I’m a 54-year-old with £1m in assets – I took my two adult children skiing and picked up the tab
I am 54 years old, divorced with two adult children, 24 and 25. I have a business degree and worked in TV before going overseas where I met my now ex-husband and we had our children. I was married for 22 years and did an MBA during this time.
For me, being financially independent has been and is, very important. In my late 20s when I had the children, my freelance TV work was too erratic and I knew that, beyond our basic needs, I needed to look after myself.
I set up my own communications agency which gave me freedom to take on the projects I wanted and work around the children’s schooling. I could work, to an extent, where I wanted and could travel to Scotland, where my parents are, as I could afford it.
Every year as the children were growing up I took them back to Scotland to spend time with my parents. At times, saving for my annual trip to Scotland was my focus and for many years, this was the only travel I could afford.
These were hard years. I did my MBA over 14 months while running my consultancy. I would get up at 5.30am four days a week to do a couple of hours of reading before getting the children up at 7.30am. I graduated with a merit.
When the children left home, I returned to Scotland to be nearer to my parents. I bought a small cottage in the town I grew up in and renovated it to my single-girl taste; think wild wallpaper and pink skirtings. Initially, while the marital home was not yet sold, I couldn’t afford to live in it. I rented it out and stayed with my mother. Now it’s a great Airbnb rental when I travel.
My philosophy is that you always need somewhere to live and you can either pay your mortgage, or someone else’s. I bought my first property aged 23 with a £4,000 deposit from my mother. I then leveraged my rental income to buy my second property, at age 25. Both those properties were sold in my 30s to invest in the marital home, a bad idea as they were cash-positive. I was also poorly advised and had an interest-only mortgage on these. But we can recover and learn from our mistakes.
I now have two properties in the UK, one mortgage-free and one with a £40k mortgage turning me £1,400 net per month. When the mortgage is paid, it will return £24k per annum. I keep these properties as I would like them myself. This means regular maintenance but I rent them out easily. Between the equity in my properties and investments.
I have just over £1 million of assets and from my investments, properties and a small amount of consultancy work, I pay myself a healthy £52,000 net per annum. This allows me a lifestyle with lots of travel to interesting and unusual places. I spend most of my time travelling and I have worked hard to set myself up to do so. I do a mixture of solo travel and small, specialised trips. In my early 50s, I am very active and this is an ideal time to see the more “challenging” parts of the world. I don’t travel lavishly but I have some non-negotiables: my own bedroom and bathroom.
I go for authentic travel experiences where I can meet locals and gain an understanding of the country that I visit. In the last 12 months, I have been to Colombia, Cuba, Syria, Iceland, Lebanon (four times), New Zealand and Cyprus, as well as a wild swimming holiday in the Inner Hebrides and other mini-breaks around Scotland.
My son lives in New Zealand and my daughter in Scotland and consequently we don’t see each other a lot. Bringing them together for the first time in nearly three years, I envisioned happy families with me enjoying the company of adult children who would share domestic responsibilities while we chatted happily. Ha! How we all laughed at that concept afterwards.
The holiday cost about £10K, which I paid for.
We chose Tignes. My son likes park skiing and my daughter powder. They are excellent skiers. I wanted somewhere “nice” with ski-in/ski-out and wide alpine runs. A bad ski accident in 2017 left me slightly nervous, with the main objective being not to break a bone and looking for alternative activities on offer.
Skiing is, if you look at it rationally, quite illogical and relatively pointless. However, this is an exercise in family bonding around a shared love of the slopes.
Day 1
We all arrived at different times: A combination of TFL and Uber to the airport (£2, £6.93). Costa Coffee Heathrow for coffee and a pain au raisin (£9.90) plus coffee for my son (£5.55). Airport dinner at Heathrow as the flight was delayed £30) and an airport lunch for my son (£40.75). Emergency chocolate at the airport (£2.99).
We missed our transfer thanks to the delayed flight so got a taxi from Lyon to Tignes (£350) but BA did refund the cost.
Paid for snacks and hot drinks at a Lyon service station having missed our transfer (£11.41). When we finally arrived in Tignes we went to Sos Pizza (£44.00).
Day 1 total: £153.53
Day 2
I went to buy breakfast supplies from the well-stocked Carrefour (£28.31) and cooked breakfast. Daughter and son are keen to hit the slopes. Personally I am ready to read my book and relax.
