{"id":7787,"date":"2014-06-20T07:19:47","date_gmt":"2014-06-20T14:19:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.marketriders.com\/investing\/?p=7787"},"modified":"2016-12-21T07:28:00","modified_gmt":"2016-12-21T15:28:00","slug":"easy-retirement-planning-checklist","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.marketriders.com\/investing\/easy-retirement-planning-checklist\/","title":{"rendered":"An Easy Retirement Planning Checklist"},"content":{"rendered":"

Financial advisors often start off their conversations with clients by taking stock of their current financial situation. Their debts, their spending habits, their budgeting skills and so on.<\/p>\n

That’s good information for grounding expectations, but it leads necessarily to the second, more important conversation: How to make sure your\u00a0retirement\u00a0plan works.<\/p>\n

That’s a matter of determining how well an individual can set a\u00a0retirement\u00a0plan goal and stick to it, year after year. It all comes down to five basic numbers, however, and you can determine them on your own with a little bit of effort.<\/p>\n

\"retirement<\/a><\/p>\n

So, get out a calculator and a scratch pad and have a go. Do this exercise in the company of your spouse or partner, someone who can jog your memory and help you make reasonable assumptions about your shared future.<\/p>\n

1. Get real about your goals<\/strong><\/p>\n

Most people focus on the age they want to stop working, but that number can become a moving target. Your health might deteriorate early, or you might be downsized out of a job and perhaps be forced to change careers late in life to keep an income.<\/p>\n

Instead,\u00a0decide on a number<\/a>. That will help you to be sure to save enough to get to that number in a reasonable number of years.<\/p>\n

2. Estimate all of your\u00a0retirement\u00a0income<\/strong><\/p>\n

Adding up the number is a matter of taking into account all of the\u00a0places you can count on money in\u00a0retirement<\/a>.\u00a0Remember, $1 million properly invested will generate about $40,000 in income, while the Social\u00a0Security\u00a0of a fully vested couple is likely to produce a similar income flow. Add in any pensions or annuities. Now consider the impact of part-time work in\u00a0retirement.<\/p>\n

3. Estimate a realistic outgo<\/strong><\/p>\n

Once you have the incoming number, however provisional, now figure your cost of living. Will you be paying a mortgage? How will you finance healthcare costs?\u00a0Travel, food, insurance? A starting budget should come in well below your initial income expectation. If not, consider ways to cut costs.<\/p>\n

4. Expect the unexpected<\/strong><\/p>\n

What one big thing might wreck your plan? It’s easy to consider the potential for catastrophe, such as a storm wrecking your home. But it’s far more likely that you will self-sabotage your own\u00a0retirement. Overspending in your first few years of living on a fixed income can drastically affect your ability to grow your\u00a0retirement\u00a0wealth for later on.<\/p>\n

5. Consider longevity<\/strong><\/p>\n

How long will your money last you? Part of the problem is that you are likely to live more years than you might guess. The other part is that inflation never rests, so your spending power is on the decline all those years, too. A proper investment portfolio balances those forces out and\u00a0protects you from long-term problems<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Financial advisors often start off their conversations with clients by taking stock of their current financial situation. Their debts, their spending habits, their budgeting skills and so on. That’s good … Read more →<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":8,"featured_media":7792,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_wp_rev_ctl_limit":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[37],"yoast_head":"\nAn Easy Retirement Planning Checklist | MarketRiders<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Retirement planning all comes down to five basic numbers, however, and you can determine them on your own with a little bit of effort.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.marketriders.com\/investing\/easy-retirement-planning-checklist\/\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:title\" content=\"An Easy Retirement Planning Checklist | MarketRiders\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:description\" content=\"Retirement planning all comes down to five 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