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How did you know it was time to retire? How will you know?
For many folks, this is purely a financial question. They hand in their notice when their portfolio hits a target size or when their likely retirement income surpasses what they think they need.
But what about you, HumbleDollar readers? Was the realization it’s time to retire about more than just money? For those still in the workforce, what will be the signal that it’s time to quit—and will that signal be solely financial or will other factors play a role?
I retired in July of 2023 at the age of 65 as I had planned about 3 years earlier. The decision was made based on:
For my wife (who was in healthcare and retired in 2019, just before Covid luckily) and I the timing to stop working and enjoy the fruits of our long careers was perfect. We both had excellent retirement benefits including pensions and working with our financial advisor we had determined that we would have “enough “.
I was hired to provide consulting services for my employer upon my retirement which did help to solidify the plan a bit and which I enjoyed. That has now ended and full “retirement” for both of us now reigns.
I retired over 6 years ago at age 65. I enjoyed my practice, had great partners and staff, and was privileged to care for many wonderful patients. I had comfortably met or exceeded my numerical goals, and “my gut” told me the time was right. I gave my partners one year notice to help them with planning. When personally informing each of my patients during follow up visits of my upcoming retirement, many expressed surprise and wondered why. I finally came up with an answer that they all seemed to accept: “My wife retired 4 years ago and I plan to join her”.
Newly retired, about half our friends were already retired while the other half were still working full time. When we would gather socially, by chance it seemed like everyone else there belonged to one group or the other. If we were hanging out with retired folks, we talked about anything except working. Whereas, when with those still working, they seemed worried or concerned, and would ask us questions like: “Are you OK?” “What do you do now?” “Have you found any part-time work, or something to keep you busy?” I gradually realized that many of them were merely thinking about their own eventual retirement, and were anxious or worried about how their life might look then. I suggested that each of them will figure out when the time is right, but because we are unique, how we spend our time in retirement will vary. My only advice to them about that was to delay the impulse to start scheduling or booking activities or commitments in advance, and wait until they are actually retired for a bit. Its funny how quickly my calendar fills up without me strategizing how to keep myself busy!
I retired at 53 with no regrets and loving life the past 6 years. Worked for 30 years as a female engineer in the oil business. While I mostly enjoyed it, the industry was dominated by men and a good majority of them had spouses that managed their kids & lives while the women there often had double duty. There was very little flexibility – no working from home or part time options – and the years juggling kids and family were difficult for sure. I was the bigger wage earner in our family at the time and staying home with the kids was not really an option. My husband was working in the schools and had every summer off. Yes I was a bit resentful, and so when the job became soul sucking and we had plenty saved I was ready to have some time for myself and just the unpaid job managing our home/family. My husband is great but I still handled too much of the duties as mothers often do. I often said I didn’t stay home with the kids so I was taking that break on this end of life. Since we were prodigious savers along with military benefits we have more money than we will need and I am super happy to have this time. I have had no problem filling my days with volunteering, cycling and hiking, traveling, home projects, coffee groups, helping my kids a bit, and so much more. I really understand what retirees often say – how did I have time to go to work?
Worked for 33 years in a top 10 multinational pharmaceutical company and through Fidelity we were able track what our pension payout would be upon retirement. After the 2006 Pension Protection Act passed the multiplier in the formula went from government bond rate to the corporate bond. As interest rates climbed payouts dropped, one year the drop was $80k. I told my wife that after 30+ years in the same company now that I was nearing retirement what was happening was just not right.
In 2010 the corporate bond rate actually declined and the payout had recouped the prior year’s drop and hit an all time high. That night I told my wife tomorrow I’m putting my 2 weeks notice and I’m taking the lump sum, I was 57 years old. Even though it was a spur of the moment decision I knew we had sufficient assets to retire. Before turning 55 we had five different financial services company do a depth analysis with Monte Carlo simulations and all five said we would be fine when I decided to call it quits.
