I read with great interest this blog post from about 7 years ago when RetiringSyd.com wrote about the impact of early retirement on her relationship with her husband. Not only did her thoughts mirror recent conversations my dear wife and I have been having, but the comment section had the experiences of many others living with their spouse 24×7 for the first time.
Certainly the old adage “Retirement: Half the money; Twice the husband” seems to play true for many people sharing a house and not finding enough room for a space of their own. This is something that we have been discussing … and making some plans around.
Last summer I posted about the need to have “A Place Not To Work” and today I thought I would update that post with the new home office that we’ve created. It’s an “extra” bedroom in our lower level that had been left unfinished since we built our house 6+ years ago. We hired a builder to finish off this room and do a couple other projects in our house over the past 1+ months.
Here is what the new space looks like empty …
The plan is that I will use the room as my new home base to work on projects related to board work that I do and if occasional consulting projects come my way. It is out of the way of the typical traffic in our house, so it will be a good place to escape to.
The room is empty now, but the French Doors (that I got on Craig’s List) lead out to a nice shady patio that will be great in the summer. I’ve just started to outfit the room – in a fashion my wife & son call my “Executive Man Cave” style – here are some of the plans:
- Super plush carpeting with radiant floor heat
- Two IKEA bentwood/leather lounge chairs – for reading
- New 50″ UHD TV – amazing picture! – to catch the news
- Pacemaster treadmill, with a laptop rack – walk while watch
My goal is to also get a very large, mombo-sized desk set up with some bookshelves above it. I’ll use the desk to plug in my laptop to a monitor and wifi printer. If I keep the room for work related activity related to my LLC, I can write off the square footage as a business expense. I have a lot of books & files in my current MegaCorp office that will need a home.
The room has turned out so plush, my dear wife is afraid I’m going to move into this room permanently, but I think she’ll be happy I will not be “underfoot” all of the time. She has long claimed the kitchen as her “office” – it also has a dedicated desk she likes to work at – so we each have our own space.
Any interior design tips out there?
Image Credit: Pixabay
MrFireStation 
Believe it or not, I still leave the house to get work done. 😉
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Coffee shop, or an away from home office?
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I use coffee shops occasionally but I also have a virtual office (8 hours per month) for $60 for quiet work, thinking and planning.
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I look forward to seeing it when it’s all decked out in man-cave retirement style!
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Having your spouse (and them having you) around all the time after retirement is a challenge. I need way more “me” time than my husband does but it’s been hard to make this clear without hurting his feelings. I’m also involved in a lot more out of the house activities than he is. It’s a balance that must be made in order to keep you from going crazy and yet keep your marriage healthy and strong. Good luck and let us know how it goes.
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Thanks for the great article and thoughts. That’s one area I hadn’t considered as I prepare for my imminent retirement. I too have been blogging to set up a path in that direction.
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It’s been fun. Check out the RetiringSyd.com post I linked to, if you haven’t already. She does a nice job framing it.
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Retired Syd is one of the first bloggers that introduced me to FIRE. Love reading her posts.
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Yes – I have been slowly reading through all 6+ years of her posts.
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Wonderful space!! It will be nice to have an office (the french doors are amazing!) to utilize when all your mental freedom in retirement takes on full creativity. I just found out here in Eugene, that we have 2 (maybe more) “thinkubator” type office spaces. Where entrepreneurs, people who work from home, small business owners, etc. can rent for a small fee a desk space & collaborate with everyone who also works there. It’s a pretty neat concept I didn’t know existed!
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I just heard about a cool incubator space in our metro. It looked really posh. I think it was $60 for eight hours a month.
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We have both worked from home for about five years, so we’re thankful that we know, going into ER, that we can handle spending virtually all of our time together. 🙂 Though I do think it’s super smart for you to have your own space. The year we spent sharing an office was not good, and we’re much happier with separate offices in our house now. Of course, you and your wife won’t be working full-time, but it’s still nice to each have your own space.
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“Good neighbors make good fences” or something like that I guess 🙂
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