€1500 a month with no rent to pay a couple could live very well

Fact is it is all subject to lifestyle and area someone wants, we all differ in this respect.

Very true, totally down to lifestyle. For us its normal living, out for a meal and few beers twice a week. Nothing massively extravagant

Ok MagicWriter, so back to you.

How old (ish) are you both and what kind of lifestyle do you live/wish to live?

I'm amazed at some of the figures quoted. 50 grand a year as a basic necessity? I didn't earn near that figure when I was in full employment never mind now that I am retired!

We have a decent life and only spend between 800 and 1000€ per month, that includes running the car, paying the electric, council tax etc. The house is paid for so no mortgage to consider. We eat out once sometimes twice a week and three evenings a week we socialise in the village bar with the locals and other expats, so we don't live like monks.

We don't factor in flights to UK etc because living to the above budget and there is no reason for us not to, there is always a surplus of pension into our account, so flights etc just come out of that. Something we call our emergency contingency fund.

It is, in CM's fantasy world.

When these sort of figures are quoted it makes you feel destitute even though you are living a very enjoyable and pleasant life and want for nothing.

Rosemary

Not so, to be fair he claimed 50 grand is required for a 'life of luxury' in a smaller Spanish city.

You are funny, the difference between the larger and smaller city is 50k a year 😁😁😁 ok.

i know i have had one of them since age 40 but believe me on the one i got at 40 forget trying to live full time on it anywhere. It did improve after age 55 but still way short of your required 50 grand.

I am still waiting to see if anyone can answer this opening question. Does anyone know a Spanish pensioner who can give a bit of information? A UK basic pension is approx £140 - is the Spanish one more, or less than this? The answer that it ranges from 600€ to 2,500€ is the only answer so far but this is rather vague. I am interested to know what pension someone working 40 years in a basic admin or retail job would get. Any idea?

Googling Spanish State pension throws up quite a few on this subject. However many are vague because as has been said there is quite a variety in amounts dependant on circumstances just as with UK State Pension. Here is a link that may help you ? Spanish pension benefits

Hi again, sorry I did not reply sooner, but been too busy enjoying ourselves in sunny Spain. We are in Alhaurin de Grande now staying with folk who moved over here in April. We are 59 and 57 respectively so not quite teenagers lol. We are looking to live the sort of life we do at home, eating at home 90% of time, going out for a meal maybe once a week, coffee out maybe now and again. Walking our dog, maybe volunteering for some sort of charity and joining some inexpensive clubs are how we would be hoping to spend our time, plus swimming and relaxing outside with a good book. I am beginning to think a lot of folk on this site are maybe way out of our league financially if you are talking in figures of 50k. We have never earned that sort of money when we both worked full time and my hubby was getting his pension! We are pretty simple people living a pretty simple life. I understand different people live different lives so costs differ, but if someone asked what is the average OAP pension in Britain so they could compare it to whatever money they had qI would be saying £140 plus some folk get extra with private pensions, pension credits and so on. Pretty simple really. Therefore, I would expect said person to work out a comparison with what they have available and reach their own conclusions. Thanks for all the replies though, they have been very helpful apart from I still don't know what an average government pension in Spain is

Some statistics (in Spanish) That link is to a PDF that shows various pensions in Extremadura compared to Spain nationally. As far as my basic Spanish can tell, the average retirement pension in Spain as a whole in April 2015 was €1,017.41 (as opposed to the average for Extremadura which was €844.91). Hope that's of some use.

That seems about right Spanish friends of ours who spent the whole working life in Madrid working for a large Spanish multi national get a state pension that is mind boggling compared to UK but they paid a lot in to get that. In some way you can choose your input. Basic state pension is £120 per week for me but most Spanish people with my kind of work record seem to get more. I have read that the basic state pension from UK is amongst the worst in the EU. In order to register as a resident in Spain you seem to have to demonstrate an income of around €600 per month and I believe that figure was arrived at as being about the minimum Spanish state pension level which makes sense. You also need to show that you have some kind of health cover then you can stay longer than 90 days if you are an EU citizen.