Retirement Realities: Extra Time

Freshly minted retirees frequently complain about having too much time on their hands! We discuss what to do with that extra time with newly retired Mark Oberlin. 

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Many retirees that complain about having too much time on
their hands, maybe getting bored.

Speaker 2 (00:06):
I don't know.

Speaker 1 (00:06):
Man, as you're gearing up to head into the office,
sometimes that's the last thing on your mind, but the
first thing that happens once you finally do. This is
West Michigan's Morning News Stee Kelly and Brett Keita. We're
calling it Retiree Realities and retirement Realities. Mark Oberlin joins
us on the liveline this morning in retirement in Maine

(00:28):
this morning, Mark, thanks for doing this today.

Speaker 2 (00:31):
Always a player, So how is it even possible?

Speaker 1 (00:36):
Do they just not anticipate what's going to happen once
they retire?

Speaker 2 (00:41):
Well, you know, certainly doesn't apply to everybody. You know,
I tell people it takes me twice as long to
get nothing done. But certainly think about this, you know,
Bread especially think about this as a football game. Yeah,
you know that when you're working, you've got a three
to four hour sporting event with really only sixty minutes
of game time and what is it eighteen minutes of playtime? Yeah,

(01:03):
so think about your workday. You know, you got eight
hour work day, you got eight hours of sleep, you
got drive time. Maybe it takes an hour to get
ready in the morning, guys ten minutes. But either way,
you think about how much time's left in the day
for you, and it's like four hours and you're so
dog on tired from everything else going on. You just
sit on the couch and watch TV and you know,

(01:23):
crap out. But when you retire, it's essentially twenty four hours,
seven days a week of unscripted time. You know, you
take away sleep time and eat time, but bottom line,
you get to like twelve hours of free time. And
a lot of people are just saying, yeah, I don't
know what to do with myself. First couple of weeks
were great. Now on board as hell, you know. That's

(01:45):
that's kind of what I hear a lot.

Speaker 3 (01:47):
You know, Mark, It's interesting different cultures, like we always
refer to because we talk about napping, you know, Spain
has nap time with the CSTA and everything. But different
cultures attack things differently. And you've got a Japanese word
you've shared with this not going to try to pronounce.
I'll leave that up to you. But how does it
apply to fulfilling retirement?

Speaker 2 (02:06):
Well, let me tell you the experience. First of all,
nap time is very important. But the piki guy is
a Japanese word that means basically discovering your purpose in life.
So you know, when you're working, your purpose in life
was basically feeding your family, putting a roof over your head,
you know, that kind of simple stuff. But now you've
got all this free time, you know, try to find

(02:26):
something that aligns with your strengths, your passions and needs
of the world. You know, give give things to other people.
You know, maybe you've been as fortunate as I have.
I've got, you know, relatively good health. You know, I've
got finances, But now I've got time to give back.
And that's that's really what I think more people should
focus on, is doing something for others.

Speaker 1 (02:49):
I remember my father in law, he was just not
thrilled with where he lived, and when he retired there
they went south in it just opened up a whole
new world for him of three four season sports and
he was just thrilled about that, and that really gave
him a little extra something in retirement. So if you're

(03:11):
one of those people, how do you discover what that is?
If you don't know what it is already.

Speaker 2 (03:15):
Sometimes it's just trying a bunch of new things. I
always tell people, you know, if you don't know what
you want to do, necessarily start off by donating blood.
Give us something of yourself. You know, when I was
in the working situation, I had maybe time enough to
donate a single red. Well maybe now you can do
double reds or two hours it takes to give platelets.

(03:38):
So I found the time to do that because I
never had a time before. You know, I volunteer at
a couple of places around town. I have a part
time job. I do pick a ball, you know, do
all the sports stuff. But you know, think outside the box.
A lot of a friend of mine is thinking about retirement.
He loves wine, he's a wine expert. I said, why
don't you go work for a local wine shop and

(04:00):
represents some Napa Valley vineyards. I mean, they would love
to have somebody like you on the ground promoting your product.
So it's all sorts of crazy things that you never
thought you could do. And a lot of these volunteer
organizations like Kids Food Basket, they just need people to
show up and pack food in bags for underprivileged kids.
Absolutely couldn't get their arms around.

Speaker 3 (04:21):
That, right, absolutely, Mark, Sorry to cut you off.

Speaker 2 (04:23):
There.

Speaker 3 (04:23):
One thing too, I want to recommend and see what
you think of this, is do something on your bucket
list maybe in that first year of retirement, just to
enjoy yourself. I'll never forget. My dad grew up and
he was a farm kid, right, and he always had
a horse and everything, and so we got him he
could actually go over to Rothbury and they did this.
He did a cattle drive, oh wow, and he loved it.

(04:45):
It was one of those things that we got him
as a gift. But you know, just hey, enjoy retirement, right,
that's what you worked hard for.

Speaker 2 (04:52):
Well, that's the one thing about retirement planning. It's not linear.
So we've always taught clients you can take out four
to five percent of your portfolio and spend that safely. Well,
in reality, the first few years of retirement, it's probably
going to be more like six to seven percent of
your portfolio because you're doing all that crazy traveling. You know.
We try to take a couple of big trips a

(05:13):
year because there will be a day when you can't.
One of you will come down with some illness, or
you blow out your knee or you know, pick pick
your malady. But At some point in time you might say, hey,
we had a good run, man, didn't we We spent
all these great trips and now we can't, and so
there's no remorse, there's no lid of good at kind
of moments.

Speaker 1 (05:33):
That is Mark Oberlin. We're calling it retirement realities. Great
stuff is always enjoy your time out east.

Speaker 2 (05:40):
Thanks man, Thank you.