u/off-grid-crumpet

For context: Husband and I both in the public sector, earning roughly £110k combined each year. We want to move overseas soon for a better quality of life (New Zealand), as we have a young daughter and are tired of our quality of life in the UK (time away from home/eachother due to work, high stress roles, the location we are forced to live in due to work is not desirable, etc). However, the promise of semi-retirement by age 40 is making the decision hard.

Here are our choices:

1. Move overseas in 2029:

• With £200k for a house deposit
• With £50k saved for moving costs/getting there/safety net
• Child aged 5
• Would need to both work full time once in the new country, as soon as possible, and we would both take a substantial salary cut due to the fact that our current roles and skills in the UK are not directly transferable to the place we are planning to move to. Most likely, we will have to start on low wage jobs, like construction for my husband and financial admin for me.
• We would be living in the country we want, with the lower stress and laid back lifestyle that we want for our family. We would likely have a small, but manageable, mortgage. Disposable income would not be plentiful - but my husband wouldn't have to be away from home nearly as much (currently he's away approx 3-4 months every year), our daughter would be growing up in safer country, and the lifestyle would be 10x better simply due to the location.
• We would both would be in our mid 30s.

2. Move overseas in 2033:

• £375k for house (enough to buy outright in cash based on where we are planning to move to)
• £100k saved to settle in / for safety net / get ourselves over there / perhaps enjoy an extended holiday on our way over there
• £700 paid into our account every month from the UK role we will have left, until pensionable age
• Child age 9, so still in primary
• The option to work part time / reduced hours, due to the fact that a mortgage would not be part of our fixed expenses.

I hope this post does not come across as tone-deaf or braggy - we have worked really hard for many years to get to a point we are now, and now faced with the choice of breaking free earlier vs. the idea of being able to be semi-retired in our 40s, we are struggling to decide what is best. Financial freedom is very important to us, but we are very aware that we will never get these years back, our child is only young once, and tomorrow is never promised. On the other hand, I don't want to be looking back when Im 40 thinking 'we could have a paid off house now, £700 extra a month and be working part time'.

Any advice or opinions would be appreciated - we flip flop between the two options on a daily basis.

Edit: Added country name

Hi all, looking for an outside perspective on our situation, hopefully from people who have made the leap abroad and have some perspective on the process.

My husband and I (both currently early 30's) have decided to move to New Zealand ( I grew up there and my family lives there), but the question is when. We have the option of leaving in 3 years time, or leaving in 7 years time.

Option 1 - If we were to leave in 3 years (2029), we would have a 5 year old, a large house deposit (about 70%) and enough savings to sustain us for the first 3-6 months whilst we find jobs and settle in. We would need to both work full time, but we would be in New Zealand living where we always wanted whilst our child is still young.

Option 2 - if we stay in our current jobs another 7 years until 2033 (we work in public sector defence, very secure), we will walk away with a £50,000 tax free lump sum amount from work and enough savings to buy a house in CASH (approx $900,000), as well as enough cash savings to sustain 2 years out of work. My husband would also immediately start to get pension payments from work (he would only be 40 at the time) of approximately £700 a month until pensionable age when his full pension would kick in. This would mean we would have practically no financial stress, and could probably both work part time whilst being mortgage free. However, our daughter would be 9 by then, as we would be 38 and 40.

Our dilemma is that: 7 years feels like a long time to keep slogging it out in demanding jobs, but the financial benefit feels stupid to walk away from. Also, we worry that moving our daughter at age 9 as opposed to age 5 will be more difficult for her, plus she would have spent most of her childhood in the UK, when we would prefer for her to grow up in NZ. There is also the worry of 'what if one of us gets ill and dies before then' and the concerns over potential regrets for postponing our dream.

If you were us, what would you do? Move sooner for the lifestyle but have to maintain full time work, mortgage, etc, or wait to be fully financially secure and essentially semi retired?