Not everyone is ready to retire at age 65. Some people, who absolutely love what they do, never want to retire. Others are ready to call it quits from their main job by age 50. They may have dreams of travel or starting their own business, volunteering, or pursuing a hobby.
If you are getting close to 65 and you’re wondering whether or not you really want to retire, consider the following:
1. Do you love what you do everyday? If you are still thoroughly enjoying your work, why quit?
There is a lot of dialogue these days about women and retirement. The word out there now is that women need to save a lot more than men for some key reasons. As a rule, women generally live longer than men, so for that reason women really should be tucking extra away in their RRSPs and other retirement savings accounts.
Another key reason is that women often earn less than men, partly because they take time off to have children, but also because there is still a disparity between men’s and women’s wages. Men are generally still paid more than women for the same work. This makes it harder for women to save as much as men for their retirement.
On the Oprah Winfrey Show a while ago, Suze Orman was helping a family to discover what was most important to them. The discussion was around whether or not a particular set of parents should be funding their daughters’ post secondary education.
I remember it keenly because the father was extremely determined and he insisted that he and his wife fund their daughters’ education even though it would mean they would be emptying most if not all of their retirement savings in order to do so.
The mother, however, didn’t think this was a good idea. She had retirement goals and didn’t want to have to forfeit their retirement. It is not that she didn’t want to help her girls, but she also recognized their need for a retirement nest egg.
When it comes to retirement planning, be sure to not only consider the financial side of things. Remember that taking care of your health is equally important. You may be saving enough money to enjoy a long retirement, but if you aren’t exercising regularly and eating healthy foods, you may not be in prime physical shape in order to enjoy the things you plan to do upon retirement.
Although we cannot control our health entirely, the choices we make today will have a significant impact on our overall physical health. When it comes to making healthy choices, don’t be too cheap. Be willing to spend your money on the things that promote good health such as fresh vegetables and fruits, whole-grain pastas and breads, and multivitamins. Don’t be too frugal when it comes to healthy choices, and despite what some may think, eating healthy doesn’t have to cost a lot. If you compare the cost of buying fresh produce to buying prepackaged processed foods, you will discover that prepackaged foods can end up being more costly.
There’s so much talk today about the importance of saving for retirement. But just what does retirement mean to you? What do you want to do when you retire? Or do you even want to retire?
These are important questions to ask yourself before you build a strategy for saving for your retirement. If you aren’t planning on living extravagantly, traveling the world, or having expensive hobbies, you won’t need to save as much as those who do have big plans.
While some people are content to stay home and take life easy, others are preparing to be more active when they retire than they have been during their working years. Others don’t ever plan on retiring because they are passionate about their work and can’t imagine that life could go on if they were to ever quit.