← HerMoney with Jean Chatzky
HerMoney with Jean Chatzky
EP 492: Retire Often: How Mini-Retirements Can Boost Your Career and Your Happiness
00:36:32
And how to afford it, even on an average salary.
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- [00:00]
Gillian Johnstrud
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- [01:30]
Jean Chatzky
Hey, everyone. Welcome to Her Money. I'm Jean Chatky. Thank you so much for being with us today. Let me ask you all a question. Have you ever thought about walking away from your job, even just for a little bit, but then stopped yourself because you got bills to pay, You've got a career that you've worked hard for. You're not exactly sure what taking this kind of a break would actually mean for your future. Yeah, if you've done that, this episode is for you. Because today we are diving into a radically freeing idea. What if we didn't retire once at 65 or 68 or 70, 70, but instead took mini retirements throughout our lives? Breaks that are actually intentional, they're planned, they're financially viable, and believe it or not, they can even be career enhancing. My guest this week has not only made it work, she's made it a lifestyle. Gillian Johnstrud is the author of the new book Retire Often How Anyone Can Take Multiple Career Breaks to Unlock adventure, advance Their career and find financial freedom. And she's not Just talking about it. By 40, Jillian and her husband had taken more than a dozen mini retirements while raising six kids. Yeah, that's not a typo. Traveling the world, investing in real estate, living abroad, road tripping in the US and still building meaningful careers. We're going to take a very quick break. Cozy Earth's pajamas and blankets are so soft, so breathable and so cute that you'll start planning your evenings around them. These are not your average loungewear pieces. Their bamboo stretch knit pajamas have a lightweight feel, a beautiful drape, and they actually sleep cooler than cotton, which means you stay at just the right temperature through the night. And here's the best part. Cozy Earth stands behind every product. Their apparel is backed by a lifetime guarantee and their blankets come with a 100 night sleep trial and a 10 year warranty so you can truly rest easy. Go to cozyearth.com and use code HERMONEY at checkout for up to 40% off your new favorite pajama set and blanket. That's cozy earth day.com code hermoney and if you get a post purchase survey, do me a favor. Let them know you heard about Cozy Earth right here. Elevate your downtime with Cozy Earth. You know what doesn't belong in your summer plans? Getting burned by your old wireless bill. While you're planning beach trips, barbecues or long weekends with your girlfriends, your phone plan shouldn't be the thing that's draining your wallet. That's where Mint Mobile comes in. For a limited time, Mint mobile is offering three months of unlimited premium wireless service for just 15 bucks a month. That means you get the coverage and speed you're used to on the nation's largest 5G network. But for way less this year, skip breaking a sweat and breaking the bank. Get this new customer offer and your three month unlimited wireless plan for just 15. 15 bucks a month@mintmobile.com hermoney that's mintmobile.com hermoney upfront payment of $45 required equivalent to $15 a month limited time. New customer offer for first three months only. Speeds may slow above 35 gigabytes on the unlimited plan. Taxes and fees extra. See Mint Mobile for details. We are back. Gillian, welcome.
- [05:29]
Gillian Johnstrud
Thank you so much for having me.
- [05:31]
Jean Chatzky
I want to start with the idea at the heart of your book. Why retire once when you can retire often? Where'd that come from for you?
- [05:43]
Gillian Johnstrud
Yeah, you know, I never thought I would be able to retire early. We didn't go into hiring professions, so that seemed kind of unrealistic. I assumed I would retire at 65 or 70, but there were these other things I really wanted to do, these other goals and dreams that might not fit alongside the nine to five. And I knew I would need time for them. So taking these mini retirements or career breaks or sabbaticals, whatever you want to call them, seemed like the most reasonable solution to that problem, to that goal.
- [06:17]
Jean Chatzky
How is a mini retirement different than just taking time off?
- [06:23]
Gillian Johnstrud
I think depends on the amount of time and the intention. So I describe a mini retirement as a month or longer. So it's not a week. A week should be a vacation. Stepping away from your nine to five and then the third one to focus on something that matters to you. So I think having that meaningfulness and that intention is what separates it from, you know, you might get laid off and it might take you a month to find a new job, but you're kind of like lounging around the house and feeling disturbe and watching Netflix, where mini retirement, you're gonna focus on doing something that matters.