In 1984 I bought 100 shares of a $3.00 stock that doubled after a few months based on the recommendation of a business acquaintance who traded stocks frequently. Right then I knew I needed to learn everything I could about stocks, bonds, investing etc and since 1984 I have done just that. Back in the day when we would visit different financial services companies to see if wanted them to manage our money every single one would say to me you should be on this side of the desk with the depth of knowledge you have about our industry. My answer was always, I’ve spent 30+ years working in a stressful corporate environment and now that I’m out you want to suck me back in, thanks but no thanks.
We’ve never looked back and like others have said in HD we’ve enjoyed a healthy stock market which has lifted our 401k’s, the pension lump sum and our other investments. Financial advisors have told us through the years, if you don’t fly first class, your daughters will, but we just can’t get over that hump. We have been Blessed to enjoy a worry free retirement in excellent health.
Simply – it was time…
1) Wrapped-up three decades-long mega projects – my docket was complete.
2) Living on bachelor status, a 3-hour Southwest flight away from the family.
3) Record low interest rates maximized the pension lump-sum option.
4) Reached a forty-year working milestone.
5) Finally, finances could withstand a 50% market pullback – ie Had ENOUGH.
After a 30yr career in IT, I decided at 56yo to “rewire” vs “retire”. I wasn’t sure what rewiring would actually look like, but I was game to give it a try. My financial goal was to be “financially independent” by my mid 50s, so if I wanted to work or “rewire” I could. I was fortunate to work for good employers, living below our means and a corporate buyout sped me on my way. Have never regretted the decision to “rewire” since “time” and how you spend it is one of the most precious gifts the good Lord gives you. I happened to have the gift of time & independence to assist my parents in the latter stages of their lives, as well as enjoy more time with my loving wife.
I retired at the age of 58 plus a few months at the end of 1998. We did not need the money. I never looked back.
A fellow lawyer put it this way: You will know it’s time to retire when you can answer “yes” to the following questions,
My wife retired in late 2019. My original plan was to retire in 2020, after I maxed-out my 401(k) contribution for the year. In the first half of the year, I had three different managers as a result of a massive reorganization by my employer. This made work frustrating. I decided to have my right knee replaced in the early spring, recover, return to work, and then retire after I turned 67. Then COVID hit. The only thing that happened on schedule was maxxing-out my 401(k) and my birthday. A window opened for knee surgery in late spring, and short term disability through my employer worked according to plan, but conversations with my newest manager prior to returning to work reinforced my decision that I was approaching the end. The day I returned to work from short term disability, I gave my two week notice that I was retiring.
In retrospect I “retired” when I stopped working for other people and started my own consulting gig, working out of my bedroom in shorts and a t-shirt with hours of my own choosing. That was 1997. It’s been relaxing and deeply rewarding, adjectives that define a happy retirement. (It’s also been lucrative beyond my fondest dreams.)
I read with great amusement the many articles written during and after the pandemic about “discovering” the joys of working from home. My usual response was, “Where ya been?”
As I’ve written here before, I retired at 53 from full-time work and a few years later from part-time work in a related field. The precipitating factor was the megacorp’s announcement that while I was grandfathered into the original pension plan, my benefit would not increase after I made it to 30 years service, which I would do in two years. Although my savings hadn’t reached my personal “magic number” it was in sight, and my pension started the day I retired, along with retiree medical.
My decision wasn’t only financial. A trip to China a year earlier had revived my interest in travel, and for several reasons I was no longer enjoying my job. I retired in 2000, and I have never regretted my decision.
Interesting and highly pertinent question to me at the moment. On numbers and retirement ambitions I hope I’m clear. And I hope I’m past the One More Year point. To me maxing out the healthy years rather than spending emotional and physical energy on projects (anymore) that don’t really interest me is a significant consideration.
So really I think I’m down to a personal question of what season do I want to kick off retirement in and how much income do I want in the next tax year.
