Condos made from shipping containers, Amsterdam, NL.
The survey results
The first key result of the survey that was included in The Road to Hell post is, per my daughter and the tiny but loyal number of respondents, don’t put the survey link at the bottom of your blog post. Thanks to those of you that responded. The next survey will be easy to find.
Good news
Our survey respondents, may they be representative of our entire readership, are in pretty good shape with written budgets and spending tracking, but they need a little more attention to written retirement strategies/plans. The numbers:
Do you have a retirement plan or strategy?
Yes, but it is not written – 77.8%
Yes and it is written – 22.2%
No – 0%
Do you have a household budget?
Yes and it is written in one place – 66.7%
Yes, but it is not written in a single place – 22.2%
No, we wing it – 11.1%
Do you track your spending?
Yes and track on paper, spreadsheet, or app – 66.7%
Yes, but informally (ex. look at bills and checks) – 33.3%
No – 0%
The other survey says
I just glanced at The Insured Retirement Institute 2nd Biennial Study on the American Retirement Experience (with that long of a name it takes a biennium to write!) Their results show that 80% of retirees have the same or less income as they did pre-retirement. 53% have less income, 27% about the same.
Mrs. NoSurprisesRetirement and I took note of the above and have had some success offsetting the less income thing as a pre-retirement practice. We used a BOGO (buy one, get one free) coupon at Jersey Mike’s subs on Friday, then used our Walgreens Balance Rewards to score 4 containers of our favorite coffee at the lowest price we’ve seen in the past 9 months. We got a deal on Blue Diamond almonds, too! Sunday got sweet as we used another BOGO at Dairy Queen for Blizzards. Overall savings was near $30! And, we won’t need to buy coffee for a couple of months!
What Mrs. NoSurprisesRetirement and I did was consistent with another study I saw (and can’t find to cite right now) that people in retirement tend to pull back on their spending, even with reasonable resources.
Actions you can take include:
What coupons should you be using? What staples should you stock up on when the deal is excellent? By the way, Target is having the equivalent of a 30% off sale on household cleaning products this week – a $15 Target gift card with a $50 ‘household essentials’ purchase.
And if you have not seen the “Why you should read this blog…WIIFY” post, it’s here
Questions, comments, or suggestions for retirement surprise areas you want to know more about?
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No Surprises Retirement 