I can retire at 55, what do I do?

[Gailete]

Not to be a Debby downer but recently my friend was also on track to retire by 45 but he just got wrecked hard from a divorce. The wife just fell out of love. The guy didn't cheat or anything..it was all random and sudden..leaving three of their young kids in limbo right now.

This friend is extremely financial savvy who bought 5 properties and rented them out to college students during the financial crisis. He has over 300k in his 401k even though he's only 35. This divorce will end up having the wife taking 50% away, and perhaps destroying the little property empire he has built.

Just food for thought. Not saying something like this may happen to you but we never can anticipate the future. Another reason why I think the spouse working is very important.

Not to derail this again, but I came late to the discussion sorry. I was the wife that worked, and did all child care, took the days off when they were sick, did all the housework, laundry, cooking, grocery shopping. So my husband tells me one day that he is filing for divorce, he wants the house, the kids, etc. We were at least a community property state when things got divided, he had to pay me my share of the house, but I was a good thing I was working because if I hadn't he wouldn't have thought twice about kicking me out to live under a bridge somewhere.

I discovered that whoever gets to the lawyer first, asking for what they want first, usually gets what they want. He got the house, the kids, everything and I had to pay child support. Finally I fired my lawyer, took him back to court for custody of my kids and the stupid man that he is, said to the mediator, "I don't care where the kids live, I just want custody of them."!!!!!! In other words. I don't care if they live with you/me full time, I want those custody checks! Haha. Greedy Gus. We ended up with joint custody which kind of worked since we both lived in the same town with the one set of schools.

Women that stay home or women who work out almost always work far more in the home that the man ever thought of doing. He figures he put in his 8 hours, what else is there to do, he did his part totally ignoring that the wife has been working from first thing in the morning until midnight or later.

[Gailete]

Technically I'm retired, But I have set me an age that I want to quit the business that I have been running now for a long time. I am exhausted and I think part of it is from having to get up every morning to deal with orders. I have plenty to do. And like others have mentioned I'm almost busier now than when I was working. I need a vacation from retirement!

If you haven't made plans for what you want to do when you are retired, then you aren't ready to retire. Until you have some concrete plans, keep working and saving, and of course if you have a spouse make plans with them.

[Singuy]

This divorcing couple have young kids, as you describe. If the wife didn't work, she took care of those kids so the husband could work, likely without having the very taxing round the clock responsibilities that is involved in being the primary caregiver (and she also probably did the majority of house management as well, shopping, doctor appointments, etc etc). Women at home deserve 1/2 the wealth of the couple most of the time in divorces, it's all a team effort. As someone who was a stay at home mom and is now a full time working mom, it's far harder to be home with a young child full time than to go to work. It's high time motherhood was valued in this country.

And this talk about "some other dude" spending HIS money (like she didn't run the house/raise the kids so he focus on earning it) and banging HIS wife (like she would still be his 'possession' after the divorce) sounds very sexist to me. She likely 'fell out of love' for a reason, especially if he is talking like that about her.

I agree, IF the wife did her job! A sudden change of heart which leads your children in limbo is not what I call doing your job. The husband held up his end of the bargain..provide and stay faithful...the wife on the other hand did not do her job properly. Raising children half way(or 1/3rd of the way in this case) is a massive failure as a stay at home mom. Many studies showing how detrimental it is for children growing up in a divorced family especially at a really young age. She literally caused more problems by being a stay at home mom this way. If you want to leave..then don't have kids. There's no doubt that the work done by a stay at home mom has value..but in this case I believe she ended up providing negative value as a whole. This is not what the husband signed up for.

[scfr]

I'm reading a book right now called Rock Retirement.

Looks like an interesting read - I've added it to my list. Thank you.

[LivingAlmostLarge]

Bah on getting pissed about divorced. It takes two to get married and two to get divorced. No divorce is one person's fault entirely.

That being said I'd retire in 3 years and say screw it. I think I'm on the 45/50/55 track. I also like DS value time over money. My DH has been offered more money but he's turned it down. He likes what he does. Second we've tossed a few "retirement" ideas and they basically are doing something crazy fun. I said sure when we hit the minimum number have at it. We're basically there so he can have at it. Just need it to come along.

[Like2Plan]

I have been running the numbers 9 ways to Sunday, and the data show I could hit my "number" in Mar 2021 at age 55. My number is 33x planned expenses in retirement, so a 3% safe withdrawal rate (SWR). The "could" part requires me to save all my pension, bonus and Restricted Stock Units (RSU) for the next 3 years. It also assumes no growth. It also assumes we pay off the house (which is in the plan).

We would live off of my base salary for the next 3 years, which is not a problem.

So what do I do at 55? What happens when I am financially independent? I'm kinda freaked out about the thought of this happening in 3 years.

You can do whatever you want! You don't have to retire. But, congratulations on reaching your goal sooner than expected.

[FrugalFish]

Very cool to have that option. Congratulations

I know a lot of older people who worked for the gov't back in the day when pensions were generous and very livable. They often struggled with the decision to retire earlier than the average person might. Most of them just came to a point when they knew it was time. It doesn't have to be a target date- just wait until you know you don't want to do that anymore, and you know what you want to do once you stop working.

You can always be like my FIL who retired 3 or 4 times. I swear he just did it to get the cakes...