Work in a business that has pretty frequent staff turnover and relatively few absolute retirees so don’t know if I’ll even officially retire vs just resign.
I’d be delighted if there was a redundancy programme imminent.
My wife and I both retired from our final newspaper editing positions by layoffs, she in January 2016 as a part-timer at age 59, and I in 2020 as a full-timer at 57. I had never had a retirement age as a goal and figured that if I ever won the lottery (highly unlikely, as I never play), I’d keep working while keeping it secret as long as possible. Well, as a result of decades of saving diligently, investing while benefiting from decades of a bull market, good luck, good health, etc., I decided that we had in effect won the financial lottery, despite neither of us ever coming close to earning six figures. I looked on the layoff as an unsought blessing because the newspaper industry, and my employer in particular, were making the daily grind unpleasant to the point that at times I dreaded it. In the three months between the announcement that my newsroom unit was being eliminated and the layoff date, I began a crash course in Social Security, Medicare, Obamacare, and other subjects that had lurched from theoretical to intensely personal. I continued to job hunt, twice nearly landing jobs that would have been a step up from my final job, but eventually I decided that I was retired — with the exception of an 11-month position outside the newspaper world that I took much later, partly because it offered health insurance. I don’t regret my decisions. I was more reactive than proactive, but I am content where we are at. Unplanned “early” retirement suits me.
When I realized that the things that bugged the dickens out of me (healthcare career) didn’t seem to bother the much younger cohort.
I retired at 65. For me, it was 3 things that came together. First, my wife retired about 6 months earlier and wanted to start traveling. Second, I had crossed a threshold related to my retirement benefits and financial readiness so while continuing to work was still lucrative, it wasn’t necessary; we had enough. Finally, at work it seemed like a natural hand-off point had been reached as a few major projects were winding down and we were on the precipice of starting a new major project. But I think the largest factor was simply that emotionally I didn’t want to spend my time at work anymore; work wasn’t where I wanted to be. I didn’t hate it, but I was ready to move on to the next phase of my life. I was ready to retire and move forward with my wife into the next phase of our life and emotionally I knew it. So for me it wasn’t a hard decision at that point. Six years have passed and I’m glad I retired when I did.
When I retired on my 55th birthday, I was burned out. I had been working for our CEO for 6 or 7 years and my most recent task had been trying to coordinate a merger in which we had purchased another sizable company. The real problem with this was that the CEO and the his #2 decided to pay more (against my advice) for this acquisition than it was worth. So, in addition to all the administrative, cultural, and tech issues, the results were less than stellar, and the CEO got whacked. I had been putting in a lot of high pressure 80 hour+ weeks, with extensive travel. I had been doing a 20 mile commute for the last 20 years and the time needed to make the trip had increased from 25 minutes to 90 minutes each way.
The replacement CEO was obviously going to want their own person in my role, and so in a meeting with the HR guy about what I wanted to do in the future, I advised him that I would be 55 in a few months, and that I would take early retirement then.
I had been with the company for over 29 years and was entitled to retiree medical. We had paid our home off 8 years earlier. Both of our sons had completed undergraduate degrees and were in PhD. programs. We had been saving more than half our income for a number of years and it was evident that we could afford to retire financially.
While I could probably found another similar position, dealing with the politics and gigantic egos of high level corporate execs isn’t enjoyable. There are times when the intellectual problems are very interesting and it can be rewarding to help create solutions. But, there are many more times when these jobs are just terrible, despite what you get paid.
For as long as I can remember, I had this joke in my head:
Question: “What do you want to be when you grow up?”
Answer: “Retired.”
I worked full-time for thirty years and retired at the age of 55. I liked the three different jobs I had but I was never passionate about any of them. I did the work, got paid and then looked forward to spending the rest of my time doing the things I really loved to do.
I feel very fortunate that I could leave full-time work behind at a relatively young age.
