Should You Unretire?

Before you retire, you need to think about more than just finances. Or maybe just…unretire. 

There are those who count the days leading up to retirement, and those who vow they will never retire. In between, however, are those who spend years looking forward to retirement  – only to discover that it’s not for them.

During the COVID pandemic millions retired, but by 2022 more than 1.5 million of them had reentered the workforce, according to a T. Rowe Price survey. Roughly half (48%) of those working in retirement felt they needed to work for financial reasons. But a similar number (45%) chose to return to work for social and emotional benefits, the survey says.

In other words, they “unretire.”

Why Unretire?

There are many reasons people unretire. They get anxious and bored. They need the money. They miss their co-workers/friends.

Certified Financial Planner Nick Abrams, CEO of Opulentia in Hunt Valley, Maryland, says one of his clients was a doctor whose retirement lasted all of six months.

“She worked for a hospital in Maryland for a number of years,” he says. “She retired and stayed home for maybe six months. Now she’s a traveling physician. She’ll travel out of state to different hospitals if they need a doctor. And she’s been doing that for probably about two years now.

“I think she was tired of the everyday grind of being a doctor and really, COVID kind of just drained her,” Abrams says. “She was single with no kids. But then once she left she realized sitting by herself every day wasn’t what she wanted.

“She was going to do more traveling,” he says. “She’s been around the world all throughout her life. But it just really came down to, okay, I’ve got to do something else.”

Retirement vs Unretirement

Beau Henderson, CEO and financial advisor at RichLife Advisors, a in Gainesville, Georgia, says some people go through what he calls the “not what I thought retirement would be.”

“That’s when somebody retires and then decides ‘I’m sick of golfing after three months,’” he says. “Or I really got a lot of benefit from my identity as the boss. Or the social aspect – I have a lot of relationships and friends on the job. We only have an idea of what we think things will be like, but we don’t really know until we get there, kind of test out and try it on.”

Abrams says other clients, a married couple, retired together from jobs with the federal government and moved to Florida.

“After they retired, they hung out for a while,” he says. “Then they decided to go into business. And they’ve got their own consulting company that’s doing very well. They make more money now than they did work for federal government. I think opportunity just came their way,” he says.

Uncertainties and Unretirement

Henderson says one thing you can be certain of in retirement is the uncertainties.

“One thing I’m certain about when it comes to retirement planning is there are things we don’t know – that are uncertain,” he says.  “Things like: How long am I going to be healthy? How much longer am I going to be able to work?  So, the problem with the certainty of uncertainty is if we don’t plan for things that might happen outside of what we want to happen, the plan might fail.”

He says that boredom hits hardest when retirees don’t have hobbies. “When you talk about the planning, there’s the financial part. And then there’s the personal part where people just sort of don’t plan out life,” he says. “A lot of the work should be around really thinking through what’s of interest to me? What are some other hobbies? What are some things that might keep me engaged? Because there’s a lot of data behind the benefits of a longer, healthier life if you stay engaged in retirement.”

Before you retire, you need to think about much more than your finances, Abrams says. “What are you going to do? What does retirement look like? “Some people love this sitting around doing nothing. That works for them, and they find other stuff to do. But some people are just conditioned to work. It’s in their nature. But they want to do it on their own terms.”

YOUR TURN

Did you unretire?  Why? What did you do in unretirement?  Share your experience and advice in the comments!

Rodney A. Brooks is an award-winning journalist and author. The former Deputy Managing Editor/Money at USA TODAY, his retirement columns appear in U.S. News & World Report and Senior Planet.com. He has also written for National Geographic, The Washington Post and USA TODAY and has testified before the U.S. Senate Special Committee on Aging. His book, “The Rise & Fall of the Freedman’s Bank, And Its Lasting Socio-economic Impact on Black America” was released in 2024. He is also author of the book “Fixing the Racial Wealth Gap.” His website is www.rodneyabrooks.com

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