- [06:58]
Jean Chatzky
What is it with the month or longer?
- [07:01]
Gillian Johnstrud
I find that's kind of the minimum effective dose to really unplug, to really be more present and just start to. To relax, to start to mentally disconnect from work. And if you have some burnout, it's about the amount of time you need to really start to kind of get your head above water again. And it's enough time to do something really cool. You can have an amazing adventure or accomplish something significant in a month.
- [07:30]
Jean Chatzky
I can see what you mean. I mean, it takes me, when I go on vacation, I try, if I can, to at least do two weeks because the first week is a bit of a wash. Right. It takes me, takes me that first week to just breathe out all the emails and other things that I'm trying to unthink. And then it takes a little while to just settle into whatever it is you happen to be doing. As I said in the intro, you've taken over a dozen mini retirements with your husband while raising six kids, which sounds logistically really intense. But. But I do want to acknowledge the financial foundation for your family that made this possible. A military pension, rental properties, and investments that helped you become financially independent by the age of 32. For most people listening, that kind of a head start just is not realistic. So can you break down for us how someone without those advantages, someone earning an average salary, still paying student loans, figuring out health insurance that they absolutely have to have, could realistically structure this for themselves?
- [08:48]
Gillian Johnstrud
Yeah, a number of our mini retirements happened before all of that. And a couple of them, like we took two, which allowed us to invest in real estate, which is one of the ways that a mini retirement can have a lot of different functions. It can be on the personal side, time with people you love, recovering from burnout, adventure, but it can be financial. We took a month off and we actually bought the house that we live in now as a rental property. We purchased it, we renovated it, we got it rented in a month and then went back to work. And now that was 10 years ago. It's significantly appreciated. So that month off, while it did have a cost, also was a huge financial advantage and boost for us. But they don't have to be expensive. I did one in my 20s where me and my best friend did a road trip from D.C. to Seattle and back in a month in my green Honda Civic. And like we slept on friends couches and we stayed with family and we camped and we almost got trampled by bison like and it was an amazing trip, but it doesn't have to be super expensive or even. Last year I took a month off in the process of writing this book to study Tango for a month. Because I just started Tango and I was like obsessed with it. I loved it so much, so much. I took a month off just to practice. But I gave myself a thousand dollar budget for the lessons, for the shoes, for the classes and it was so enjoyable. So I don't. You don't necessarily have to spend a lot of money for it to be meaningful.
- [10:22]
Jean Chatzky
You actually put a figure in the sand. You said if you can save an extra six and a half percent, that can fund a lifetime of breaks. Can you walk me through that math?
- [10:36]
Gillian Johnstrud
Yes. So six and a half percent, this is kind of like the most outrageous, idealistic version. And that would equate to taking a month off every other year. So you might end up with 20 mini retirements in your lifetime. So it's a lot. And it's assuming that you get zero compensation or you have no additional income during that month off. Every single month off is entirely unpaid. And the kind of target I encourage people to shoot for with their budget if they just don't know where to start, is 50% of whatever your take home pay is. So if you bring home 5,000amonth, you can spend an extra 2,500 for your mini retirement. If you bring home 10,000amonth, you can Spend an extra 5,000 for your mini retirement because that kind of keeps it tethered to your typical lifestyle. So maybe early in your career you're bringing home 5,000 and your budget's smaller. But maybe later in your career you're bringing home 20,000amonth and you get a $10,000 budget. So your many retirements kind of scale with your income and your lifestyle. But that would cover 6.5%, would cover your full take home pay for that month off, plus your additional 50% for your adventure budget for a month every other year. And I encourage people in the book I talk about, like, find the thing that's high leverage for you for some people, that's earning more money for some people, that's reducing expenses. But that six and a half percent isn't. It's not a huge amount of money. If you're bringing home five, six thousand, we're talking about three or four hundred bucks a month. And this isn't so you can, you know, pay your water bill when you're 70. This is for something that's going to happen really soon. So you might be like, okay, so I'm going to trade like my Chipotle burrito bowl that I have every Friday at lunch because next year I'm going to be eating street tacos in Mexico. Like, I'm not depriving myself, I'm just pushing that kind of luxury. I want slightly in the future and hopefully a massive upgrade.
