After you FIRED and retired, were there expenses you immediately cut or stopped?

[WhenIsItTime]

Nothing deliberate. Fortunate to have FI before RE.

[MichaelB]

The first change in expense after quitting work was we sharply reduced eating out. While working we had little time for family meals and made up for that by going out. Once unemployed, free time was no longer an obstacle and there was no need to go out.

[brucethebroker]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Alan We immediately sold one of our 2 cars. Overall our expenses went up because we then started doing a lot of travel.

+1 Yeah, the 1 car thing really reduces our expenses. Plus, we now seem more inclined to combine trips instead of just jumping into a car for a single errand. We make a game out of having No Car Days a few times each week.

We are also buying more take out rather than dining in. Started with Covid related dining room shutdowns, but we soon began enjoying not having the expenses of dine in beverages and tips (seems like 20-25% is now the expected norm). Our fave take outs are only a mile or two away, which makes a short drive, and usually not out of the way when running other errands.

[lawman]

No, I wish there were. Plenty I'd like to cut but my wife is hellbent on leaving as small an inheritance as possible..

[COcheesehead]

We moved to a lower cost of living area so property taxes went down along with home, auto and umbrella insurance.
Our gas consumption went down. We have days we’re neither car leaves the garage.
Lunch expenses went down.
Clothing expenses just switched from professional to outdoor/athletic.
We eat out less because we have more time to cook.
We no longer save, but I never considered that an expense, but that alone cut out 50% of our cashflow needs.
In our first year of retirement we were right on budget at about $140k, but we bought stuff for the new house, had some hangover taxation from a real estate sale and had some unexpected medical expenses. This year even with inflation we are about $25k below that assuming we spend our entire travel budget, which we may not.

[Montecfo]

I think clothing budget went up as DW needed retirement clothes! But overall will be lower. Mine certainly is.

Some things went up like business subscriptions and cell phone no longer reimbursed by company.

I did cut insurance costs by cancelling LTD and one of two term life insurance policies.

Gas and lunch spending plummetted automatically.

Of course we spend a lot more on travel but can be more opportunistic on when we travel.

[daylatedollarshort]

Right off the bat - no more job and commute costs (lunches out, dry cleaners, clothes, gas, train fares); no more small business expenses, including the overhead of having our own retirement plan; no more need to save for retirement; lower SS and income taxes; and no more need for disability and life insurance; less carry out because we have time to cook; and time to do our own taxes now.

Then we had time to hack all our expenses - changed insurance deductibles, dropped the landline, went around with a Kill a Watt, changed hair stylists, replaced some appliances with more energy efficient ones, LED lights inside, solar lights outside and probably a hundred or more other small changes that allowed us to live better (or at least the same) for less money. It all really added up. I wish we'd made time for this before we retired. We could have retired even earlier.

[Sojourner]

Quote:

Originally Posted by cyber888 After you FIRED and retired, were there expenses you immediately cut or stopped?

• Eating lunch out
• Commuting costs (tolls, fuel)
• Monthly parking fees
• Buying clothes for work
• Expensive, postpaid cellphone plan

[steelyman]

These are all good replies. I’ll echo that contributions to workplace retirement plans (in my case, maxing out both 403(b) and 457 plans) made a big difference once stopped.

My final year was a partial one (I left in August) and I still contributed to the annual limit. That was worthwhile (temporary) “pain”.

[rodi]

When I first retired I was very nervous about whether I had "enough". I went through methodically looking at recurring expenses. Changed cellphone plan from Verizon, to Ting, to T-mobile 55+. (Note 4 of us on the plan since we still have college age kids). Renegotiated cable. Shopped insurance. Switched land line to magic jack.

We were never huge on eating out, and I brown bagged it to work most days... but we really stepped up our home cooking after retirement. DH is a great cook so we got competitive about who could make the best meal. That led to even fewer meals out. (And we tend to eat out lunch, split entrees, etc - so even cheaper.)

Other things were less intentional... Less gas used, fewer (much!) new clothes. No dry cleaning. And having the time to shop for value allowed us to improve our travel for the same budget we had before we retired.

[Dash man]

I cut a telephone line I used for work. Contributions to 401k stopped and social security and Medicare taxes stopped. Paying for my son’s college stopped around then too, but contributions to 529 plans have started again for grandkids.
Overall expenses increased with more travel, health insurance, a wedding to pay for (they are now getting divorced [emoji22]).

[Stormy Kromer]

I eliminated the 1.5% fee that my FA was charging me for arranging a pile of mutual funds that could never come close to the S&P 500 in its best year. That saved me the most by FAR.

I FIRED 6 years ago and haven't spent much on clothes except socks and underwear.

Drive a pickup and car with a total combined miles over 300,000.

Bought a $300 Pit Boss smoker and eat like a king on venison and elk with vegetables from my big garden.

No cable except for netflix. I do have sirius XM radio in the house and wouldn't live without it. I have mobile antenna to put in the car cuz I am too cheap to buy an extra subscription for the vehicles.

I'm living large. In a modest way.

[Ronstar]

Clothes, gasoline, lunches. I haven’t bought any dress pants, shirts or shoes since I retired 8 years ago. No longer have a commute. Used to eat lunch out every day when working. Very seldom eat lunch now.

[UnrealizedPotential]

First thing I did was get rid of the landline. That's the one thing that stands out upon thinking about it. Of course I moved to a place with a lower cost of living as I could never retire in so cal.

[Souschef]

Travel!!!
The first few years we spent about $40 K a year on travel. DW really wanted to travel, but her late husband owned a business and could not get away.
Between 2007 and 2015, we spent at least 2 months a year traveling.
That included getting married on Santorini during DW's first European cruise.

[N02L84ER]

The last year both DH and I w*rked full time we paid

FED+IL+FICA+MEDI+SEP > $146,000


The past 16 years of retirement, we averaged < $60,000 per year in total expenses including taxes and insurance.

[rk911]

nothing comes to mind. if anything we're a bit less restrictive with our spending.

[cyber888]

Quote:

Originally Posted by Souschef Travel!!! That included getting married on Santorini during DW's first European cruise.

That's nice. I have good memories staying at Oja, Santorini.

[jollystomper]

Nothing cut, just some reduced. The major ones:

- Federal/State taxes (now less than half as compared to my working days)
- Charitable giving (as it is in proportion to our income)
- College expenses more due to when I timed my retirement)

Clothing is down slightly, as I still like to look good in nice clothes . Overall food is down, I rarely eat out for lunch, we both cook more, and I buy much less snacks than I did in the past.

[TheWizard]

Not much change for me.
My commute wasn't all that long but I do more day trips on retirement that exceed my commute, so not much difference.

I do pay more income tax in retirement than when working, so clearly I worked too long, and thank you Paine-Webber...