Do you spend more or less than you thought you would pre-FIRE?

[harley]

I don't know but I am guessing less as the children are getting older and there are less things to pay for on their behalf.

Hahahahahahahahahahahaha! Whoo! Thanks for that. It feels good to have a good belly laugh every once in a while.

 

[Danmar]

Retired 10 years. As I recall about the same in total as planned and quite a bit more than pre retirement. Components have changed quite a lot though, more on personal use real estate and, not surprisingly, less on travel. I should go back and look at that spreadsheet again. Haven't in several years.

 

[Trawler]

Retired almost 4 years. Our spending is more than preretirement however less than planned retirement spending. Our dental costs have been much higher than anticipated but other healthcare costs less than planned due to ACA subsidy. We spend more on travel and entertainment than in our working years. Spend less on wardrobe hair cuts fuel and gifts. Utilities are lower as we are usually gone for a couple months of high heating season. Cell phone costs have been going down as well. We comparison shop now as when working we paid more due to convenience and did not want to spend time shopping.

 

[kramer]

My spending in early retirement is less than planned . . . in fact, I am still below the budget I set 9 years ago when I retired, despite inflation since then. I didn't want to count on living abroad as I do now (with big savings in housing and health care). I budgeted that I would have a cheap home base in the USA with a lot of international traveling.

This year I have tried to intelligently up my spending . . . I am in the middle of a 5 week vacation in the Middle East. This was an experiment to see how long at a time I might like to travel.

I have really enjoyed the trip so far but I miss my life in the Philippines and so I might make my next far-away vacation adventure only 2 to 3 weeks.

 

[kcowan]

Our spending was level for the first four years. Travel/entertainment replaced employment expenses. Then we bought a southern property and started spending 6 months and renting out our northern property. Budget has dropped by 30+% but we are working to bring it back up! (charitable and gifting)

 

[explanade]

Spending is up, due to health care and travel.

However, spending in each of the first two years of ER has been less than 2% of savings.