The Case of “Are We There Yet?”

John and Sarah were nearly there, or so they thought. Trouble is they didn’t know where ‘there’ was. It all started one night when John, a Senior Pilot for a major long-haul airline, was flying over Outer Mongolia, on yet another quick turnaround flight and suddenly thought to himself How much longer do I have to do this!?

John used to live to fly. Every minute he could be in the air he would. But now things were different. Increasing pressure, increasing regulation, continued testing, and increasing cut backs, it was no longer the same. The fun had gone. And now, aged 55, he was thinking ‘WHY am I still doing this?’

John loved to fly, but what he wanted to fly was his own single engine, two seater bi-plane. Now that was real flying. That’s what he wanted to do. To buy and fly his own beauty.

He had a great pension. He’d built up some capital. He’d nearly paid off his mortgage. But what did it all mean? Was he ‘there’ yet?

He needed help.

So, with an introduction from a friend, he turned to one of our Lifestyle Financial Planner’s to help make sense of it all. Our Lifestyle Financial Planner helped John and Sarah get a fix on what they wanted, and when they wanted it. They worked out the sort of lifestyle they wanted to enjoy. Travel? ‘No thanks!’ They’d done enough of that in their lifetime. Now, their interest was flying for John and for Sarah, breeding goats on their 20 acres.

So our Lifestyle Financial Planner ‘crunched their Number’ – the amount of money they needed, taking everything into account, to live the life they wanted.

The result was that YES, they were already there – so long as they built into their financial planning a house downscale at around age 75.

Sarah no longer spends weeks alone. She now has more than the goats for company. That’s because John no longer flies long-haul. Instead he enjoys the wind in his face at the controls of his own bi-plane.

And our Lifestyle Financial Planner continues to get an annual supply of goats cheese.