as I’m in a similar position!