- [12:47]
Jean Chatzky
And so you're doing this, Putting aside this six and a half percent fund while you're saving for your 401k, while you're paying your rent, while you're doing, while you're doing all of those other things. You've laid out a couple of sample budgets here for people at different stages of their careers. Could you take us through one with an example or two of what it might cover?
- [13:16]
Gillian Johnstrud
Yeah. So this is kind of maybe the most you would want to spend. And I always want to encourage people if you want to do something more affordable. There's a lot of ways to kind of hack this. So I'll use an example. My family and I, last year or two years ago did a road trip from Montana down to Florida and back. And we did Disney and we did Washington D.C. and kind of the whole thing. But we rented our house out because we were going to be gone for six months. We rented our house out while we traveled. And we realized that it actually costs us about the same amount to travel basically full time as it does to live at home. So that additional 50%, we actually, other than our tickets to Disney, which did not fall into that Disney tickets were Definitely separate. Our costs were about the same. And this is possible even if you're renting a place, but you want to go to Italy for a month to do a cooking class, you could sublet your house, you could Airbnb your place for a month to offset that cost. So I think finding the budget that works for you. And in the book I encourage, if you've got a bucket list of 20 different things, start with the more affordable ones, front load the affordable experiences now, so that as your financial freedom grows, you can afford the more expensive ones. And there is a little bit of a correlation. Sometimes the younger we are, the adventures that might sound interesting and palatable at 45 might sound less interesting at 70. So you kind of get the advantage of doing maybe the more rugged or adventurous things that might be more affordable when you have less disposable income and saving. You know, you can save the around the world Cruise when you're 75. Like 75 year olds love to go cruising.
- [15:07]
Jean Chatzky
I'm not couch surfing in my 70s. I'm just, I'm just saying. Let's talk about the tactical process of saving this money. Do you recommend a separate account? Do you recommend a sinking fund? How saving is hard for people. I mean, we have lots of things, including that Chipotle bowl that we want every Friday that are just calling to us on a regular basis. So how do you, how do you make sure that the savings goal actually gets satisfied?
- [15:41]
Gillian Johnstrud
Yeah. So once you've kind of picked what that meaningful thing that you're going to do is, and for a lot of people, it is travel, but it can be something at home. One year I built a food forest in my backyard and just landscapes.
- [15:54]
Jean Chatzky
You built a what?
- [15:55]
Gillian Johnstrud
A food forest. It's like a massive garden, except perennials that make food. So. So like fruit trees and fruit bushes and herbs and strawberries and it's a jungle back there. My kids love it because I've got all these, I've got like a million kids, so I just send them out and say, go eat your snacks. Like all the snacks are in the backyard, but you can do stuff at home. So what I encourage people to do, after you pick this kind of adventure, whatever that is, come up with the almost like an a la carte price list. What are all the different components going to cost? What if you're going to go to live in France for a month? What are my airline tickets? What's my Airbnb? How much does it cost to go to the Louvre? Just make a little Google sheet. If you're kind of geeky like me. But the advantage is that as you're making those choices, like, maybe it's a big choice. I want to do this forever. And you're looking at buying a new car. And you're like, do I do the $600 car payment or do I go cheaper and do the $400 car payment? You're like, oh, shoot, that 200 bucks a month. Like, that would get me a lot closer if I only need to save 400amonth. Like, that one choice makes this mini retirement thing really possible. But maybe it's smaller choices. Like, you're like, I could do dog sitting. That would bring in 300 bucks. But then you look at this price list and you're like, oh, man, 300, that's. That's a lot of street tacos. I can buy a lot of street tacos for 300 bucks. And so transferring that money, I think into a high yield savings account, into a separate account, but you can kind of cross it off of this price list because you're not just saving, okay, I need $4,000 for this goal, or I need $6,000. You're saying, okay, if I don't go out for drinks tonight, I save that $30. Actually, that $30 buys a really nice lunch in Paris. Maybe instead of this thing, I want that thing. And you just kind of mentally, yeah, I'm going to skip this. But I'm not depriving myself. I'm just choosing the thing I want more, which is the lunch in Paris.