The apartment is a good one with a great location. I was a bit disappointed that the second bedroom is tiny and with single bunks. I had to pay £122.78 for linen as apparently that isn’t included in the £2,800 rental cost. Son also needed new ski gloves (£50). There was also no Wi-Fi in the apartment, which caused angst among the young adults. I wanted ski-in/ski-out and while you can ski-in, skiing out would require skiing 5-minutes along the pavement.
Although it’s -4C, the blue sky and nice, dry cold means it is a very pleasant walk around the village. It’s not busy and there are no queues on the lifts.
Local markets, an amazing cheese and cured meat shop and a patisserie to-die-for complete the very French and chic atmosphere. The location is fantastic.
Day 2 total: £201.09
Day 3
I cooked breakfast again (£17.33 from Carrefour) before the kids went skiing (£121.98 for two full day/full mountain ski passes), taking a break for excellent pastries at Maison Bouvier Traditional French Patisserie (£15) then lunch back at the lodge. Son bought a Yonder Media Mobile sim card (£13.32) and I went to the Spar shop for groceries for dinner (£24.04) before skiing, home, snacks, card games and the odd bout of teenage-reminiscent bickering.
Day 3 total: £191.67
Day 4
More skiing (£121.98), more pastries (£25.32, £10.82), including a lemon tart for dessert later on. Spent £42.33 on groceries from a fancy large supermarket nearby and £6.90 on snacks from Carrefour.
Day 4 total: £207.35
Day 5
I first ventured to the slopes and it was great to feel I could still ski. One logistical mishap was my gear not coming from Scotland. Tignes Spirit Rentals sorted me out (£132.43). A full day of skiing for the kids (£121.98), half day pass for me (£51.58). After a few hours I needed a reward of hot chocolate with Baileys (£22) and the kids had coffees and pastries (£17.78). The facilities on the mountain are excellent. Carrefour for baguette number one of approximately 26,000 purchased on this trip (£1.90). Groceries (£68.22).
By day five, we felt ready to venture out in the evening. 20 steps from the apartment in the Langley, there is a fire and a DJ setting up. At 6pm the DJ turns out to be packing up, such is the pre-dinner aprés-ski vibe in Tignes (£60.53).
Day 5 total: £415.89
Day 6
Another full day of skiing for the kids (£121.28) and baguettes (£24.72). I did some laundry (£17.20) and, taking my aprés-ski responsibilities seriously, I got to Langley early on Thursday. At 3pm the DJ sets up and I claimed a spot by the fire with my book and glass of wine. That afternoon, the kids tested out the pool table in Moose Bar (£23.30).
After another home-cooked meal using the amazing produce, we ventured to the “Pie & Vinyl” night at Lo Terrachu, a bar with a DJ and pool tables where I was briefly chatted up by young man who promptly disappeared when my son returned and glared at him. My son was unsure about going to the pub with his mother but we played pool amongst the very cool French set and the not-so-cool Brits (ourselves included) and I left the kids to it at around midnight (£60.95).
Day 6 total: £247.45
Day 7
We take a break as the weather is cloudy and have a spa day at the Le Lagon Tignes (£83.81) plus £30.61 spent on swim trunks for my son as he forgot to pack a pair. Spent £42.65 on groceries. Pizza for dinner (£34.08) as I had lost interest in being Mother of the Year and the 24 and 25-year-olds were reverting to being children and asking ‘what’s for dinner?’
Day 7 total: £191.15
Day 8
Friday was another blue-sky day. A full day of skiing for all of us (£181.38). My daughter and I skied to the other side of the mountain to Val d’Isère. It had a slightly different vibe to Tignes and there was no 6pm pause on the aprés-ski! We had drinks at a great bar called Cocarico (£106) which had a band playing. Took a taxi back to Tignes, as we missed the last shuttle bus due to the fab atmosphere, live music and people watching (£42.33).
The long, wide runs at Val d’Isère are lovely and although it was a tad lumpy in the afternoon, I felt I could (almost) love skiing. Or maybe at least “enjoy” it. I contemplate a chalet here for next year as they really are ski-in/ski-out.
Day 8 total: £329.71
Day 9-14
The rest of the two-week trip became rounds of meals and skiing (£181.38, daily), supplies replenished with multiple, daily trips to the two supermarkets, the kids hitting the aprés-ski and my timetable organised around the 3-6pm music sessions in the Langley. A lunch out in the village towards the end of the trip is disappointing and expensive (£47.40).
Total for days 9-14: £2,739
