Retirement Planning

As you approach retirement and move into the distribution phase of your life it’s imperative that you work with an advisor that thoroughly understands the risks involved and can help you manage this risk over the course of your retirement.

I thought it would be of value to include a few case studies – examples of the situations we run into day to day and a brief overview of how we help. There are times when you research a company and you just want to know if they have helped people like you. As a financial services company, we can’t provide testimonials, however we can highlight some situations we’ve worked on – maybe they are similar to yours?

Helping 2 Pre-Retirees Set Up the Right Foundation

Sue, age 50, had been working for the phone company for the last 22 years, and had seen great financial success climbing up to a senior management position. However, an unexpected reorganization within her work group brought some tough decisions to the forefront.

She was married, trying to juggle the responsibilities of her job, her team and managing her concerns of a demotion and less pay. She knew she had to focus on her work and do whatever possible to reach her 25 years of service anniversary to become pension eligible. She really needed to have someone else manage the finer details of her financial plan, investments and emotions. She asked us to take a look at her finances as well as her self-employed husband’s, and ensure they were both on the right track.

As part of their plan, we:

• Organized their financial picture into an easy-to-understand summary.
• Designed a process for them to view all of their investments in one place and track against their financial plan in real time.
• Had multiple discussions regarding what retirement might look like – both in the best circumstances and if times became tough.
• Designed a prudent investment portfolio that aligned with the optimum amount of risk Sue wanted to take, while also planning for a long-term, more aggressive approach that her husband preferred.
• Put retirement savings goals in place to aid long-term savings and save on taxes.
• Coordinated a business succession plan for her husband so the full value of his business would be financially recognized when he wanted to retire.
• Optimized a strategy to use various retirement plans to allow for a balanced approach while making best use of company match benefits and tax-deferral opportunities.
• Planned out their short and long-term goals and ensured there was a spending/savings plan that aligned with them.

This is a shorter post than usual – trying a different approach this week. On Wednesday we’ll highlight a case for a couple at retirement and on Friday I’ll post a brief outline for somebody who’s already a few years into retirement. Looking forward to feedback – please use my Contact Page to reach out – comments and suggestions are welcome and I’d really enjoy finding out if there are any financial or retirement planning questions we could answer for you. Have a great week!