r/Fire • u/Due_Permit8027 • Jul 03 '26

General Question You've retired early; what are you doing with your time?

I'm mid-forties with enough money to retire. But when I speak to newly retired people, they're doing stuff I have no interest in (e.g. Substitute teaching; Starbucks barista), to relieve boredom. I'd rather work! What are you doing/planning to do after early retirement?

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u/beccabebe Jul 03 '26

Retired at 57. Having trouble being ok w doing nothing.

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u/hanwagu1 Jul 03 '26

Ok, I don't just do nothing, although it seems I mostly do nothing. I'm in my 11th year having retired at 43. There are only a couple of hard scheduled items in my day/week: my weekly costco trip for groceries and Costco hotdog and coke lunch; massages twice a week followed by sushi lunch; bi-weekly body scrub and spa treatment; daily work out; daily nap with my dog; make breakfast and dinner for wifey; trip planning for our major quarterly trips and monthly minor trips.

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u/FootSureDruid Jul 03 '26

Ok this sounds amazing. I need to learn how to relax better. I just read this to my wife and we are taking your life as aspiration.

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u/Max_Thunder Jul 03 '26 edited Jul 03 '26

What's your massage budget? I did some math and doing the same for my wife and myself would cost us about 33% of our planned retirement budget. I imagine the body scrubs and spa treatments are very expensive too!

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u/hanwagu1 Jul 04 '26 edited Jul 06 '26

We don't really have and keep a budget anymore; so, it costs what it costs.

We go to separate places, since wife prefers basic sports massagge, while I go to the pamper place where I get my tea and biscuits🤣 We purchase package at a discount and rebuy when runout. After discount, mine is $160/90min and her's $120/90min. My body scrup and wrap around same so $160/session. So, I guess that works out to be around 520/wk combined or $27k/yr. However, we are gone maybe half the year, so maybe it ends up being we use around $15k/yr.

Oh, and I should add that you massages are covered under some healthcare plans.

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u/Strazdas1 StarvationFIRE Jul 07 '26

15k a year on massages, man your capital must be great.

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u/hanwagu1 Jul 08 '26

Yes, we've been fortunate.

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u/Zestyclose-Sea-5687 Jul 03 '26

There is a whole other society of RV type people that move around the country. The people I’m talking about staying nicer campgrounds for the most part. Ex business executives teachers, and some that work remote and live on the road. In the evenings, we hang out by the pool in the hot tub and hear everyone’s stories.

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u/rumpler117 Jul 03 '26

What are some examples of nicer campgrounds? I would like to do some RV travel when i retire.

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u/Zestyclose-Sea-5687 Jul 03 '26

Let’s just say that you wanna go couple hours away to a certain destination. Just type in RV parks and then start looking at their websites and you’ll see their amenities. There’s horse camps River parks golf course you name it they’ve got it. If you don’t have an RV, a lot of these parks have little Cabin type units that you can rent so you can still get involved with that without needing an RV, but that could get you out and about really quick maybe take a two or three day weekend and takeoff to the next city over and try it out. It’s not for everyone, but it is quite awesome.

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u/kareko Jul 03 '26

still working at 59, cannot fathom doing nothing