Scottish Widows is a life insurance company in the UK.  I’d prefer not to to have the bad retirement surprise of an early death. She does look vaguely sinister….

Surprised!

At one of the Friday AM breakfast group meetings I posed the question of retirement surprises to my fellow diners. No one seemed to have had a severe bad surprise, thank goodness. Of the surprises that were mentioned, most indicated that home maintenance was the culprit.

Ken and Bobbi (pseudonyms) had a water heater go out, as did Sean and Deala (more pseudonyms). Sean’s water heater was particularly problematic and expensive due to code issues.  Water pipe issues and remodeling project scope creep were also mentioned by the group.

Goal

Remember – our goal here is to try and avoid retirement surprises.  After thinking about the problem, I decided to see what we might do with the useful life of home items, such as appliances and paint, combined with costs.

The solution, but stay tuned for the mis-underestimated part

I mentally walked through my house and developed a list of appliances and maintenance items.  Once I had the list I researched the usual lifespan of the item and what the cost to replace it might be. This took a lot longer than I thought it would, but no gain without pain, right?

With the costs and lifespans, I put together a spreadsheet. We’ll talk about it next, but you can find one to use here, available in both Excel and Google Sheets versions.

Mis-underestimated

Well golly, I tried the house maintenance costs spreadsheet.  According to the spreadsheet, I mis-underestimated fairly significantly the amount of money that maintenance costs for a house over time. Especially if you try to accrue the money for those costs on a monthly basis.  On the other hand, when some things wear out, such as a furnace or refrigerator, they are hard or impossible to live without.

When you look at the spreadsheet, you will see average life and average costs.  You can enter your estimate of the remaining life, in years (ex. 5 for 5 years or .25 for 3 months), of your item and what you estimate your replacement cost to be. The spreadsheet will calculate a monthly cost to accrue (save up), so that when you need the replacement, the money is already in the bank.

Good news – surprise eliminated. Bad news – shock at the amount needed per month. Seriously, mine was three times what I had previously budgeted. I was shocked, but now at least I can plan in advance.

On the plus side, it looks like plumbing, electrical wiring, and walls last a very long time, so I did not need to include those.

Some of the reference sites I used:
https://www.thisoldhouse.com/ideas/how-long-things-last
https://www.thespruce.com/lifespan-of-household-appliances-4158782
https://www.homeadvisor.com/cost/heating-and-cooling/install-a-furnace/

Actions you can take include:
Download and personalize your House Maintenance Costs Spreadsheet.
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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