When you hear financial lingo do you immediately begin to tune out? Does retirement planning make you nervous? If so, this is the right series for you. You’re listening to a 5-part series on retirement planning specifically designed for non-planners. 

The goal of this series is to educate you on retirement planning without all of the confusing lingo. We’re going to keep it simple and focus on teaching you the most important aspects of retirement planning. If you haven’t listened to episode 393, go back and check it out so that you can understand how to begin planning for retirement. 

You only need to focus on the important aspects of retirement planning

There are many retirement planning geeks out there that love to focus on the economy, markets, and business cycles. They relish mapping out different Roth conversion scenarios to reduce their RMDs. But if you aren’t a planning geek, talking to those people can make retirement planning seem overwhelming. 

You’ll be happy to learn that to successfully plan for retirement you don’t need to have a degree in economics, you just need to make sure that you focus on the most important things. That is what we are doing here today. I’m here to help you understand what the most important aspects of retirement planning are. 

Can your retirement dreams come true?

During the previous episode, you created a vision of your ideal retirement. Now it’s time to see if you can make your retirement dreams a reality. The biggest question everyone has in retirement planning is will I run out of money? 

The answer is, no one knows. The economy, life’s surprises, and people’s perpetual habit of changing their minds make it impossible to be sure. There are too many unknowns to be certain about the future. However, it is okay to have that uncertainty. 

If you can get a good approximation of a retirement plan then you can make adaptations to your plan as life unfolds. I use agile retirement management to help my clients make adjustments to their retirement plan when life shocks or bad markets disrupt their plan. 

Where will your retirement income come from?

When planning your retirement you’ll want to consider the income you will receive from Social Security, pensions, or even part-time work. The rest of your retirement income will need to be covered by your retirement savings. 

There are many software tools that can help you plan your retirement. It is important to use a retirement calculator to estimate how much money you will need to live out your retirement dreams. In the Rock Retirement Club, we use the New Retirement Plus Calculator. A retirement calculator can give you a long-term projection of your retirement income needs. 

Have your first 5 years of retirement income readily available

While retirement planning software can help you plan out the long-term, you’ll want to understand where your money is coming from in the near term. You should have the next 5 years of spending readily available in accounts that aren’t exposed to the winds of the economy like money market accounts or CDs. 

Listen in to learn what the most important aspects of retirement planning are so that you don’t get worried about getting caught up in the small details that don’t matter as much. 

OUTLINE OF THIS EPISODE OF THE RETIREMENT ANSWER MAN

PRACTICAL PLANNING SEGMENT

• [3:51] Can you safely pay for your dream retirement?
• [6:55] Where will your retirement income come from?
• [13:45] Recheck your retirement compass periodically

LISTENER QUESTIONS

• [19:31] Does it make sense to make after-tax 401K contributions?
• [23:14] How to estimate MAGI for an IRMAA appeal?
• [28:12] Can you start Social Security benefits from one spouse early and then wait for the other spouse’s benefit?
• [29:35] Should I open a non-retirement account?

TODAY’S SMART SPRINT SEGMENT

• [33:45] Understand the resources you have available to use in retirement

Resources Mentioned In This Episode

NewRetirement.com

Rock Retirement Club

Roger’s YouTube Channel - Roger That

BOOK - Rock Retirement  by Roger Whitney

Work with Roger

Roger’s Retirement Learning Center