Retire early or travel while we can?

we retired mid 50s, over 20 active fun years ago, never looked back.

If you have no debts and no mortgage you 'll find you can live very comfortably on a reduced income.

Our children in their 50s are are all planning to be mortgage free and retire before 60 .

Tanzania is on my must visit list. My husband is 2nd generation Polish and his mum's family were there for several years before coming to the UK. I'd like to see where she lived.

Wow I didn't know that answer bet others don't.

That's just the sort of thing I would like to do

Definitely try and pack in as much travel as you can, while you can! My husband and I have the opposite situation - we both had amazing careers working for an airline that enabled us to travel around the world and visit incredible destinations. Now in our late sixties, we are held back in the UK by a very elderly mother who insists on living on her own and refuses point-blank to have carers. I would feel resentful about this a lot more if we hadn’t travelled so much with our jobs for 35+ years…..
If you don’t have family duties or ill-health, really do try to experience the thrill of travel to other countries if you can.

I retired at 68 from full time employment and my husband retired a year earlier when he was 71. I didn’t feel like retiring at 60 because I enjoyed my job and I knew I still had a lot to give! Those extra few working years made so much difference - financially - to being able to do whatever we wanted to do and travel wherever we wanted to go when we both finally retired, and it’s definitely given us the freedom and choice to be able to live an active and fulfilling retirement. Money worries in retirement years just adds stress to you day to day life - and that can be a precursor for many depilating annd life shortening illnesses.

You are the ages DH and I were when we retired. If you can afford it, then go for it. We have done lots of travelling but 18 years later we are slowing down and only go to Europe now, though DH does still mutter about going to Tanzania again.

As I know far too well, you never know what’s around the corner. If you’re healthy, I’d say go for it and travel. I’m sure you wouldn’t regret it.

Do it - I do so many lovely things - never bored. Look after my granddaughter once a week which is just the best thing ever.

Please do it!! We had to retire a few years ago because of my health and we have done so much sine then. You will wonder how on earth you ever had time for work. The world is a big place and it's well worth exploring before, as you say, it is too late. Enjoy your well earned retirement and your travelling

We both took early retirement, just before 60 for my husband and 57 for me. The house was paid for, so we did our sums and reckoned if we lived carefully for 5 years until his pensions kicked in we could travel. So on a cold November day, backpacks packed we set out for a 4 month adventure in SE Asia using a map and travel book to get around. What wonderful memories we have and we carried on for 10 years after and never regretted it. I had my my 70th birthday in Cambodia and then due to a decline in my health we had to stopped. We can’t travel abroad now but we did it while we could. Now we just travel a little in this country. The cost of our travels was no more than living at home over the winter. So go for it

I retired at 61 the day before my first grandchild was born, I was able to help my daughter out for a year, then Covid hit, I went back to work as a nurse, I m now 68 and still working but just one day per week. I’ve travelled a lot, India, Nepal, Peru, Vietnam, Cambodia, Thailand, Finland, Norway, Canada, USA, Australia, New Zealand, Ecuador &Galapagos, South Africa and Mauritius as well as a lot of Europe, it’s about getting the balance right, I felt I was vegetating by not working at all and needed to keep my brain active otherwise I might have found myself just sitting around not doing anything, we re all different I guess 🤷‍♀️

Well, this is a timely thread! A few months ago I made the decision to take early retirement next year when I'm 65. I love my job, but physically I'm slowing down and things seem to take me so much longer to do now! I also want freedom to be able to do what I want, when I want, rather than being tied to work hours. Yet, even though I've made the decision, there are still days - like today! - when I wonder if I'm doing the right thing. Will I miss where I work, will I be bored and will I be able to cope with being with my husband all day, every day?! He retired 4 years ago due to ill health, so our retirement together will now have to be a very scaled down version of what we assumed it would be back in our younger days. 🤷🏼‍♀️

Enjoy your retirement. I retired early due to health problems but am busier now than when working. Continue with my hobbies which give me great satisfaction.

We retired early on reduced professional pensions too. Don’t regret it at all but we have now come to understand that even if you have paid your 40 (+) years National insurance they reduce your state pension by the number of years that have passed since you last worked. I worked as self employed for the first few years so haven’t lost as much state pension as my DH did.

It’s just something you need to factor in when you do your calculations.

Retired at 60 haven't regretted one minute. If you can afford to - go travel.

I retired 6 years ago at 65. I still miss work. I miss the mental stimulation and the social interaction with a wider range of people. I only seem to meet other old people now! Although I don’t miss office politics and tiresome bureaucracy. We do have relatively good pensions, but I miss having greater financial flexibility. I am finding that life is getting more expensive, not less.

We are still well able to travel but have never wanted to be away for months at a time. Experience has shown us that 4 weeks is our comfortable limit. I would say that it depends what you want to do - very sympathetic to those who found themselves with less time than they hoped due to loss or ill health. But I know just as many who can’t afford to do what they would like - often because redundancy etc cut their working lives short.

You have a good chance of being healthy and active in 20 years time - just think about how much money you need to live the life you want to live over that time span -not just over the next couple of years. I met someone who had retired early, then gone back to work. He said that you need less money than you think in the short term, but more in the longer term. I have found this to be true.

Retire and enjoy yourself. My late husband retired at 60. He said to me, "If I die tomorrow, I've had 20 wonderful years" he had never been ill all his life but died two weeks later out of the blue.

I decided to retire at 58 after regularly working 12 hour days. One day I took a look at all the young faces in my open plan office and immediately made a plan to get out of the way and let a younger person have my position! I used my savings to repay my mortgage and overpaid my National Insurance to fill any future gaps and ensure I get the full state pension. I do not regret my decision and have filled my days travelling and volunteering 😀

I pretty much retired at 57 (I still do a bit of consultancy work) and have never regretted it. My husband is a bit older than me, and the plan was that we'd retire together when he was 65, but the change to the pension age made that seem impossible. In the end, he decided to leave at 60. I stayed on for a while, but didn't like leaving the house in the cold and dark whilst he was still in bed .

Like others, I wasn't sure I was doing the right thing, and knew I wouldn't be able to change my mind, so it was a big decision that I dithered about for ages, but it was the right one. I'm never bored, and absolutely love not having to set the alarm. I still get a buzz from the work I do, even though it's just a few hours, and I now have plenty of time to follow my interests and do as I please.

My husband isn't much of a traveller. I would like to do more of that, but I'm not bothered enough to want to go alone or with friends. Maybe I will if I get itchy feet, but maybe not. My health means that I would have to think carefully about where to go and what I could do anyway.

Go for it! My life was cut short at 63 by a big stroke. I am so sorry I put things off. Can’t do it now.

I took redundancy at 60. My husband had already retired he was then 70. Oh how glad I did we had nearly 8 years of travelling and long winter stays in Spain before he got ill and died of prostate cancer 3 years ago. If I had waited till I was 66 I would have missed all those happy times and memories.

Just do it !!! Life is short

Go for it and retire early. I hung on to the bitter end because DH wanted me too but 6 months later needed life changing surgery. None of us can see the future and retirement is the best job I ever had.

Definitely travel now whilst u can