Imagine if you passed away before you had the chance to fulfill your retirement plans.
I know, it sounds so heartbreaking, and it happens every day to people with good intentions.
Creating retirement plans with your spouse or partner can be exciting times for couples.
Although, the reality of our retirement plans changing is imminent as life throws curveballs.
When I set to retire, we will have more than enough money to fulfil our retirement plans.
However, there is no need to have millions of dollars during retirement, although convinced that we do.
Retirement planning generally is based on the life you plan to live and income availability.
Today, I want to focus on death before retirement and not being able to live your dreams.
Lately, our mindset has changed, which includes how we plan to live our retirement years.
We reconsidered our retirement plans after family deaths, diagnosis of our son’s autism, and recently a Canadian Budget Binder alumni.
Retirement Plans To Retire Early
My employer told me that by age 63, I could take early retirement, although it wouldn’t be as lucrative if I stay the extra years.
I’m reconsidering as it’s tempting, although I had decided that I’d stay until they kicked me out.
I enjoy my profession, and as long as my health is good, I thought I’d keep working.
My work pension plan is a defined pension that pays me an excellent yearly income if I stay until 65.
Working After I Retire With My Employer
If my employer needs a retiree to fill in due to absence or holidays, they pay well over $100 an hour.
I only know this because another long-time employee who retired is often back in the facility.
At our annual Christmas gathering at a local restaurant, I asked him why he keeps coming back.
He’d be a fool not to come back when he gets paid $120/hr.
In a way, he reminded me of myself where money talks even after you walk.
Waiting To Live Our Retirement Plans
I spent about an hour going through years of conversation with who I would call an internet friend.
She passed away last week, and as I re-read the retirement plans she was saving for, it hit me.
Now her husband is left with all of the savings, and the love of his life is gone.
The retirement plans they made together will never be, and that’s not the ending anyone wants.
When she talked to me, she’d often tell me about the discounts at fancy 5-star hotels using her credit card rewards.
I was so impressed with the way she saved money and believed that simpler times were ahead.
We had a lightbulb moment earlier this year when we decided to live a simple life.
That’s the problem today that people are money hungry for tomorrow that they forget to live.
Remember the expression that which we do not learn from we are doomed to repeat?
We became a society of freed and excess much like the days prior to the fall of the Roman empire.
We are now going to crumble under the weight of those excesses. Simpler times are ahead for many reasons.
1. Lack of funds
2. Lack of merchants providing the goods and services
3. A return to focusing on family, home and hearth.
– Mary Campbell RIP
Dying Before Retirement
Why are we waiting for retirement to spend money on ourselves?
So many people I know, and perhaps you know, have passed away before retirement or just after.
My father-in-law is one of those people who was just a year away from his retirement.
He didn’t get to see a dollar invested into his retirement pension; however, it did pay for the costly $40,000 funeral.
Housing In Your Retirement Plans
Should you include your home value in your retirement plans?
Here’s my take on the situation.
If we sold our house after I retire, we’d both be OK with this as having too much home is hard to maintain as you age.
Our house is fully paid, which should be the case by retirement age or close to it.
The option of moving to a smaller city or town to purchase a small retirement home is inviting.
Although, who wants to move when they retire into another home?
Do it before you retire.
Another tip is to downsize before you retire and get rid of stuff you don’t need or your kids won’t want.
We could always rent an apartment and live out our retirement plans without worrying about the property maintenance.
Purchasing a condo is another idea if you want to put your money to work for you instead of renting.
This may also allow us to have more money in the bank that we’ll probably never use.
On the other hand, if you want to be close to family, perhaps you could buy a bigger house with an in-law suite.
There are many options for retirement housing however if you’re not spending less your money will be tied up.
You could take out an equity line of credit on your home; however, that’s just another debt you’d need to pay back.
Tread with the possibility of change regarding retirement plans and your current and future housing situation.
Death Before You Live Your Retirement Plans
When you die before you even get a chance to live your dreams is a travesty.
Both Mrs. CBB and I created many bucket list items we wanted to tackle during our retirement years.
I’m not sure where we were heading with those plans, but now we realize they might never come true.
So, we both decided to look at our retirement plans and instead of waiting, we’re living for today.
I don’t want to be left alone with a load of money, retirement plans and no spouse.
I’m almost certain Mrs. CBB feels the same about that money won’t matter if I had died.
Nothing can bring us back, and all of the things we saved money for to do later will be gone.
Retirement Plans We’ve Changed
After I retire, since Mrs. CBB does not work, we planned to take a trip to Europe and travel.
By then, our son will be old enough to come with us if he wants, and we’d have a blast.
Oh, and we can’t forget the tour of Ontario we were planning to see all of the provinces.
The big house on a farm that we always wanted has changed to staying where we are.
