Pleasures of Early Retirement
Today, there are many people considering early retirement. When can I retire? If you’re asking this question, it all depends on when you have complete financial independence and whether you are ready for adjusting to retirement early.
With financial volatility, many people would like to postpone their retirement age. Yet, there are many pleasures to be enjoyed with an early retirement plan. For most of us an early retirement age (anytime from 40 to 60 years) can only be a dream.
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How to retire early? You’re probably asking this question if you’re busy climbing the career ladder, in a fast paced lifestyle, coping with traffic jams and high costs, with no time for family, friends or hobbies in your life.
If you’ve planned your income plan for retirement right using the best retirement calculator, it’s possible to retire early. You should have opted for plans like 403b retirement plan or the Roth IRA, to create a solid retirement account at an early age.
Once that’s done, you can enjoy these and many more pleasures derived from an early retirement. You’d surely love to go on that safari before your knees start to give way, right?
Top 10 Joys of Early Retirement
#1. Enjoying with Family
If you’ve made use of the best retirement plans, you can get a better balance over your life by spending more time with family, with an early retirement.
You will find yourself spending quality time with your children, your old parents, your spouse and will find yourself happier for it.
#2. Time for Hobbies
You get more time to indulge in the hobbies that you love, if you’ve diligently followed plans for retirement savings by age.
There are plenty of hobbies that come really cheap. Select the ones that you love. You can finally start working on that golf swing or join a book club.
You will end up learning new skills and can upgrade the quality of your life. For instance, if you like eating good food, why not learn to cook and then play host by entertaining friends. You can enjoy hobbies like sailing and fishing; gardening, cooking or biking; the options are endless.
#3. Earning Money with Hobbies – Retirement Advice
Learn skills of making a good pizza or pasta, or learn to brew beer. You can save money and enjoy yourself on the path to becoming a connoisseur. Sell your baked goods or even set up your stand at the market.
Can I retire early? Sure you can. In fact, your hobbies could also turn into a new gig that could earn you part time money, like book writing. If you love organizing, offer services for assisting someone with a flourishing business.
#4. Taking up a New Career to Improve Retirement Fund
Maybe, you’re not interested in that regular 9 to 5 job any more. But you still have a lot of punch left in you. Or your pension is just not enough for your lavish lifestyle or you’re still left with some credit card debt.
Traveling is fun, but you want to do something more meaningful with your life. Post an early retirement planning, you can still remain active and take up a new, less strenuous career. It will improve your stress levels and you also keep getting income.
In many cases of early retirement, people find a part time job in something that they are truly interested in, something that they have dreamed about all their lives, especially if they want to improve their retirement accounts.
For instance, if you love to run a bed and breakfast or want to offer a kayak tour, put your management/marketing skills to work and start your own business. Use travel websites like Kayak or Yapta to market your business.
#5. Improving Health
According to advice from early retirees, who have retired early and happy, they say it results in less stress; better quality of sleep and more exercise, all of which are conducive to better health. Most retirees rate their mental and physical health to be more satisfactory. You don’t have to visit your doctor that often, except of course for age related problems.
You will also spend more time in household repairs, gardening and so on, requiring more physical work compared to your desk job. This will result in improved health. That’s one pleasure you just cannot overlook.
#6. Spend Winters in Florida
It’s water, water, everywhere!!! It’s warm and sunny and you can spend long hours at the beach or the pool. And the children or grandchildren will love Orlando, it’s the Holy Grail as far as they are concerned.
Go walking, biking or running, do whatever your thing is if you’ve opted for an extreme retirement with absolutely no work. Have a long lazy lunch or enjoy a movie. The cost of living is also less, so it’s extremely suitable for people with fixed incomes. Miami might be expensive, but there are plenty of other options in Florida.
#7. Blogging
There are several ways to retiring early. Once you retire early, you can start blogging on a subject dear to your heart. It’s very fulfilling and a great outlet for your feelings. You could influence others positively and be the happier for it.
#8. More Friends – An Early Retirement Perk
You have more time on your hands, so you can spend it on your friends. Building a stronger relationship with them can give your real pleasure.
#9. Volunteering Work
Stan Goldberg, a San Francisco University professor retired early at 57, but his contributions to society had not ended. He worked as a hospital volunteer, offered counseling to caregivers, wrote award-winning books. For instance, you can volunteer to help children through organizations like Big Brothers Big Sisters.
#10. Traveling/Go on Vacations
If travel was always on the top of your bucket list, here’s your chance of fulfilling your dreams. Travel and visit places all over the world to your heart’s content after an early retirement. You are probably in the peak of health, so you can indulge in adventurous activities, mountain biking, hiking and so on.
You can opt for volunteer programs offered abroad for subsidizing the trip. For instance, there are jobs like taking care of pets in exchange of lodging in several countries.
Wrap Up
How much money is enough to retire early? Now that’s a highly nebulous question. It all depends on your lifestyle and whether you want complete retirement or just a partial one.
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Before you opt for an early retirement, you have to carefully weigh the pros and cons. If you have not planned carefully throughout your working life, you might find that your savings are just not enough. The key to a happy early retirement is save more and live on less. Trying to catch up with the Joneses is a bad idea.
With early retirement, comes a reduction in income, whether you are opting for Social Security or for early pension.
The bottom line is that an early retirement would be ideally suited if:
- If you need the additional time for taking care of family members.
- If you have built up a solid nest egg.
- If you want to take up an alternate and less demanding career.
- If your mental or physical health is affected due to your job.
So, do you have what it takes?
