Those retirement articles are ridiculous. Everyone’s situation is different. My husband just retired and we can absolutely live off his Social Security payments since they’re just shy of $4,000 a month. (He was a high earner.) We also put aside $10,000 in an emergency fund. This is only because we paid off our mortgage and all of our other debts before he retired. We have only one car.

When I begin collecting my spousal benefit next year, we’ll have a lot more money for fun. If the 2008 financial disaster had not hit us so hard that we depleted our 401ks, penalties and all, just to survive, we’d be living large. As it is, between our home and retirement accounts, we are at just about a million net worth.

We sold our home in California for over four times what we paid for it and moved to Pennsylvania where we got a better house with a bigger lot for less than we paid for the house in California in 1988. We were somewhat smart and very lucky. If we had refused to relocate, or sold at the wrong time, we’d be in a terrible financial hole.

We feel fairly secure but are keeping an eye on things. Luckily, we travelled the world throughout our lives and did many of the things people wait until they are retired to do so we don’t feel bad about not retiring to an oceanfront villa. I hate using sunscreen anyway.