We don’t have any plans to move now or in the future; however, things could change.
Donating our time to volunteer was something we wanted to do at a retirement home.
Although, we never did quite think about us potentially being in a retirement home or long-term care.
- Travelling around Europe with our son
- Touring Ontario and exploring history
- Purchasing a farm or country property
- Volunteering Our Services
- Spending as much time as we can with our son doing the things he loves to do
Why Wait?
Those five items were at the top of our retirement plans as if we needed to wait to fire up the engine.
I’m not sure why people, including ourselves, wait and put travelling in their retirement plans.
By that time, our health may have declined, and the cost of travel insurance would be expensive.
Why not plan travelling for today?
We’re going to start touring Ontario to explore historic sites now instead of waiting.
The country property will be too much for us to handle, but it sounds good for quiet retirement days.
Most importantly, donating our services to volunteer in our community was in our retirement plans.
Why wait?
That seems to be the theme of our retirement plans, although going into debt to fulfil them isn’t such a brilliant idea either.
I might throw that in so I don’t sound as if I’m saying spend all your money today and forget tomorrow.
That’s far from the meaning of this chat about life that I’m sharing with you today.
The other day our son asked me why people die. I told him that everyone would die someday, and he just stared at me.
Having one child and seeing the fear in his eyes when he said, “but I don’t want you to leave,” gave me the drive to write this.
The lesson I learned from Mary was to live your life today because tomorrow, not even the money will matter if you’re gone.
Family first, cozy home and smiles are now part of our before and after retirement plans.
Discussion: Have you thought of your retirement plans, and have they changed?
Please leave me your comments below.
Mr.CBB
Below is a recap of the blog posts I’ve published in the past week.
- What To Consider Before Starting A Blog In Canada
- Should We Buy A Starter Home Or A Forever Home?
- Amazon Canada Grocery Products We Buy Online
- How We Curb Impulse Buying
- Are Mobile Apps Ruining Your Budget? Plus our July 2021 Budget Numbers
- Do You Really Need Millions Of Dollars When You Retire?
Support CBB and I’ll continue working to bring you the best information in frugal living and finance.
If you’re on Pinterest, follow my Pinterest Social Media Account. Let’s PIN together.
Subscribe to Canadian Budget Binder to get our behind-the-scenes bi-weekly newsletter.
Mr.CBB’s Thoughts and Quotes
This is finance 101 in the simplest form. It means if you want it, then find the strength never to give up.
If you plan to use a budget or perhaps pay off debt, push yourself because the strength you need comes from within.
Frugal Recipe Idea
We are dill pickle fans, and when I found this dill pickle pasta salad, I knew it was going on our meal plan.
Since we don’t have pasta in our house, we do have keto penne pasta that I will substitute.
We are fans of the fermented Dill Pickles from Costco Canada in the refrigerator section.
Although, if you make homemade pickles, that trumps all.
Would you try this recipe? Let me know in the comments below.
Thanks to Tammi from My Organized Chaos for sharing and creating this frugal recipe.
Ingredients For Dill Pickle Salad
The ingredients are inexpensive and straightforward, both of what we love at CBB.
I will likely add a bit more mayo because I love a super creamy mayo pasta salad.
For the full recipe, click the photo link above.
- 4.5 cups shell pasta
- 3/4 cup pickles, sliced
- 2/3 cup cheddar cheese, diced
- 1/4 cup green onion, chopped
- 2/3 cup mayonaise
- 1/3 cup sour cream
- 4 tbsp pickle juice
- 1 tsp dill
- 1 tsp celery seed
- 1/2 tbsp pepper
Landscape And Garden Tip Of The Week
We’ve talked about this years ago because Mrs. CBB was shocked to see varied colours in the UK.
In our back garden, we have white hydrangeas, but I’d love to work on the soil to grow a deep purple.
Purple is Mrs. CBB’s favourite colour, so perhaps I can try to surprise her next summer.
Have you ever created different colour hydrangeas? Let me know in the comments below.
Saturday Search Term Giggles
These are keywords that readers typed into their search engine and landed on this blog.
I get quite a few of these every day and pick some of the best to feature right here.
- Financial Obligation To Siblings – Sounds like an interesting topic
- Selling Bottled Water At A Garage Sale – I suppose you could and with profit.
- Smell Before Buying – Some people really want to know what something smells like before they buy it. However, because we are going through Covid-19 this has been tough to do with a mask on.
That’s all for this Saturday, CBB Friends.
Mr. CBB
Subscribe To Get The CBB Newsletter
To receive my newsletter via email, I invite you to subscribe to the blog and verify your subscription.
The post How Our Retirement Plans Have Changed: The Saturday Weekend Review #334 appeared first on Canadian Budget Binder.