- [17:59]
Jean Chatzky
We're going to take a very quick break. Jillian. When we come back, I want to talk a little bit more about your rental properties, because I know my audience is obsessed with how that whole thing works. Also how you manage to do this with six children when a lot of people are thinking even having one at this point is way too expensive. And how to hold onto your job while you're taking these mini retirements. We'll be right back. I've had term life insurance since my kids were little. It was one of those decisions I made early on. Not because I wanted to think about those worst case scenarios, but I wanted to know they'd be protected no matter what. Fabric by Gerber Life is term life insurance you can get done today made for busy parents like you. It's all online, on your own schedule and can be done right from your couch. You could be covered in under 10 minutes with no health exam required. Fabric's policies are flexible, high quality, and affordable. We're talking a million dollars in coverage for less than a dollar a day. Join the thousands of parents who trust fabric to help protect their families. Apply today in just minutes@meetfabric.com hermoney that's meetfabric.com hermoney M E E T fabric.com hermoney Policies issued by Western Southern Life Assurance Company not available in certain states. Prices subject to underwriting and health questions. Here's something scary but true. The average adult unknowingly consumes over 150,000 plastic particles every year. And over 70% of the cookware sold in the US is still coated in PTFE. That's the same toxic chemical used in traditional non stick pans. Caraway is on a mission to make cookware safer and way more stylish. I've been using my caraway set on repeat. I gotta say, everything moves around the pan so much easier than in traditional cookware. And it's so beautiful that I don't mind just leaving it sit right on top of my stove. It Caraway's cookware set is a favorite for a reason. It can save you up to $190 versus buying the items individually. Plus, if you visit carawayhome.comhermoney you can take an additional 10% off your next purchase. This deal is exclusively for our listeners, so visit carawayhome.com hermoney or use code hermoney at checkout. Caraway Non Toxic Cookware Made Modern we are back. We're talking with Gillian John Srud, who has written a great new book called Retire Often How Anyone Can Take Multiple Career Breaks to Unlock adventure, advance Their career and Find Financial freedom. So rental properties. Gillian, I know that a lot of people are curious how, how did you get started with this? Do you think it's still possible in this real estate market to get started with this? How much money do you need to get going? And the idea that you renovated a house in a month to me is astonishing. So talk about that too.
- [21:27]
Gillian Johnstrud
Yeah. So I, I know a lot of people who do real estate and I won't claim to be the real estate expert by any means. There, there are smarter people than me on this topic, but I know a lot of people who are still buying properties and still making money. Like with anything, I think you have to know your market and you have to research it and you have to know your numbers. For us, the role that many retirements played was it was something I had been really interested in. You know, I'd read all the books, I'd Been thinking about it and researching it for a long time, but it's really tough. At least for us with all of our kids, it was really tough to do alongside nine to five jobs and all of our family commitments, because you can do a lot of stuff. You can read the books and research and maybe go to some open houses. But when it comes to that big push of we're going to buy the property and all the loan signing and all of those things and do any renovations that you need to do to get it up to speed and find renters, it is a big time commitment. And if you have to, if you have to hire all of that out for some people, then the numbers don't work. There's not enough margin to do that. So just even having for us a month to finish all of that up and to give it, we had eight, ten hours a day that we could get through all of those logistics made it. It was the difference between doing that and not doing it. And for context, we only bought two rentals, which isn't. It's not like we were building a whole empire. But they both. Cash flowed well enough that it made a significant difference. At first they were $1,000 a month, and then eventually $1,500 a month. After all expenses, cash flow, which isn't $10,000 a month, you know, it's not enough to live on. But in the context of mini retirements, $1,000 a month, that means every year you have an extra $12,000 to take many retirements, which is an enormous budget. And so sometimes it can feel like, gosh, that's a lot of hassle for like 400 bucks a month or a thousand dollars a month, whether it's a side hustle or real estate. But if you think of how much that is over two years, and you want to take a month long mini retirement every two years, that 500 bucks a month, well, that's $12,000 every two years. That's an enormous budget. And that could fully fund this kind of different, this different lifestyle where you get to have these small breaks and you don't have to save everything until you're 65 or 70.
