ooooo what to buy myself

A question about : ooooo what to buy myself

so my company have started the NEST pension plan for it's employees, i spose i really should be grateful as before this they were not willing to put anything into a pension at all, yes i didnt get a wage rise this year ( or last year or the year before etc) but atleast i get some pension contributions

now i am 40 and only working part time ( cant get a full time job in my field for love nor money) i do try and pay what i can into my pension but with only taking home Ј800 a month it is quite hard and actually impossible when i have paid my share of the household bills.

anyway enough moaning about that it is what it is and i am doing the best i can to put myself into as good a position as i can, my company currently pay Ј8 a month into my pension and i pay Ј8 a month into my pension

it did get me wondering what exciting thing i could spend my whole ohhh it must be what Ј1 a month or so( when i come to retire) on, and what benefits will that mean that i will no longer have access to

so i'm thinking a whole Ј1 a month ermmmm maybe a current 10p sweetie ?

anyone else had thoughts along this line?

Best answers:

• Perhaps you should think about when you're going to be able to retire because from the sounds of things you aren't planning to!
• oh no i am planning and doing the best i can ...it may not be as good as most people, but with only earning Ј800 a month it is quite hard
  i'm just thinking about my NEST pension here
• theres nothing left at all from my wages, thankfully my husband earns more than me and covers the bills i can't, but it doesnt allow me much left to save money for retirement.
  in the meantime i am applying for every job that is suitable and hopefully one day my situation will change
• I think new employment s the answer. Where yolou can work a full week, not part time.
  16 quid a month going into your pension isn't enough.
• no it certainly isnt Atush, and i am looking have been for over a year now,
  i do have other money going into a personal pension and i do save a small amount in an i.s.a for early retirement ( i plan on retiring 5 years early .... so that i am retiring at the same time as my husband)
  but all this has only been possible because my husband earns a better wage than me. if i was to rely on my wage alone i would not manage to survive never mind be able to save for pensions
  that was not the reason for my thread though
  it was more a tongue in cheek look at how "great" these pensions can be for people Ј16 a month is not enough to tide a person over when they retire i think i would genuinely get a whole Ј1 a month and that would buy me very very little
  i am sure i am not the only person that finds themselves in this situation either
• well halfing bills with hubby looks something like this
  mortgage Ј278
  council tax Ј110
  gas and electricity Ј70
  food Ј140
  car payments Ј123
  diesel Ј80
  insurances Ј56
  visa's Ј175
  car insurance Ј12.5
  house insurance Ј16 ( we got burgled and our premium went up)
  mobile phone Ј35 a month
  then ofcourse there are the other things i try and contribute to
  pension wise what i am currently trying to do is put 12.5% of my wages ( pre tax) into my personal pension, this doesnt always happen sadly if i have to pay the bills, the only help i get with that is the tax stuff from the government, with the NEST plan my company will only pay 1% no more so i do take whatever money i can from them as although Ј8 a month isnt a lot it is better than what i was getting before
  i know being 40 i should be putting roughly 20% of my wages by but that is just impossible at this stage for me, i am actively seeking a new job so that i can pay more into my pension
  i know for some people Ј800 a month can stretch really far but for myself it doesnt
• Assuming you continued at Ј16 per month growing with inflation for 28 years until state pension age at a real (inflation-adjusted) growth rate of 4% you'd have Ј9768 at the end. Enough for about Ј40 a month if using income drawdown. Or a lump sum of about Ј2442 and monthly income of Ј30.
  If the growth was 5%, about the long term UK stock market rate, it'd be Ј11,468 and Ј48 a month.
  Not huge numbers but not too bad considering your out of pocket cost will only be Ј6.40 a month. If in normal health around half of people would live to get the income for at least 20 years, likely to be more like 25-30 by the time you get there.
  The rules for auto-enrollment are deliberately set up so that those who are on low incomes don't end up paying much in. That's to try to keep the cost from being excessive for them. Seems to apply to you.
  In your case, best to just stick with whatever your employer will pay into NEST and what you have to do to get that and put he rest somewhere else as you're already doing.
  The NEST default investment option is probably bad for you. They may have put you into a low risk option instead of a higher growth one. Best to check and switch if they have done that. Unless you really do want low growth.
• have to admit i didnt know it would be as much as that , it would also only be for 23 years as i plan on retiring early ... and yes for Ј6.40 a month that isnt too bad... fingers crossed that when i get a new job it will be much better... i really sympathy for other people though that may land up with just that per month, and i have no doubt it will take me over the limit for any further government help
  i doubt it if i will live the 25 to 30 years sadly ... probably lucky to last 10 tbh as i have had a mini stroke so far ... so i think that no doubt i will die younger than the average person, but i do understand what you are saying about getting it for the long term
• Well, if you die and it interests you, if you haven't taken pension benefits or if you're using income drawdown, your spouse gets to inherit 100% of your pension pot when you die, without any taxes. So all is not lost, even if you don't get to benefit yourself.
• well atleast he can buy the penny sweeties then lol
  thanks though james its something less to worry about
• i didnt say i did, i said halfing the bills would look like this ... he does pay more which does allow me to put some money into a pension... but if i didnt have the kindve relationship with my husband that i do have things could be very difficult, i also said there are other th ings i contribute to, i spose the best way to understand our financial position is, our money gets pooled into the one pot and we pay all the bills, by the food/diesel etc and save what we can... at the end of the month there is never any more left ever
  dont get me wrong i have no money left at the end of the month, and tbh i really do need more money ( as i have stated several times already) things are very tight for us financially as although my husband earns more than me he doesnt earn an awful lot either, basically enough to help us scrape by, pay the bills and put a very small amount away for my pension and early retirement
  the aim is when i get a better job we can put more by for my pension and early retirement, then when we have five years wages saved for me we will start to save money so that we can both retire earlier month by month ( if that makes sense?)
• but again as previously stated this thread was aimed at a more or less look at what plans like NEST will provide when people retire and what exciting things we could do with the money