8 Tips To Help You Prepare For Retirement

Heading towards retirement? If so, it’s vital that you prepare for the next chapter of your life.

A well-planned retirement can be a richly rewarding experience, giving you the time to do many more of the things that you want to do with your life without having worry about the drag of the daily grind.

Here’s eight tips that can help you to work towards that dream retirement:

Work out how much you can expect to earn from your pension: Before you pack in your job, you need to know what your post-work income will be. You should contact the Government to get your State Pension forecast and do the same for any other pensions you might have accrued throughout your working life.

Go through the rest of your finances: You also need to have a thorough look through the rest of your finances. What savings accounts do you have? Could those be used to boost your income?

Think about how to boost your pension pot: It might well be worth your while to top up your pension pot in the years before you retire to maximise the amount you can draw down the line. By looking into this well before you hope to retire you’ll give yourself time to boost your fund and it might well affect your decision on when to start claiming your pension.

Set out your retirement budget: Sit down and map out how much you expect to spend on day-to-day living costs when you finish work. Draw up a budget and look at the things you spend money on now and think about how this might change. Don’t wait for any nasty surprises, plan ahead so that you can feel confident about having a comfortable retirement.

Clear your debts: It makes sense to try to begin your retirement debt free. Given that your income is likely to go down when you end work, you don’t want too many loans or credit cards eating into your pension income. Plan to pay these off before you leave work.

Take financial advice: Thinking about your pension might well seem daunting, especially now that reforms have given people more choice over how they spend their pension pot. While an element of freedom is welcome, knowing the ‘right’ decision is tricky. If you’re struggling, speak to a financial advisor and get them to help you weigh up the pros and cons.

Plan something productive: It’s important not to lose sight of the emotional change involved in leaving work. To avoid feeling a little lost without the structure of your working day, set out some structure by factoring in time for a hobby or voluntary work, for example.

Consider downsizing: Kids flown the nest? If so, do you really need that big old family home any more? It might well be time to sell this and downsize, getting yourself a property that is more cost effective in terms of bills etc. You might also want to retire to a different part of the country if you fancy a change of lifestyle – especially since you’ll no longer need to be near the office.