I started saving for retirement at age 39, after a bad divorce in which I lost everything, plus ended up $80,000 in debt. I never made a lot of money each year (averaging around 40K) but managed to put 6000-8,000 away annually anyway. That's because I had my own business, and was able to put up to 25% into a sep-ira. At the end of the day, now 30 years after I started saving, I find that I have accumulated well over a million dollars. Guess I picked the right investments. But some weren't so good, and I lost the entire amount invested in them. It all averaged out in the end to produce a lot more than I had ever envisioned needing. I retired at age 66, and have been able to pay all of my expenses out of my social security check. Hence the only thing that I drew money out of my retirement account for was to buy the shiny new red sports car that I always wanted. It's a bit more car than I'm used to, but, hey, life is short.
When I hit 70, I'll have to take my RMD's, and I have no idea what I'm going to do with it. All my health care is paid by the VA because I'm a disabled vet, and my wife has Obama care, so the premiums are very low. I have learned one important thing, which I pass on to all those who are younger than me:
The time to do something is when you can!
I can no longer travel for more than 3 hours on an airplane, due to health issues. I used to go to China twice a year, so that gives you some idea of how limited I've become. And I can't drive for more than 200 miles a day because I end up falling asleep at the wheel. I used to be able to go over 700 miles a day when needed, but those days are gone. In addition, I find I can't ride motorcycles anymore due to slow reflexes, loss of hearing, fragile bones, etc. So at this point, I'm glad that I did get to ride over 150,000 miles on motorcycles when I was younger.
My out of pocket expenses are low enough so that I really don't need to draw anything out of my retirement funds. I will leave a large part to my wife and my kids, but will most likely donate the balance of my estate to the VA, which has done such a good job taking care of me all these years. By which donation, I hope to be able to pass on something which will help other vets get better health care, if only incrementally.
At the end of the day, my Social Security and my VA disability benefits cover all my housing, insurance, transportation, food, and entertainment expenses. I think that it all comes out to less than $36,000 a year. Maybe other people can't live on this amount, but to them I will say, a man's wealth is not measured by what he has, but by what he doesn't need.
