A few weeks ago, we gave you the first five steps to developing a workable retirement action plan. It is much easier when you break all the tasks up into small steps so now let’s take a look at steps 6 through 10.
6. Take time to do some insurance planning: The right insurance policies will go far in helping you preserve your post-retirement income, provide a legacy for your heirs and control your expenses after you retire. Consider long-term care insurance, life insurance and before you retire, disability insurance so that a long-term disability doesn’t wipe out your savings.
7. Change your asset allocations: It’s important to strike an appropriate balance between risk and reward before you retire. How you allocate funds in the accumulation phase of your life should be very different from how you allocate in the income phase (or “decumulation” phase). Your financial planner will help you select investments that are appropriate for the income phase but still help you try and keep up with inflation.
8. Create an estate plan: It’s always a good idea to have clear, legally enforceable directives for the distribution of your assets. As you do this, review your beneficiary designations on your insurance policies and retirement accounts to make sure that the assets will go to the right heirs and/or their descendants. Remember that assets that have named beneficiaries will not follow the instructions in your will so it is important that the beneficiary designations still align with your objectives.
9. Develop your new budget: If you want to know how well your retirement budget will serve you in your retirement years, create a budget now to determine how much income you’ll need to draw monthly. Doing this exercise will also help you decide whether you need to consider certain lifestyle changes, relocation or other arrangements.
10. Stay focused: In the last few working years of your professional life, it may be easy to get distracted from your plans. You may have a tendency to become lax about saving, you may want to become too aggressive or too conservative with your investment allocation, you might spend more as a sort of last hoorah, and you may even consider retiring early. Any of these actions, and hundreds of others, can hurt your retirement plans by reducing the savings you have set aside. So stay focused on your original goals and go that extra mile to secure a retirement you can live on your own terms.
The Wealth Managers at Kramer Wealth Managers are here to help you create a goal for your retirement and implement each of the steps necessary to get there. Contact us today to get started on your own personal WealthPath.
