Personal Finance

At what age do you plan to retire and why?

Christy Bieber

Published: January 17, 2025 1:03 pm

When do you plan to retire? This is a question everyone should answer, and ideally sooner rather than later because you’ll need to set your retirement planning goals based on your target exit date. 

A Reddit threat posted this question recently, and it’s helpful to look at the answers provided to see how others make their choices. It’s also important to remember, though, that you may not get to retire at your preferred age so you’ll need to be prepared if you end up having to leave work sooner than you’d hoped.

Here’s when Redditors plan to retire 

There were many different responses to the Reddit thread, with some people saying they intended to leave work in their mid-5os or even in their late 40s and others indicating they had worked until their 70s or planned to do so. 

There were a few common trends, though:

• A number of people said they would retire once their pension kicked in or once they could start making penalty-free withdrawals from tax-advantaged retirement accounts at age 59 1/2.
• Several said they would retire at 65 when they became eligible for Medicare.
• Those who retired early said they left when they became financially independent — which was a goal they’d worked towards throughout their career by being frugal and saving aggressively.
• Many noted that they retired at a more traditional age in their 60s but that they had younger spouses who were planning to quit in their late 50s

Many of the posters were guided by either their financial readiness, their concerns about enjoying their healthy years, or both. And, all of these are very valid reasons to pick a particular retirement age. 

While you may hope to work for a long time, you should plan for early retirement

As you set your retirement goals, it’s interesting to look at what other people are planning and why. This can help you get an idea of when your own ideal retirement date is. However, no matter when you actually want to retire, you should prepare to leave the workforce at a pretty young age.

See, the TransAmerica Center for Retirement Research found that 58% of current retirees had to leave their jobs sooner than planned. This departure was driven by factors outside their control, including health problems, family needs, or a lack of employment opportunities. TransAmerica also found that the median retirement age was 62, even though 49% of non-retired workers said they planned to quit after age 65. 

If you haven’t prepared for the possibility of retiring early, leaving work ahead of schedule could be a disaster. It could leave you with far too little income if you claim  Social Security sooner than planned and shrink your benefit. Plus, you can’t save for as many years as you thought so our nest egg will be smaller. 

By saving as if you’re going to leave work at 62, you open the door for yourself to do so if you need or want to. You can always stay longer to end up with extra money but you don’t want to bet your financial security on working until you’re 68 or 70 only to find out too late that isn’t possible. 

Since many of the Redditors said that enjoying life while in good health was a major goal, being ready to retire at 62 can also help ensure that you have some years of retirement when you can really enjoy life before the inevitable issues of old age begin to creep in.