I retired at 61 due to my wife’s fight with cancer. She had both good and bad times for the next 3 years and passed away exactly 3 years after I retired. It was a great 3 years for us and we did many things together after I retired. Cobra and the ACA health plans worked great for us.
I essentially was preparing the day I started working. I was a diligent investor in my 401k and IRA. I wanted to be in a financial position to pull the trigger later in life when the opportunity presented itself. That opportunity came at age 57 when my employer was doing enhanced layoffs and at the time I had a difficult supervisor. So after 34 years working for the same company I pulled the trigger. I’ve never looked back. While working I had been a VITA volunteer and like others in the HD community I’ve continued to help others as an AARP tax aid volunteer.
Robert, thanks for volunteering with TaxAide. I’m looking forward to the upcoming season.
Robert, I just volunteered for the AARP tax aid program. I’m looking forward to the tax season.
Best of luck with this tax season. I’m sure your experience will be a big help to your community. And the cookies some of the very senior clients occasionally bring is a nice perk.
I hung it up at age 70 for a variety of reasons. It took some time for me to rebuild my finances following my divorce and change of occupation. Working enabled me to delay taking my Social Security. Being a one man shop, the fear of getting sick during the intensely tax prep season was a very real possibility. I stayed healthy, but I felt like I was pushing my luck, so 70 just felt like a good time to retire.
Great question, one that aligns with my near-daily thoughts. Is that a sign I’m nearing my last day?
I can’t deny that finances play a part. Just yesterday, my wife told me she had been looking at a new option in our state for health insurance. Replacing my employer’s plan is part of the calculation for me if I retire within the next couple of years, before I’m Medicare-eligible at age 65. Even then, my wife would need coverage until she turns 65 three years later.
But the money considerations don’t end with determining the minimum threshold If my wife pinned me down on that figure, I’d have to admit we’re already there. But I like earning, and I like big cushions of safety. I also like taking advantage of a sweet deal: I’m making more money than I ever have, in an environment that’s been easy to enjoy.
Lately, though, I’ve noticed some little annoyances that turn my thoughts toward retirement more often. I hate to admit it, but I’m feeling some generational bias. I work with folks 20 to 30 years younger than me, who seem to have a different focus toward work than I did when starting out. Also, we’ve had a change in top local management at my hospital. Even though I’m insulated from much of it by a wonderful direct manager and autonomy in my clinical practical practice, I don’t like the new feel at work.
Despite my finger-pointing, I’m pretty sure most of my thinking is just grumpy old man syndrome. I’ve lived through periods of dissatisfaction at work before, but I didn’t have the option to quit. Now that I do, I find my thoughts wandering among the possibilities. I’m not budging yet, however. I’ve met plenty of folks who use their free time to search out unhappiness they couldn’t find before they retired.
I guess my answer is “I don’t know,” but I’ll be interested in reading other comments.
I know this may read as a political post, but it is just the facts.
Before you retire you should be sure to determine whether or not your state plan’s funding is connected to the Affordable Care Act.
The incoming administration has long had animosity towards the act, and has tried to repeal it numerous times in the past. At this time if repealed there is only a supposed “concept of a plan”.
We were able to retire 3 years early only because we could obtain health insurance outside of our work. If you start on a policy supported by funding from the ACA, you may find that at best it is unaffordable due to repeal of the subsidies, or at worst it will no longer be available to you at all.
Before you jump into retirement before 65 please make sure you have a plan for all three contingencies. You and your wife may find that your only option is to continue to work until you are Medicare eligible, whether you want to or not.
The focus now is on the level of ACA subsidies first removing the added subsidies and then who knows how far. You raise a good point.
As we were within a few years of the magic date at which I could leave my company with retirement benefits, we were also seemingly stuck in a place we didn’t really care to be. Our outlook started to be that if that date came and I wasn’t either in an amazing role or moved to somewhere we were interested in living, I would leave. At that date plus a few months, I was gone.
