Smart Money with Purpose: Retiree Interview Number 1

I really enjoy reading C. S. Lewis’s insights on true friendship. He focuses on a true friendship being based on a central question: “Do you see the same truth?” For example, if I run into a St. Louis Cardinal fan in Montana, I have an “Aha!” moment. “What! You too? I thought I was the only one.” And a joyful conversation follows recounting all the great Cardinal teams and players. A new friendship is born.

Friendship also occurs in much the same way in the Smart Money with Purpose community. There are many views of money, but this community comes together because, among other truths, we see money should be the slave to our life purpose. As a result, I have made many friends I have never met, but who share a real friendship.

Which brings me to my friend Brian. I have never met him face to face and would not know him if he walked into my office. But I have gotten to know him because we have shared ideas with one another about money and purpose. As a result, I am happy to introduce you to Brian today in the first of what I hope will be many interviews with your fellow SMWP community members. Brian offers insight into how he approaches the season of life we call retirement.

Brian’s comments are in bold.

Tell us about yourself.

My name is Brian.  My wife and I live in Kennewick, WA.  My wife was born in South Dakota and moved to Kennewick during High School.  After college in Missouri, she moved back to Kennewick.  I grew up in Yakima WA, went to college in Portland OR and moved to Kennewick after college to work.  We met at church and have had an amazing life together for 34 years.

Why did you decide to retire?  And what process did you go through to make that decision? 

My wife retired a few years before I did after working 30 years for a social services agency that helped developmentally disabled adults live independently in the community.  We both worked since getting married and based upon our budget and savings decided we could live comfortably without her income.  She was also beginning to feel burned out.  Our house was paid off and we didn’t carry debt making this change feasible.  I decided to retire a few years after my wife upon achieving financial independence.  I kept working a few years past my long-term goal of retiring at 55 mainly because I was enjoying my job enough to want to keep working.  By the time I did retire, my job satisfaction had diminished and the financial rewards had also diminished.
The process we went through started early in our marriage when we decided to track our spending and budget.  We also dreamed and planned for the day we would retire.  We also “test drove” a few financial advisors and had one advisor provided through my job as a benefit in the 401k program.  I must admit it was very nerve racking to step away from a steady paycheck.  Change is often difficult.

Has your retirement decision been a good one? What are the major pluses and minuses of your retirement? 

We are both glad we retired.  So far it has been a good decision for several reasons.  We both enjoy the freedom that not working gives us in our daily schedule.  No alarm clock is one of my favorite things.  After 28 years of getting up at 5 am to go to work, I savor waking up to no alarm clock.

Pluses of retirement:

– less time constraints

– the ability to help others during hours we would have been working (we brought my wife’s mother home to live with us 2 years ago when she needed help due to dementia; we also assist an aging aunt and uncle with their financial resources)

–  more time to pursue interests such as reading, music, gardening, hobbies, etc.

–  lower stress levels

–  not feeling like we are burning the candle at both ends 

–  the ability to pursue new things we like without concern about how it will fit into our work schedules.  examples:  cooking new dishes, experimenting with new musical instruments, listening to new types of music, trying new restaurants, seeing new travel locations.

– making new friends and becoming part of new social circles.

Minuses of Retirement:

–  Giving up the steady paycheck and benefits (medical/dental insurance, 401k)

–  Not seeing people you used to interact with at work

–  No longer being part of the team you worked with

What has been different from your retirement experience from what you expected? 

–   I didn’t imagine how much fun I would have being around my wife full time.  We both needed time to adjust to being around each other, but have settled into it nicely.  

–  I didn’t envision how much more relaxed I could be without the tension of work life.  I loved my job – most of the time but work can be stressful.  

–  We never envisioned spending as much time helping others as we do.  We are so happy to be able to do it and have met some wonderful people along the journey of helping aging family members.  

–  I completely underestimated how much joy the freedom of time gives me.

How would you describe how you found purpose and meaning in your career compared to your retirement experience?

I found purpose and meaning in my career through the early to mid-years by learning new skills that I could apply to help with my employers’ success.  Later in my career I added mentoring to the mix to pass on knowledge to those that had an interest in learning where experience and tribal knowledge were valuable.  In my retirement life, I have found learning is still key to finding purpose and meaning.  Retirement learning just doesn’t always translate to earnings, which for us isn’t as important as it once was.  I find the value of time is now much more important to me.  I have also learned that by having more disposable time available I am able to share it with aging family members that need assistance to lighten their load.  If I still worked the hours I used to, I would not be able to spend the time required to help them at the level I am able to now.  We also find purpose and meaning in sharing with those less fortunate.  We support children through World Vision.  We believe in helping people to help themselves through the World Vision organization. 

