Preparing for Retirement

Retirement? What retirement? I have pretty much decided that I won’t retire, because I really can’t define what that means anymore. Also, I have not money to retire, so it looks like I’ll be working until I’m not.

The retirement age has shifted a lot since I started working. When I began work it was 55. That’s next year for me and I can’t even think about what that would be like. I have too much energy and brain cells left to retire – and again no money to do so.

Then that idea kind of disappeared and it was moved back to 65. Now it seems to have shifted again to 75.

Given that my kids are still considered dependent until aged 21 by Centrelink, I can imagine that generation x will be looking at well into the 70’s for retirement benefits.

So that is kind of good news actually. It means that from here, aged 54 for me, there is still nearly 20 years to get my act together and start squirrelling away for some type of ‘retirement’.

According to this article, people are retiring whether they have enough or not. Interesting it states that the Australian Superannuation Funds Association think that $545,000 net worth is a comfortable retirement. Obviously they have not seen the price of milk lately or tried to go to the doctor. Also ‘net worth’ includes the family home dear friends – so we’re pretty much all screwed.

Retirement for me is leaving paid employment or my ‘career’. Honestly, I’m hoping that it will turn out to be the job I’m in now. Working four days a week allows me to do my blogs and ebay and write, which hopefully will all add to my ‘retirement’ nest egg.

There’s no denying that we all have a hard road ahead if we’re going to retire, house our parents, help our kids and look after our own health. We have time. We just have to work out the best strategies to get there and I hope that this blog will help you with those.

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