Now I wasn’t entirely convinced I wouldn’t work somewhere else, but nor was I looking. Interestingly, several months later something of a dream job opportunity to work at my alma mater came along. But by then the opportunity to be nomads for a while had also taken hold. Here we are.
Nice to know the backstory of your current nomadic lifestyle, Mike and Mrs. AAR.
Thanks but you’re thinking of Michael Flack.
I chuckled at your comment “At that date plus a few months”. My retirement plan had a specific time requirement and I simply had to have a couple months padding “just to be sure”. Specifically, in my case the official calculation wouldn’t be done until after I had retired so I just couldn’t bring myself to cut it too close.
In that circumstance I’d have been reluctant to cut it close as well!
My own eligible date was very clear, but I had gotten a notion that I should retire at the end of the year rather than as soon as eligible. As it happened I split the difference.
At age 64, two years before my FRA, I was burned out from a fulfilling but stressful job as a visiting nurse. My husband, six months older than me, was working part time and covered under my health insurance. A distribution from his mother’s estate helped us decide for me to retire as soon as Doug was eligible for Medicare, and pay the single COBRA premium until I also turned 65. We booked a lovely small ship cruise and bus tour of southern Spain and Morocco, departing the day after my last day of work. So our decision was based somewhat on finances but also doing what felt best for us – more time together, less talk about work.
I think knowing when to retire is critical to a happy retirement, but I doubt that can be primarily driven by money or a specific date.
Having enough money is important, but retiring because you do does not mean future happiness. I maintain when it’s time you will know. Listen to yourself. Listen to family.
Frankly, I was surprised how easy it was to walk away, but the environment had changed so quickly it became clear I no longer fit in nor could I abide by the new philosophy developing. If I had stayed I would have been miserable trying to deal with the new system and people
One day in March or so I said to Connie “ I’m going to retire.” She said, fine if that’s what you want to do. I began phased retirement for 18 months the following July. I think being able to work part- and seeing my authority and influence slip away was helpful as was seeing how my successor planned to do things very differently.
My only regret was seeing how my methods working with and communicating with employees and the unions was largely abandoned to corporate formality.
I never had that epiphany, and still think I would do a little consulting it came to my door. I stopped working full time when my employer said my job was moving 3 hours south to the DC area. I was able to consult part time of the next 2-3 years, and that helped the transition. Covid reduced the amount and opportunity to consult, and I haven’t had a paying gig this year. So maybe I am fully retired.
When i realized I am enjoying the daily grind of work less and less and was dreaming more and more of each day being a Saturday. I haven’t retired yet, my wife and I are just 53, but we are planning to call it quits at 57 or so. We’ll have the financial resources to do that and I feel pretty confident we can manage the Healthcare bridge to medicare from that point. Health insurance is the main reason I’m working now, and the next three years will allow my high-school daughter to be in college with older two completing their undergrad degree. In summary, I am tired of working, and at age 57, we should be ok financially barring something catastrophic.
When my three younger brothers, age 62 to 68, retired I decided it was time for me at 70 to retire. I loved my work but wanted to spend more time with my wife who had retired two years earlier.
For me it was just being tired of working all the time. I wanted more time for golf, fishing, gardening and family . I retired at age 59 and 19 years later, I’m glad I did.
Hi Ken, I’m not there yet, but at 53, I too am just tired. Maybe if we had sabbatical I’d stay longer, but I just want to do my thing, go on the long cruises and be a bum for a bit.
I was over 65, wanted to travel a lot more and just do more on my own than work. We love it, we hit the afternoon movies, early happy hours and home by 6. I’m a regular at Costco, wife and I going to volunteer spending time talking to Alzheimer’s residents at Sunrise Senior Center, as a business owner still do limited travelling (only what I want), going to huge BAU building show January in Munich, back to London in March with friends, Viking Homelands cruise in August, Malt Shop Cruise in November, ……….