damn older husband

God damn husband, being older than me.

He'll be retired while I'll still be slaving away, 8 hours a day working for the MAN. Although technically working for the government is a pretty good gig in this country, work is work, is working for others gain and a minimal wage.

So I've got to get a plan, somehow I need to retire at the same time as my husband, then I can dedicate my time to pottering around in my garden, tasting beers of the world and writing that erotic science fiction novel I've had floating around in head for the last week. You know, the things we all dream of.

Now, I'm not really the start a business, entrepreneurial type. I have very little of that tough edge or drive that successful people seem to have in droves. I'm mostly lazy and would just like to win the money. Paying the bad at math tax hasn't worked out so far so I am forced to actually try and save and invest. OH THE HUMANITY.

I bought some shares, my tycoon brother gave me a stock tip, I checked out the company and it looked pretty good. The CEO bought a huge parcel of shares so he's obviously confident in what they're doing. But I had minimal cash to invest. Most my spare monies goes on the mortgage, but I invested what I had. Banks don't really want to lend you money to buy shares these days, its definitely a cash buy only. Sure you can get margin lending, but I don't know if they would set that up for a small time investor like me. Also as my brother tactfully worded it "the NZX moves slowly" that's putting it mildly. Its pretty unexciting, especially when you're only investing tiny tiny amounts like me.

Most average joes when they want to invest go with property, I would say thats because its the only assets class that banks will lend you a shit load of money for. So that is my next plan, to buy a god damn rental. I don't want to be a landlord, I really can't imagine anything worse (I'll fork out for a hard arse property manager). It does seem to be the only way to get any kind of decent capital gain in this country. Its going to be a god damn nightmare. I can't afford Auckland so I'm going for Waikato, maybe Whangarei at the right price. I'm going to try buy by the end of 2010. I'm scared, bank managers, lawyers, accountants, ARGH, I had a bad enough experience buying our own home. Our broker was a dick and so was our lawyer. Nuts. 100% using our own home as security? Seems risky to me, but trying to save a second deposit while we pay off our bastard mortgage will probably take 4 years. Too long really. A pity we've already committed to the last family holiday before the kids grow up because that holiday savings account is just asking to be invested in something.

Anyway retirement at 45 seems like a fantasy, but if I can at least work it so I can work part time, I'll be happy with that.