Investing 5 Years to Retirement

This is no time for mistakes.

Recently, a non-client asked me to review their investments.

They estimated they were 5 years away from retirement and trying to do the right thing with their money.

They were concerned about their investments because of the pandemic and the financial instability coming with it. Add in the political and, now, social instability and, understandably, they were nervous.

As if one “instability” weren’t enough.

After a quick glance I noted they were aggressively positioned with almost 90% of investments in stocks and about 10% in conservative income investments.

Unable to give specific advice based on this information alone, I asked them about their goals? No real goals other than they were merely trying to do “the right thing. We all do (I think), so this wasn’t particularly revealing.

Next I asked them how much they thought they needed to accumulate to make their retirement “work”?

They stated their goal was $1.0m dollars but admitted they weren’t sure what they needed. Still, not enough for me to be seriously helpful.

Finally, I asked them about their spending plans/use of the assets during retirement. (At this point I’m trying to gather any piece of information that would allow me to provide some context of how they’re positioned and what they needed to think about). They stated they did not know.

This conversation isn’t unusual.

I have it once per week with non-clients.

These are basic questions. These are the questions you need to be able to answer when you are 5 or even 10 years away from retirement.

What is everyone waiting for?

Wouldn’t you feel better if you knew…

Where you stand,

Where you want to go,

What you need to do to get there.

It’s called a retirement plan.

And before you consider retiring you should have one.

See what a real Retirement Plan looks like here…

Image credit: Photo by Aaron Burden on Unsplash