I've said it before and I'll say it again: I've been very blessed. The people I've known, the experiences I've had, everything has been a blessing, even if some things ended before I wanted.
In 2000, I accidentally quit my job. The details aren't important, but the fact that I didn't have another job to go to does. I was working as a consultant and my company was struggling to find someone to replace me so they asked me to stay on for a month. At the end of the month, they still hadn't found someone but my counterpart at the client had also quit, so the client asked me to take his job.
In 2000, the "dot-com boom" was in full force and I decided to become an independent contractor. I was 31 and didn't know a thing about business other than there was money to be made, so I turned down the client. That's when they offered to hire me as an independent contractor at $100/hour which worked out to $200,000/year.
Of course that was gross income and the federal government was going to take roughly $60k, not to mention state and local taxes. I had basically no expenses -- I wasn't even driving to work, I was cycling! -- so I spoke to an accountant who showed me "this one weird trick" to shield income: A company can match an employee's 401k (retirement fund) contributions up to 25%! Of course most companies don't do this, but if you're the only employee then why not? I was putting away about $40k per year, and this went on for 8 years.
When my first wife and I divorced, she would have normally been entitled to half of my 401k, but I told her she could keep the B&B if I could keep my retirement fund. That was a bit disingenuous because I actually had no claim on the B&B (despite all the money I invested) and she had no idea I had $300,000 in my retirement fund. Thankfully she didn't ask and we signed the divorce agreement.
I then moved to the UK and started another private pension fund. When I moved to New Zealand, I could have left it in the UK but for some reason I decided to transfer it to NZ. That turned out to be a really good move: Since it's been out of the UK for 10 years, the UK won't tax it, and neither will New Zealand. (The US will because they're bastards.)
I also started another private pension fund ("Kiwisaver") but I used most of that in 2023 for the house deposit. (I've purchased three homes in my life, and each time I was considered a "first time buyer" because they were in three different countries and they don't check internationally.)
In the US, you can take the full state pension at 67 or an "early benefit" at 62. In New Zealand, you get the pension when you're 65 but the bastards require you to apply for any other state pensions and then reduce your benefit dollar-for-dollar. Thus, even if I waited until I was 65, I'd still have to apply for an early benefit and, since the US benefit is more than the NZ pension, I would never get a penny from NZ!
Now, NZ argues you shouldn't get more than someone who has worked in New Zealand their entire life just because you worked in two countries, which sounds reasonable, but it also ignores the fact that I will get a lower benefit from the US because I worked in New Zealand! The US bases your benefit on the "average salary" you've earned over 35 years, but it only counts the years you worked in the US (or for a US employer). Any other year is a 0. So based on my "average salary" my full US benefit will be $2,466/month. If I had continued to work in the US, it would be $3,924/month, or $1,458/month more!
The New Zealand benefit is a flat US $1,394 per month so if I did get it, it still wouldn't make me whole, but to deny me altogether -- even though I've worked here for over ten years -- is really messed up.
In the UK, you can't get the public pension until 67, but I wasn't expecting a UK public pension because I only lived there for six years (and only worked for five). However, while doing my research I discovered you can make "voluntary" payments for years you're out of the country. (The UK pension is based on the number of years you contributed, not on how much you earned.) So if I make voluntary payments for the next 11 years (plus I can pay retrospectively for the previous six years) I will actually get a UK pension equivalent to US $1,015 per year. (These figures are all in current values and exchange rates.) Still not as good as if I'd stayed in the US but better than nothing.
Altogether my three private pensions are presently worth about US $800k. You can access UK private pensions at 55, US IRA or 401k funds at 59 1/2 and New Zealand kiwisaver at 65 (or earlier if I can show hardship). I put together a spreadsheet that indicated if I limit my spending to NZ $60k per year (roughly US $40k) I could stop working today and would still have some money left when I'm 90. Of course, there are a lot of variables but I've tried to be conservative.
This assumes about US $13,000 in income from renting out the master bedroom in my house. I moved into the guest room a while ago and listed the master bedroom on Airbnb, but I realised I'd be better off with a steady income rather than the peaks and troughs of Airbnb. I've had a few bites and I'm hoping to have it filled mid-February.
I also figure I can earn some pocket money, as well. Although it sounds ridiculous, from what I've read it's easy to make decent money from Uber, just not a living. If I worked a couple of hours each day and made US $10k, it would fund an overseas trip every year. I'd be happy with that.
I could also do some volunteer work so I'd have some structure and spend time with people. I really don't have a plan (obviously) because I didn't think I could pull this off -- after spending $1M on the B&B and then walking away from it, I assumed I'd be working until I was 67!
So those are the numbers, but the real motive here is that I just can't keep working. When I had my family to look after, I could stay motivated and put up with the nonsense, but I haven't gotten any satisfaction from work in almost 20 years. I used to love work, but I made the classic mistake of moving from doing to planning, to middle-management. Now I spend my days writing up plans that routinely get shelved or ignored because someone higher up (and not technical) thinks they can do it better. Then when it turns to custard (and it always turns to custard) then it takes three times longer to fix it than it would have taken to do it right in the first place.
New Zealand is particularly bad for some reason, and it's not just my opinion: Labour productivity in New Zealand is roughly 68% of the OECD average. Unfortunately nobody seems interested in addressing this so it just keeps getting worse. I can't keep running on this treadmill. And worse, my programming skills have atrophied so I couldn't even move back into a programming role if I wanted to. I'd like to believe that without the pressure of a salary, I could go back to school and find that same spark of enjoyment I used to get when I was younger, but I don't know.
I'm meeting with a financial advisor tomorrow to discuss all of this and see where we end up. I had been considering buying my neighbour's house and renting it out, but I'd have to use my pension funds for the down payment and it would be a negative cash flow for many years, so that would obviously quash my ability to retire early. (But I would eventually have another income stream as well as an investment property, so that would be nice.)
A few final thoughts:
Because I have NZ citizenship, I can move to Australia without restriction. If I move there when I am 67, I can immediately apply for an Australia "age pension." It is a flat rate of about US $1800 per month but they means test it so I would only get about half that. However, I could literally get three pensions from three countries. (And after living there for four years, I could get citizenship, as well.) However, if I moved out of Australia then they would pro-rate it based on the number of years I lived in Australia before I was 67, which means I would stop getting it.
I will continue to receive both the UK and US pension no matter where I live. However, the UK pension is not adjusted for inflation for people who live in Canada, New Zealand, and Australia!! Thus, when I start drawing the UK pension, that is the amount I will receive for the rest of my life--over 30 years, that's a steep depreciation. Even more bizarre, if I lived in the US or Israel (or 42 other countries, including Turkey) it would adjust for inflation!
I have considered moving to Australia just because their productivity is much higher than New Zealand and I might be able to get some satisfaction from working again. However, that's a big step and I'm not ready to make it yet.
As much as I wish I could have stopped working to spend time with my wife when she was alive, I couldn't have. First, because we were expecting to have to self-fund her treatments, we needed to be saving money. Second, we bought a single-level house and spent a lot of money making it her refuge -- the master bedroom, deck, garden, etc were all set up because she was worried about losing her mobility. Of course, she died before that became an issue, but it was still a great comfort to her knowing it wouldn't be an issue. We couldn't have done any of that if I had stopped working. And on top of that, I didn't even know I could access my UK pension at 55 -- I only discovered that when I was trying to find out how to report her death to the UK. (Even if I had known, I turned 55 only three months before she passed, so it wouldn't have made much of a difference.)
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