What advice would you give to someone considering retirement, but uncertain of how to prepare for it? 

I would suggest developing a notebook/file for retirement planning including uncertainties.  I think writing retirement planning and uncertainties down helped me focus on what I needed to feel comfortable preparing for the decision.  Uncertainties for me were things like:

• How much money per month/year is enough?
• How will inflation impact us in retirement?
• How to insure for medical, dental, life?
• What to do with extra time?
• How many years to plan for finances into the future in retirement?
• What activities do I want to pursue?  Travel? Golf? Art?  Guitar?  How much do these cost?

How did you figure out the money aspect of retiring? 

We established a budget early in our married life for peace of mind. We listened to Larry Burkett and Ron Blue on the radio (way before YouTube and the internet).  One bit of advice we took to heart from them was to keep a firm priority about three major items and the rest would fall into place:

1.  Credit cards.  Avoid carrying debt on credit cards.  The interest rates are just too high.

2.  Cars/trucks.  Don’t buy expensive vehicles.  We were able to find good used cars that we kept for 10+ years each time.  When we were finished with our cars/trucks we passed them to family members in need as they had little resale value but still provided reliable transportation.  Keeping up with the latest trendy cars was a temptation but one we avoided.  We also did not spend a lot on recreational ATVs, motorcycles, trailers, etc.  Instead, we found things we loved.  We hiked, biked, and found other less expensive forms of entertainment.

3.  Housing.  Don’t over spend on housing.  Keeping up with the neighbors was never a goal.

After we had our budget developed, we saved and invested.  After about 20 years it dawned on us, we might actually be able to retire by age 55.  We started looking into financial advisors but were not satisfied they provided enough value for the fees they were asking.  I felt comfortable choosing investments after reading advice from Jack Bogle and from Financial Engines, a robo advisor service provided by my employer through their 401k program.

Do you find you have a relatively stress-free financial situation in retirement? Or are finances a concern you spend a lot of time on? 

We are finding retirement relatively stress free so far.  We are only 4 years into retirement but at this point we think we are adequately prepared.  We still spend time budgeting, planning, and investing, although not as much as before retiring.

What would you have done differently about your retirement decision if you could do it over? 

I would have started believing I was ready sooner.  I spent too much valuable time considering what I would do if inflation soared, if Social Security became insolvent, we lived to be 100, etc.  All are things we have little or no control over and can/should be planned for before and after retirement happens. Believing I was prepared was a big relief for me. I didn’t retire for a few more years, but I noticed my attitude about work stress changed when I knew I no longer “needed” the job for financial reasons.

What are the major activities that take up your time? Did you take up any new hobbies as a result of the additional time? 

With the pandemic, we curtailed a lot of activities.  We spend a good deal of our time reading, gardening, helping our aging mothers and an aunt/uncle, cooking new meals, watching travel shows.   

We bought ukuleles to try a new music hobby.  We also expanded our garden.

What are your future plans? 

After the pandemic we plan to see (in person) family and friends.  We plan to take trips to favorite places (Mt. Rainier, OR/WA coast, Columbia River Gorge).  We also look forward to traveling to some new places.  

What made you willing to share your story with others?

I enjoy reading other people’s stories and thoughts on blogs like Smart Money with Purpose.  Getting to share our journey is a chance to look back at our past lives with a smile on our face and look forward to what lies ahead with a great deal of hope (hope is a powerful thing!!) and a certain amount of uncertainty about what will happen in the crazy world we live in. 

What advice would you give to someone once they have retired?

Look for opportunities to help others as a part of your retirement time.  The flexibility of leaving a 40 hour per week commitment creates a large block of time to do something meaningful without a large commitment of time.  The reward for your effort is repaid many times over in the joy you can bring another just by a visit or a trip to McDonalds or Starbucks.  Opportunities with the elderly, disabled, and kids are in every community.  A visit to someone who is shut-in or just doesn’t have a lot of outside contact can make such a difference in someone’s life.  Check with your local nursing homes, retirement communities, senior center, church, rehab centers, schools, etc. 

What else would you like to share with the SMWP readers?

For the person that is thinking about retirement.  I never thought about retirement as FIRE or the end of a career, more as the beginning as the next natural step in our life journey.  Dreaming, planning, researching and sharing it with my wife and friends was almost as much fun as the actual retirement event.  The actual retirement decision was difficult!  But if I had not taken the little steps over 20+ years, it would have been a daunting decision.  Plan, dream and enjoy the journey.   Be prepared for change because it is life we are talking about.  Life has always been twists and turns, ups and downs, brick walls, joyous celebrations, and dreams come true in our journey so far.  I don’t expect that to change much in the future.

Thank you, Brian, for sharing with the readers of Smart Money with Purpose!