No one wants to spend their retirement worrying about money. Unfortunately, in today’s economic environment debt is common. Once you retire it is almost certain that your income will decline. But if you have loads of debt, your expenses will stay almost the same or even grow with the accumulation of interest.
In days past, it was expected that you would have your mortgage paid off and be debt free by the time you retired.
The key is to get your expenses under control before even considering retirement and that is why many people these days are planning on postponing retirement for a year or two, either because Social Security retirement ages have been postponed or because of out-sized debt.
Many others who have already retired are even taking on part-time jobs at McDonald’s or Walmart to provide a bit of a cushion.
So the best idea is to eliminate debt before retirement, to avoid the possibility of having to take on one of these types of jobs afterward.
Obvious ways to reduce your expenses are to eat out less and avoid entertainment expenses. Another way to save is to reduce your fixed expenses such as eliminating the fancy cable TV packages or your land line phone. Who needs a land line if you have a cell phone? If you absolutely must have a land line consider a Magic Jack which allows you to use your internet connection and telephone to make (and receive) phone calls.
Other fixed expenses are things like insurance premiums. Compare home owners insurance rates, car insurance rates and other types of insurance to be sure you are getting the lowest rates. Even if you only save $50 a month on any of these ideas if you can put several of them together you can end up drastically reducing your monthly expenses.
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