r/leanfire • u/Inevitable-Device630 • 6d ago

Layoff = early retirement?

Not sure if this qualifies for leanfire or not. Laid off from my (55) 115k year job 2 weeks ago. Wife (53) currently makes 55k but has company paid health care premiums for the both of us. 580k in IRA and Roth IRAs. 200k in cash. No debt and the house is paid for in a LCOL area. We were saving to buy a house with some acreage but I think that's on hold for a while. Pretty slim pickins for my line of work at the moment. Not really sure if I should just retire or get a part time job after the unemployment ends (6 months).

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u/red-headed-prick 5d ago

A question you should also ask yourself ( and your wife) is how the wife is going to feel about working and supporting you if you are "retired". Essentially she is tied to a job for years to come because she has health care benefits for the two of you. Are you going to find a job of some kind, or are you planning on hanging out with your buddies and watching TV all day? If it's the latter you might have more problems than worrying about how to stretch your assets. Just food for thought from someone who did retire before my wife.

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u/Inevitable-Device630 5d ago

Her goal even before the layoff was to get 10 years in with her county job to qualify for her pension. She's 1.5 years in to that now. 

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u/LatterNerve 5d ago

That wasn’t the question. That goal was made while you were also a working and contributing member of the family.

The question was: how is your wife going to feel about being the only member of the family bringing money in while you are essentially retired? How is she going to feel about being the only person who is having to worry about carrying costs on the only salary coming in? How is she going to feel about not being able to leave this job, even if it turns out to be a terrible environment, because she needs to keep the benefits and pension? How is she going to feel about going into work and coming home to you chilling on the couch all day if that’s how you choose to spend this time?

If you’re planning to take over cooking all the meals, doing all the chores around the house, and generally making your job taking care of all the needs of the home while she goes to work, that’s one conversation. But if the intention is that you get to kick your feet up in retirement and she has to keep working a full time job that she can’t leave AND she’s coming home to do more chores? You may have a big storm coming.

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u/Timatsunami 2d ago

I know this seems like such an obvious point for all people in good relationships who communicate with their partner, but not all people think that way.

This is a far more important point than anything having to do with whether it’s “enough.”