I’ve Saved Enough for Retirement. Now What? [Video]

You’ve worked hard, saved well, and on paper are ready to retire. But you just can’t make the leap. In this video, we explore what we see holding people back, and the practical things you can do about it.

Video Transcript

You’ve done all the right things to retire. You’ve run the numbers, but you can’t shake this nagging fear that you have that you’re still missing something.

Hello, my name is Michelle and I’m a financial advisor here at Financial Design Studio. We help business professionals retire in a tax efficient way. If retirement is getting close for you, we have a free retirement guide that you can download here, which is also linked below.

As an advisor, I’ve helped countless business professionals, who have massive salaries and executive compensation packages, plan out their retirement. And I’ve also seen firsthand what worries hold these people back. They’ve saved enough for retirement. So what comes next to bring confidence to that plan?

What Am I Missing Before Retirement?

If you’ve been asking yourself, “what am I missing?” you need to realize that retirement planning is not about numbers. If it was about numbers, then anyone could calculate whatever they need to and they’d be set.

That’s why you feel like something is missing. Retirement planning is about blending both the assets you’ve saved and the things you care about. So your plan has to be more than just the account numbers and the amounts you have.

For example, if you’re someone who cares about family, you might want to give to them during your lifetime. You want to watch them enjoy the money that you’re giving. But that will end up being a pretty big yearly expense and you will end up with less money in your account at the end of your life. However, you did something that was important to you.

There are lots of examples of situation that make no financial sense but provide you the confidence that you can do what you want:

• Taking out a mortgage before retirement… so that you can be close to family.
• Skipping Roth conversions… because you are giving your money to charities.
• Taking a lower social security benefit… so you can retire before your body ages too fast.

The financial best answer won’t give you confidence. The right answer takes your personal goals into consideration.

It’s important to do what matters to you.

What If You Make Mistakes While Retiring?

Now if you’ve been worried about “getting it wrong” or making mistakes, chances are that the burden of retirement planning is all on your shoulders alone.

You probably think you just need to find the correct answer and move onto the next decision. And what you need to realize is you can’t plan retirement one decision at a time. Retirement planning involves hundreds of interconnected decisions.

You don’t just need correct answers, you need answers that are accurate to you personal goals, other financial decisions, and what’s happening in the market. No Google search or AI will ever be able to provide this level of personalized and comprehensive planning.

Let’s test this out, planning retirement one decision at a time. So let’s just start with the first decision. When will you retire? Now remember. You’re just gonna make this decision as it comes, not in light of everything else that you need to decide.

If you google the “correct” answer, you will probably find some information on the full normal retirement age for Social Security, with is 67. Or maybe you will see that the median age of people retiring today is about 63 for men and 62 for women. So that kind of gives you some range. Even in this one decision, deciding when to retire based on what the correct answer is, even that alone is really hard to make that one decision.

And this is what we see with clients. They come to us and say, “I’m planning to retire at age 67,” which is the correct answer. But then when we build a plan that blends what they have with what they care about, and they see that they could retire sooner.

This is why comprehensive planning for retirement is so important. As those decisions come up later, you’ve already considered them in light of your plan. So when you are considering all of these other factors, you gain confidence in the ability to retire.

What If Something Changes After You Retire?

Now, if you are confident in your retirement plan and you don’t have any of these worries, but you still won’t take the leap, chances are you are worried. But it’s about the unknown of something changing down the road. And what you need to realize is that a retirement plan isn’t something that you just set and forget.

The issue is that the moment something changes, and it will, do you want the pressure of ensuring that you stay on track over the future years? Who do you trust to help you when you no longer can?

A real example I see with many couples is there is one person in the couple who likes to manage the finances while the other doesn’t. And this works great while that person is alive. But when that finance person passes away, their spouse who wasn’t managing the finances is left scrambling to find accounts and take care of distributions, all while trying to plan a funeral. The living spouse doesn’t have the knowledge or systems in place and so they turn to find a financial advisor.

When change happens, whether that’s the death of a spouse, long term care, or early dementia, you don’t want the success of your retirement to solely depend on you. In a moment of crisis, having a partner who knows you and has known your life can provide the confidence you need regardless of what happens.

Next Steps

At the end of the day, it’s questions like these that are why people nearing retirement work with financial advisors like us who manage investments alongside comprehensive planning. This is how you can create a tax efficient retirement.

if you resonated with any of these topics, you can find our free retirement planning guide linked below.

And if you want our team of financial advisors to support your retirement plan, this is what we do best. Our team specializes in tax efficient retirement planning for individuals with executive compensation. So you stay on track all year, every year, reach out to our team at to schedule a 45 minute consultation.

We will see you there or in the next video!

Bonus: Our Free Retirement Planning Guide!