Expat in South East Asia

[Aus_E_Expat]

I came across this website and enjoyed a lot of the comments etc in the Forum and the main site so I thought I would join.
Some people may think I no longer qualify for ERE but with retirement ages going up and many more people of my generation likely to have to work well past 65 years of age, I think I may well qualify.
So, some background about myself;

Personal
I am about to turn 55 years old (which is when I thought I would retire but now unsure).
I am married, my wife is 50.
I have 2 children, both of whom I am fully supporting (one is at university and the other has another 4 years of high school to go).
I am an Australian but I have not lived in Australia for the past 26 years. I am currently living and working in South East Asia.
Due to my family situation (children is university and school), my wife and children live in Australia and I live alone in South East Asia. I spend about 10 days a month in Australia with my family and 20 days back in the office (although I have a home office and work whenever I am in Australia).

Work
I am basically self employed as a consultant so I do get to chose how much I work – but generally that means never saying “No” to a client who wants me to do some work. As a result, I generally work about 70 hours a week (12 hours a day, Monday to Friday in the office and about 5 hours a day from my apartment on Saturday and Sundays).
I used to really enjoy my work – but cannot say that any longer. I feel a bit trapped by work and do not know how to get free of it.

Income
I have been earning about US$500,000 per year for the past 4 years after tax. This year will be down a bit – mainly due to some increased overheads etc.

Assets
My wife and I have a reasonably large house in Australia, close to the city centre.
I have a large apartment where I live when I am working.
We also have an investment property in Australia worth about US$800,000.
We some other investment property worth about US$400,000.
I have a superannuation (retirement) fund of about US$2,000,000 plus some other shares and funds of about US$700,000.
We have cash in the bank of about US$1,400,000 (now largely earning nothing as interest rates have crashed).
We have no mortgages on any of our properties and no debt apart from monthly credit card bills of about US$2,500.


I know it sounds like we are well off but I do not feel well off – I still feel quite financially insecure and feel I need to keep working in case everything turns sour.
As I mentioned, I have 2 children I am still supporting and see no end in sight in paying private school fees and university fees.
We are not big spenders – we are not frugal but most of our spending is modest.

I guess my big issues are;
1. How to feel confident enough to break free of work and relax – if I don’t, my current lifestyle will probably destroy my marriage or kill me (or both);
2. What do I do with myself if I am not working? I had a day off last weekend and was crawling up the wall with boredom (I play tennis twice a week but otherwise really have no hobbies – I try to avoid the usual expat hobby of drinking myself stupid every weekend).
I would be interested in any thoughts or comments – even if you tell me I am stupid and should not worry.

[theanimal]

Welcome. If you tell us your annual spending it'll be easier to analyze.

[GandK]

Welcome!

[Aus_E_Expat]

Spending habits - probably easiest to outline what I expect would be my spending habits over the next 4 years if I was not working. Following amounts are annual

Children's education - School fees etc - $30,000 .
Medical insurance - $4,000
House insurance - $2,000
Car Insurance - $2,000
Groceries, food etc - $17,000
Electricity - $3,000
Telephones & internet - $5,000
Car running expenses (2 cars) - $8,000
Travel - $25,000
House repairs etc - $8,000
Clothing etc - $4,000

So it comes it just over $100,000 per year.

I know I could put my daughter in a government school and save $20,000 and not travel and save $25,000 but these are expenses I am committed to.

[bigchrisb]

Lets say that your daughter does a 4 year degree after her 4 years of remaining school, and the cost remains as current. That's 8 years at $30k/year for $240k. Set that aside from your $5.3M invest-able portfolio, and you still have $5M. Without the education line item, you say a $70k budget.

If your investments only kept pace with inflation, your current investments would last at that expense rate for 70 years, or until you and your partner are into your 120's.

I'd argue that the the probability of zero real return, and the probability of living past 120 for both of you are both exceedingly low. Hence, financial security is not a very good reason for you to keep on working, particularly if you are not enjoying it!

Reading through this (and feeling somewhat the same myself, albeit 25 years and about $4m in net worth younger), I can't help but wonder if there are some deeper issues about life satisfaction - i.e. what would you do if you weren't working? This is an issue that has been getting me down a bit lately, as so much of my life satisfaction has come from work (which has stopped being satisfying recently).

[Aus_E_Expat]

Bigchrisb - You are absolutely correct.

In the Lifestyle section I have posted a thread on what to do with the time.

I need to work out what I would do - particularly as I still have school age children so travelling for months is not an option.

[GandK]

I need to work out what I would do - particularly as I still have school age children so travelling for months is not an option.

It might be, if you're going someplace with a reliable Internet connection. Many schools now allow students to take their classes online. This is something my husband and I are looking at potentially doing a few years from now. My husband wants to spend a few years traveling once he leaves the workforce, but our youngest will still be at home then.