The idea for Five Five Quid came about when I received a letter from the Department for Work and Pensions. The letter informed me that the earliest I can get my state pension is when I’m 66 years and 5 months old. 

It also gave me a link to find out what the value of that pension would be.

Currently for a man born after 5th April 1951 or a woman born after 5th April 1953, the maximum available state pension at state pension age is £175.20 per week.

Which sounds ok but it’s only £758.20 per month which for most people isn’t enough to survive on let alone “enjoy” retirement.

And the maximum state pension assumes 35 years of National Insurance contributions. If you’ve got less than that, you’ll get less. Also, if you were contracted out of SERPS at any point, you’ll get less.

Of course many people have a work pension or personal pension which improves the situation.

But a large number of people, often through no fault of their own, will not have enough income to live as they’d like to.

I’m one of those people.

There are a number of options available to improve the situation.

1. Continue to work until you’re no longer able to. This always conjours up images of pensioners working in B&Q for me.
2. Save more now. This has the dual effect of reducing your current disposable income and improving your future finances. Meaning the difference between how you live now and how you’ll live in retirement is reduced.
3. Develop another stream of income so that a) you can implement 2) and b) you supplement your state pension. Preferably, there will be some form of residual income involved.

Which option makes most sense to you?

For me, there’s only one sensible option and that’s option 3 – develop another stream of income. Fifty Five Quid refers to the amount of daily income that I see as being useful ie. it will improve my life considerably; and it’s also possible, not a pipe dream. Monthly, that’s £1,673 and with the maximum state pension added that’s £2,431 a month or £29,172 a year.

After tax, that’s £25,838 a year or £2,153 a month net income.

I see only one way and that’s to have some form of business for yourself, that you control.

For me, and perhaps you, that’s got to be an online business, which has the significant advantage of requiring zero premises, stock, or employees.

As you can see from my about me page, I’ve been involved with internet marketing since early 2004.

In fact 100% of my current income is derived from the online world. It’s been like that since 2009. Much of that though involves me putting the hours in as a service provider. I need to move the balance more towards that passive or semi passive income model. I’ve aleady started.

If you’d like to follow along with my journey and find out how you can do the same thing yourself, just click here to download the Fifty Five Quid Retirement Income Report.