Is Semi-Retirement the Best of Both Worlds? – Liz Weston

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To retire or to work longer? There’s another option that may be just right for you – semi-retirement. We catch up with Liz Weston, who retired from NerdWallet earlier this year on how its working for her – and what you can learn from her experience.

Liz Weston joins us from California.

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Bio

Liz Weston is an award-winning personal finance columnist, speaker, commentator and author of several books about money. She earned the Certified Financial Planner® designation in 2016. Her question-and-answer column “Money Talk” appears in newspapers throughout the country, including the Los Angeles Times, the San Diego Union-Tribune, Palm Beach Post and the Oregonian.

Liz Weston’s book “Your Credit Score” is a national best-seller now in its fifth edition. The New York Times called one of her other books, “The 10 Commandments of Money: Survive and Thrive in the New Economy,” a “wonderful basic personal finance book…supportive of people struggling to understand these topics and trying to make ends meet.”

You may have heard Liz Weston on public radio as she’s contributed to American Public Media’s “Marketplace Money,” and NPR’s “Talk of the Nation” and “All Things Considered.” She’s appeared on “Dr. Phil,” “Today Show” and NBC Nightly News, and was for several years a weekly commentator on CNBC’s “Power Lunch.”

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For More on Liz Weston

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On Deciding to Retire…and Joy

“I think what surprised me the most is how fun this is. That was what I was really worried about – what would retirement be like? So many people are rushing towards it, and they don’t really think about what life will be like afterwards. And I was thinking a lot about how I would spend my time, what I would do, what the challenges might be, and what’s caught me by surprise is just this feeling of joy. I feel like a kid on the first day of summer vacation, and I know this won’t last. Everything changes. This is kind of the honeymoon period, but yeah, it’s really fun.Well, I’m incredibly blessed and lucky that the financial stuff was in place. It was taken care of, and it allowed me to retire a little bit earlier than the norm. But again, the other thing that surprised me was how hard that decision was to make, because I really loved what I did…And then a friend and former colleague of mine died in a car accident. And he was only 61 and we’d spent a lot of time talking about what we were going to do in retirement. And it brought home the fact that we don’t have infinite time.”

On Semi-Retirement – and Off-Ramps

“I think it’s the best option, especially, if you like what you do, and you have skills that can continue on in retirement where you don’t need to work full-time. I had really wanted an off-ramp from my job at NerdWallet, and they didn’t support working part-time. So that was kind of a difficult thing to wrap my head around and realize, okay, I don’t have this option, so this was the next best. A lot of companies, though, do have some kind of off-ramp, and I think it helps people a lot because you keep your foot in the workplace, you can have continuing, you know, because social interaction is so important, you can have that part of your identity still remain intact so you have that sense of purpose. You’re making some money, which for a lot of people is really important to make their money last, but you’re starting the process of exiting. And just as a rant on the side, if somebody listening to this is part of a company and has decision-making power, please think about it. This because you’ve got a lot of talent sitting there that’s on its way out the door that might have a lot of institutional knowledge. You might be able to squeeze a few more years out of them if you give them that option where they can just slowly ratchet down their work commitment. If you can offer benefits even better that’s another big stumbling block for those who are looking at early retirement. But you know there’s a lot of us out there with a lot to give and we’d like to stay on a little bit longer. If you offer that option I think they will really take advantage of it. I think a lot of companies would find that out if they experimented with this option.”

On Purpose & Community

“And there was also a learning curve or training period that had to be gone through. So taking a look at that thinking about the options before you retire is really important – thinking about your sense of purpose, how you’ll get that. But you don’t develop relationships overnight. So it’s important if you don’t have a lot of friends or all your friends will still be working to start building those opportunities to meet more people, and it doesn’t have to be these, you know, incredibly intense friendships that you develop all over the place. So just you know doing things that you enjoy that other people enjoy can be a way to have those little interactions throughout the day that can make you feel more attuned and more connected to your community.”

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I help people who are retiring, but aren’t quite done yet, discover what’s next and build their custom version of their next life. A meaningful retirement doesn’t just happen by accident.

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About Your Podcast Host

Joe Casey is an executive coach who also helps people design their next life after their primary career and create their version of The Multipurpose Retirement.™ He created his own next chapter after a twenty-six-year career at Merrill Lynch, where he was Senior Vice President and Head of HR for Global Markets & Investment Banking. Today, in addition to his work with clients, Joe hosts The Retirement Wisdom Podcast, which thanks to his guests and loyal listeners, ranks in the top 1 % globally in popularity by Listen Notes, with over 1.5 million downloads. Business Insider has recognized Joe as one of 23 innovative coaches who are making a difference. He’s the author of Win the Retirement Game: How to Outsmart the 9 Forces Trying to Steal Your Joy.