- [24:05]
Jean Chatzky
If you are in a job right now, I would say that with this labor market starting to waver, chances are pretty good you may want to hold onto that job. I want to ask you two different questions here. The first is how can you take a mini retirement if you're afraid about being laid off? And the second is, if you're laid off, can you turn that Into a mini retirement?
- [24:34]
Gillian Johnstrud
Yes, yes to both. So if you're worried about being laid off, I always encourage people, if you like your job, if you want to keep your job, negotiate this offer that is your first step is just to try to negotiate a month off. Which I know can sound kind of scary and unusual to like, yeah, that's not really my company. Like they don't really do that. They don't have that program. It's not something they typically offer. But I have found people have tremendous success if you put a little bit of thought and effort into those conversations. So I always encourage people first, you have to kind of craft that mini retirement story. How are you going to present the idea and if possible, to include these four elements. One, make it positive, don't make it a negative thing. I'm so tired of y'. All, I can't look at your guys faces for a minute longer. Like, make it a positive thing. Pick something that's interesting. Not just like, oh, I want to go home. Like, I want to watch Netflix. I just need to chill out, do something interesting. Ideally make it specific. So instead of I just want more time with my kids, pick a specific, specific thing that you're going to do with your kids. I did a 10 week road trip to 10 national parks with my kiddos in a pop up camper. It's a very specific thing. And then ideally the fourth thing is make it something that's a one time event, something that's not. Like this is something I'm going to do every year. But it's maybe it's around an anniversary or a birthday or a specific kind of activity. Like you're going to hike the Camino that takes a month. But most people don't hike the Camino every year. It's kind of a once in a lifetime thing. So when you put all of these together, you might say, let's say you go to your employer and you're like, hey, so my mom is set to turn 60 this year and her and my dad had always planned to take a month off to bike through Croatia when they turn 60 and retired. But as you might know, my dad passed away a couple years ago. I would really love to be able to do this trip with her. You know, she's still young and healthy and it would mean so much and it would be a great bonding experience. Like we don't have that much time together. I've got a week of pto. I would need another three weeks. I could take those unpaid, but I would love to be Able to go do this just once in a lifetime experience. And when you frame that story, it has all four elements. And then the other thing you bring is what are the challenges? Like, you have to do kind of the mental logistical work. What are the challenges of you leaving? This cannot be your boss's problem. They have a big enough job, right?
- [27:01]
Jean Chatzky
Absolutely.
- [27:02]
Gillian Johnstrud
So think through all of the challenges, come up with a lot of solutions, and then the trick is articulate those challenges to your boss. They might be hesitant to say those things out loud, but until we can acknowledge the challenges, you can't really get to the solutions. So you've presented this very compelling thing you want to do. They don't want to, like, burst your bubble and crush your dream. So say, I know you might be concerned about this, or I know this might be a factor. I know this might be a challenge. But whatever you think they're thinking, say it out loud for them. Take on kind of that emotional labor. Say it out loud for them so that you can start this collaborative and creative process for figuring out the solutions together.
- [27:49]
Jean Chatzky
I love the specificity of all of that because as a boss, that's exactly where my mind goes. Right. Somebody wants to go for a month. My mind is, well, we've got eight newsletters over that month and another eight podcasts. And how are we going to get all of those things done? And I like that you're willing to put that on the table and help me come to a solution to. To figure that out. One of the things that. One of the promises that the book makes is that this actually could be good for your career. How as a boss, I don't necessarily think that the person honestly who wants to take a month off is the promoting next.
