It’s the stage of life that we all don’t want to get to, but unfortunately it’s going to happen regardless. Rather than moan and just hope that we skip this element of life, it’s time to tackle retirement head-on and work out exactly what you should do once you reach the required age.

Of course, the steps are going to largely vary depending on your circumstances. It’s for this reason that today’s guide will focus on what you should start to think about once that retirement age looms.

Think about the latter years

As we all know, life doesn’t end upon retirement. While it might feel like that for some, it really doesn’t.

It means that you ultimately need to think about the latter years. In other words, what happens ten or twenty years after you stop working?

This is where pre-planning is absolutely essential. The press have covered the cost of elderly care hugely over the last couple of years and based on that, are you in a position to be able to afford it? How about your funeral? Again, it might be a long way down the line, but in a bid to not leave your family with a gigantic bill it can be worth taking precautions to arrange this years in advance.

It’s pre-planning like this which can really make life after you retire so much easier.

How much money do you need?

In truth, a whole dissertation can be penned on this question and it’s very difficult to quantify.

One of the big problems is that there are a lot of misconceptions about how much money you need to live on once you retire. A lot of people base it off the average lifespan – even though there are absolutely no guarantees that anyone is going to live until this age. There’s every chance that you will live until 90, which happens to eclipse the world average by around twenty years. In other words, what exactly will you live on for those final two decades?

Therefore, you really need to start doing the sums and calculating your expenses and any remaining income you might have. By doing this, you can at least see how much your pension is going to give you, rather than working backwards so to speak.

The practical elements of life

This final point is a very practical one, and just asks how you are physically going to manage as time progresses.

Again, it’s one of those issues that most of us are happy to ignore initially, but the last thing you want is to be living in a two-storey building when you are struggling to navigate the stairs. It is minor considerations like this which you need to keep in your mind, just so you can move to an easier way of living in good time.

Again, this isn’t to tar retirement with a hugely negative brush, and it’s worth mentioning that there are plenty of things to look forward to. In order to experience these, you really need to get practical elements in order though.