How wealthy do you 'feel'?

[awright101]

Yeah a lot of this puts life into stark context. My father (RIP) had several high paying jobs (his boss was Dick Cheney at one point), nice lifestyle lost to 2 messy divorces, built it back up again with private businesses, sacrificed all spare time into generating a high income to enjoy in retirement and foregoed luxuries in the mean time. Retired at 62 with a hefty amount for his retirement. Was struck down with colon cancer and died 4 months later. Life is a f*cker like that so it made me plan for the future but also not go without and sacrifice in the mean time as life can be an absolute barsteward. So if I want that new Tudor, well as long as I'm not getting into debt for it I'll get it today. Because I may get hit by a bus tomorrow. And actually if I get into a bit of debt for it that's fine because I can pay that back or worst case sell it.

I plough all savings into a pension as I don't trust myself not to rinse out an ISA. But I do have a property, my wife has a property and land in Thailand and my thoughts on retirement are to treat it as a (hopefully) long holiday

I agree. It’s finding that balance. I lost mum and dad at an early age and always try and live for today whilst not going bonkers.