Stop the retirement
carousel – I want to get off!
Despite what I have written, you have read, and others have witnessed,
my first year and a bit of early retirement was not all rainbows and
unicorns. Once again, in the interests
of full disclosure … during my first year of early retirement, in no particular
order:
1. The glass in the marvellous photo gifted to me
at my retirement party, cracked on the taxi ride home and had to be replaced.
2. During the six week period from the beginning of
November to mid-December 2012, I cracked two, not one, but two, major
fillings. The second trip to the dentist
involved rebuilding a portion of the remaining tooth. (The lesson here - think carefully about whether
or not you want to “buy” into Ryerson’s dental plan when you retire!)
3. Early one Sunday morning in February, I had to
make an emergency telephone call for a plumber. I do not have to tell you how
much a plumber costs at 1 a.m. on a Sunday morning. The call also resulted in a follow-up visit
to replace a very important piece of bathroom fixture.
4. My stove died – or at least the oven did. The stove itself, a basic, white builder’s
stove, was 10+ years old, so there was no up-side to calling, and paying for, a
repairman. So it was off to Home Depot,
in the middle of a spring snowstorm to “buy” a stove. I used the verb “to buy” euphemistically
here. I basically pointed at the
cheapest model and said “sold”.
5. The first Saturday in June, the boiler
on the roof of my condo “failed” and flooded the top four floors of my
building. I live on the second floor from
the top. My unit did not suffer any
water damage (though while in my pyjamas, I did get to meet a very nice, young
Mississauga fireman!) though I was without power
for four days while electrical panels were replaced. Running water and electricity were eventually
restored to my floor, but I lost all of the food in my freezer and refrigerator.
6.
On a July 1st car trip to Windsor, my
car, well, died. It was several hundred
dollars for a new fuel pump, plus the cost of an additional night at the hotel before
I was finally able to make my way home to Mississauga. (This is the fuel pump story I just know
everyone is wondering about!)
7. And then came the Christmas ice storm. Fortunately, I was without power for only
four hours so no provisions lost during this power outage.
8.
And just to kick a girl while she’s down – I
toddled down to the underground parking garage one morning in December only to
find the right front tire on my car was flat.
Other than having to make yet another call the CAA, this time to get the
car out of the garage, replacing the tire was not really an unexpected cost. I knew all four tires on my car were due to
be replaced – it just would have been preferable if I had been able to choose
the date the car went into the garage.
In fact, in this long list of misery, the only expense I had budgeted
for was new tires for the car.
9. And oh, by the way, my car was also due for
emission testing and registration sticker renewal.
I have witnesses and credit card statements to verify
all of the above!
As a home and/or car owner, you can except to have to deal
with any or all of the above maintenance scenarios and emergencies. Just hopefully, not all in the same calendar
year. Or in the first calendar year of
retirement!
When you are working, making a full-time salary, these sorts
of emergency expenses hardly cause a ripple of excitement or concern. You put the repair cost on a credit card,
smug in the knowledge that the next pay cheque to drop into the bank will more
than cover the expense.
Except that once retired, you are keenly and painfully
aware of just how much money is not dropping into your bank account on a
monthly basis. It is to cover these
sorts of emergency expenses and keep the financial anxiety at bay that you need
to have a workable budget in place before you retire.
I did have a workable, monthly budget in place before I
retired. And as recommended in a
previous blog post, my budget includes a dollar amount that is automatically
transferred into a savings account.
Because I had a working budget and a savings plan in place
before I retired, I only had to dip into savings for a few hundred dollars to
clear off my December credit card balance.
So today’s words of wisdom from the Mad Retiree, even if you
a have a workable budget in place, don’t be too smug and condescending about
how well you have constructed that budget, because the powers-that-be will let
the air out of your right front tire.
‘Cause life happens.
Even when you’re retired.
So start trying to get a handle on your day-to-day expenses
as soon as possible. Then work hard and
conscientiously to establish a workable, monthly before you officially retire. And
make sure there is some wiggle room in that monthly budget to cover household
emergencies without having to dip into savings to pay off unexpected
credit card balances. The cost of
emergency maintenance and repairs to home and auto do not suddenly disappear
just because you are now retired!
(Another Mad Retiree tip - beginning the year prior to your official retirement date, try to learn
to live within your new, monthly retirement budget. Basically, start how you mean to go on!)
P.S. if you’re a pet owner, don’t forget to
include food and veterinary costs for your fish, fowl, or livestock in your
monthly budget. I don’t have any pets,
so forgot to include the costs of keeping them healthy and happy in my original
financial notes. Thanks to Helen and
Linda for catching the oversight!
