How to Deal With Retirement Uncertainties

• How to plan what we know that we don’t know. Life expectancy. A healthy 65-year-old could live to 95. Many people will live past 100. It’s important to have income and give yourself raises for inflation. Plan to be alive until the age 100.
• Changes in interest rates. Your portfolio is affected by changes in interest rates. Interest rates affect bond rates. If the bond interest rate goes up, you don’t make any money. If you’re near retirement, you need a significant amount of assets that can’t go down. Look into ETFs and insurance products.
• Tax rates in the future. There’s a good chance that taxes will go up, it might be a good idea to investigate things like Roth conversions.
• What happens in the market from year-to-year? We have no idea, but we need to be careful of the averages. Especially since many investors switch in and out, and don’t get those averages.

Important Retirement Decisions You Need to Get Right

• When you start your Social Security. Starting Social Security is a irreversible decision. You need to consider your individual circumstances and include Social Security as one income source in your overall plan.
• Whether you should take the spousal benefit on your pension. There are so many different options. It’s important to get help with making this decision. There are things you can do, like take the full benefit plan but purchase life insurance.
• Whether or not to get life insurance. You need to weigh all of your options before dropping life insurance, or if you need life insurance get a decision as possible.
• Choosing a retirement date can be emotionally irreversible. It’s critical to choose a retirement date that works for you, because it’s hard to get back into the workplace. Plus, there are emotional drawbacks.