- [28:35]
Gillian Johnstrud
Yeah, so there's a few different. A few different ways. So if we talk first about taking a month off from your current employer, there is a reality of burnout, that it reduces our motivation, it reduces our creativity, it reduces, like, that extra advantage. And I kind of compare it to, especially in some professions where being the best really matters, like, being average isn't going to help you out. The best disproportionately win at something. And so I kind of compare it to running a race. If you're running like the 400 meter dash, if you could do something for a month that made you 10% faster than everyone, you don't win 10% more races. If you're 10% faster than ever one, you win all the races. And in some professions, it matters. Winning all the races matters. And so there's that element of you come back better. There's another element, especially for, I think, disproportionately for women, when they juggle a lot personally, they don't have as much time and bandwidth for extra education, for certifications, for training to do that alongside their job, alongside all their family commitments. And so taking a month off really can help you focus on these other things that are going to make you more even to your peers when you return. All those things that maybe some of your other coworkers can do that training year that can go to that conference, you can create a little bit more equality in your qualifications in that. And then the third thing is often in between. If you decide to separate from your employer in between jobs, for most people, your largest chance, your largest ability to get a significant raise or a significant promotion is by switching employers. So if you kind of bake that into your career plan, okay, every three years, every five years, I'm going to switch employers because I'm going to try to level up and just be intentional about taking a month off, three months off, four months off. In between these jobs is a mini retirement. You might end up coming back to a much better job. I had a friend who took a year off, and he came back and he got a 50% raise, which is amazing. And you're like, that's so cool. And I'm like, mm, that's not cool. Because the reason he got a 50% raise is he had been his last employer for 15 years. So he had been underpaid for a long time, and he left a lot of money on the table. Because I'm a little bit of a money nerd. Like, if we assume he was making 100,000 and he came back at 150, maybe for eight of those years he had been underpaid. That's $400,000. And even if his mini retirement cost him 100,000 because he took a whole year off, that's $300,000. And at 40, if he could have invested an extra $300,000, shoot, by the time he's 70, what's that, like, a million dollars? He was a million dollars poorer because he didn't take that time off earlier. So it can have a massive impact on your lifetime earning potential.
- [31:56]
Jean Chatzky
Last question. Six kids.
- [31:58]
Gillian Johnstrud
Yeah.
- [31:59]
Jean Chatzky
How do you do this with six kids?
- [32:01]
Gillian Johnstrud
It is so logistically hard. I mean, many retirements are. And it takes planning and it takes effort, and you have to budget. We had to homeschool, we traveled with them, and so we had to Figure that out and they do public school the rest of the time. It's so much logistics. It's a little bit like spring cleaning your house. You gotta pull all this stuff out and it's a little bit messier before it becomes more organized. But the reality is in the rearview mirror. I remember before we left for that 10 week road trip to 10 national parks the week. I think most moms feel this. Like the few days before vacation are like the worst days. It's so much preparation and it's so much work and you're responsible to finish up so many things. If you're leaving for 10 weeks, it is not easier than leaving for like five days. And I was just like, oh my gosh, what have we gotten ourselves into? This is so much work. Because we're also renting out our house. It all has to be clean. But the reality is with these kinds of experiences in the rear view mirror, all of that hassle gets smaller and smaller and smaller and sometimes you forget that you even felt stressed. But the meaningfulness of that experience. God, when I think about that trip, my kiddos are all, they were all itsy bitsy then. They were like 2 and 5 and 7 and 9 and now they're all teenagers. Like my old is about to turn 18, he's 6 foot. Like they're all big and, and I love them, but it's just so different. And I look back at that and I just, I feel so much nostalgia for that trip. And we were hiking in Yosemite and the Grand Canyon and all of these beautiful places. The further away you get, the more meaningful that gets, the more precious that get that gets. And I've even had people on my podcast totally gaslight me because sometimes these are my one on one coaching clients. So I was there. I heard before their mini retirement that they were nervous, I heard their fears, I heard their stre. And then three years later, they come on my podcast and I'm like, so is there anything like you were nervous about? And they're like, no, no, it was really simple. I felt really good about it. And I'm like, liars, liars. I was there. I have the notes, I have the receipts. You had concerns. But three years later they're like, no, it was amazing. It was pretty easy. I felt great about it.
