Although there are over one million of them in Australia, there’s one group of retirees who are rarely mentioned in all the literature about retirement. They are the single retiree!
Single retirees can be people who have never married, people who are divorced or people whose partner has died.
For some strange reason, nearly all of the retirement literature we see features attractive couples having a good time with other similar couples. It’s as if single retired people didn’t exist.
As there is currently over 1.3 million single retirees in Australia, there’s a pretty good chance that we would have plenty of single retirees living in our area. The reality is that life for someone who’s single and in their 50s, 60s or 70s is different from the normal picture we see of retired couples. If you are single and have already retired, I hope you’re happy with your new life. However if you are still in the workforce and thinking about retirement, it might be a good idea to consider some of the following –
FINANCIAL SECURITY As you only have one income, there isn’t the safety net of a second income to fall back on in the case of an emergency. It’s important to have appropriate insurance policies in place to pay the bills if you can’t work for a period. It’s also desirable to have an emergency bank account with enough in it to pay short term living costs or cover any unexpected disasters.
GOVERNMENT PAYMENTS FAVOUR COUPLES and as you know living as a single is not half the cost of living as a couple. So what can be done? As a start, make sure you are getting all the government concessions you are eligible for, in particular the Commonwealth Seniors Health Card, The Pensioner Concession card and the Low Income Health Card. A visit to a Centrelink Financial Information Officer before you retire is a good idea.
DO A REALITY CHECK. Life in retirement is going to be very different to your current lifestyle. You need to consider a lot more than just financial issues. One of the benefits of being single is that you don’t have to consider a partners wishes when you’re planning your new lifestyle. A good tool to help you start thinking about the range of issues you’ll encounter in retirement is our book “The Rest of Your Life”. It tells you all the things that most financial planners don’t talk about.
You can order a copy on the home page of this web site