- [34:21]
Jean Chatzky
On this podcast, we've got an audience of people that I think are thinking about their real retirement, their final retirement. What are the big lessons that you take from these mini retirements that help you prep for that inevitable retirement at Some point in your life.
- [34:44]
Gillian Johnstrud
Yeah. Mini retirements are a fantastic preview test run of retirement. You get to not only experience the benefits of retirement, but you get to kind of work out the kinks. Because sometimes that transition into retirement isn't smooth. It can be a little bumpy. But the more you've practiced, the easier it gets. And I've known a lot of people who retired early. And it's always funny when people are planning on retiring early, because I'll say, hey, have you thought about doing a mini retirement? They're like, no, no, no, no. I'm just gonna. I'm gonna work super hard. I'm gonna, like, push through. I've got, like, five more years, and then I'm gonna retire forever. And to me, it sounds a little bit like someone saying, I really want to run a marathon. I'm super excited about running a marathon. And you're like, so have you ever done, like a 5K? And they're like, no, no, no. I'm gonna sit at my desk, I'm gonna work hours a week. But I've listened to some podcasts about running marathons, and I've read a couple books about running marathons, so it's gonna be awesome. I'm gonna be so good at running marathons. It's gonna be the best thing ever. And you're like, you don't wanna try just a little bit? Do a little test run. You can work out some of those kinks. You know, I'll. I'll have people be like, well, I find so much purpose and so much identity in my work. And I'm like, that's amazing. But if you're gonna retire eventually, should we practice, like, building out some purpose and meaning outside of work, or. They're like, I'm terrified to draw down my retirement accounts. And I'm like, yeah, valid. But if you're gonna do that for 40 years straight, should we practice doing that a little bit? Should we practice maybe that discomfort of not earning money, of not investing just for a month and see how you feel so you can kind of work through that so that when you do retire, it's just such an easy transition? Because you've kind of been doing this all along. You've had so many test runs. You figured out your hobbies, you figured out your routine, you figured out how to not fight with your spouse because they're, like, constantly in your space. Like, you worked out the kinks.
- [36:44]
Jean Chatzky
Gillian, you've given me a lot to think about as someone who has never taken a mini retirement other than maternity leave, which I've got to tell you, does not count. So as you know, as you know.
- [36:58]
Gillian Johnstrud
It does not count, but not restful.
- [37:00]
Jean Chatzky
Exactly. Exactly. I think it's a fascinating concept and I do think that the idea of practicing before you actually retire for a number of reasons sounds like a really, really good idea. Thanks so much for being on today.
- [37:16]
Gillian Johnstrud
Thanks so much for having me.
- [37:18]
Jean Chatzky
Absolutely. If you love today's episode, please take a moment to leave us a five star review on Apple Podcast. Your feedback means the world to me. And if you're ready to keep the money conversation going, HerMoney has three amazing programs design designed to help you feel more confident and in control of your money. There's Finance Fix. It's our four week coaching program that helps you rethink your spending, find hidden savings, and make smarter choices for the future. Our Pre Retirement program runs for six weeks and walks you through building a retirement strategy that's personalized for your next chapter. Finally, there's Investing Fix, our investing club for women. It meets every other week on Zoom. It is a supportive space to learn, ask questions, grow your investing confidence and build your portfolio. And your first month is absolutely free. These programs are truly helping level the playing field for women financially. I'd love for you to join us. Her Money is produced by Hayley Pascalides and our music is provided by Video Helper. Thanks so much for listening and we'll talk soon.
- [38:40]
Gillian Johnstrud
The average career in the US spans 40 years, but real estate investing can cut that timeline to just 15. I'm Dave Meyer, host of the Biggerpockets Real Estate Podcast and I transformed my financial future through rental properties and so have thousands of others in our community. Every week we bring you real investors sharing real strategies with real results so you can build wealth, buy back your time, and even retire early. Don't miss the latest real estate insights and advice. Watch, listen and subscribe by searching for the BiggerPockets real estate podcast on your favorite podcast platform and on YouTube.