Designing a Retirement Asset Allocation Strategy Part II: Liquidity

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Designing a Retirement Asset Allocation Strategy Part II: Liquidity

How to Fill Your Second Bucket in Our ‘3 Bucket Safe Money Approach’

The following article features content adapted from the book Momma’s Secret Recipe for Retirement Success by Dan Ahmad, Jim Files, and Jack Canfield. Get your copy here!

We’ve said it before, and we’ll say it again: You need a comprehensive, written retirement income plan if you’re serious about your retirement security. Your plan needs to tie everything about your money together, which we recommend doing with what we call the “3 Bucket Safe Money Approach.”

We wrote about Bucket #1 here in our first installment of articles on this topic, and you’ll want to read it before you continue below. Bucket #1 is the first step in your planning – the one where you determine how much income you need for the rest of your life and allocate the necessary assets to this pot of money. Bucket #2, which we’ll discuss in this article, is the second step in your planning. This is where you determine how much liquidity you need and allocate assets to this second pot of money accordingly.

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Answer These Three Questions to Know What You Really Want Out of Retirement

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Answer These Three Questions to Know What You Really Want Out of Retirement

Sharpen Your Focus on What Your Golden Years Mean to You

We’ve talked before about the importance of a written retirement income plan to set you up for an enjoyable retirement free from financial stress. However, there are three baseline questions you need to answer for yourself in order to clarify and solidify your plan. After all, any retirement plan can only be effective if you truly know what you want out of your retirement, right?

Ask yourself the three questions below – and answer them honestly – to sharpen your focus on what retirement means to you. Then, use the added clarity to develop the best-written retirement income plan for you.

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Retirement Resolutions for the New Year

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Resolve to Strengthen Your Financial Future Regardless of Where You Are in Your Working Life

Each new year brings with it the promise of a fresh start, a chance to reassess, and to begin again. It’s the time for resolutions, big dreams, and goal setting–and maybe even for building a new life in retirement. Whether you’re nearing that new phase of life, or you’ll be working for many more years, setting retirement resolutions can help you prepare for and strengthen your financial future. Resolutions are easy to break, but with the right amount of intention and commitment you can get on track for a fulfilling and successful retirement –and stay there. No matter where you are in your retirement planning, the retirement resolutions below can help you to strengthen your retirement plans as you step into 2022.

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Busting the Myth That “All Annuities Are the Same – And They Are All Bad”

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Busting the Annuity Myth

Don’t Fall for These Untruths About a Misunderstood Retirement Income Vehicle

The following excerpt, written by Leslie Davis, is from our book, Momma’s Secret Recipe for Retirement Success. Get your copy here to read more!

It may sound silly, but I feel bad for the word “Annuity” because the poor little fella gets criticized daily! It seems like 50% of the individuals I’ve met think they hate annuities, while 50% think they love them. To me, an annuity is not just a type of financial vehicle per se, but also a collection of valuable benefits.

For example, let’s say you’re having a B-B-Q with your closest neighbors one evening. The neighbor to the right of you owns a beautiful new Tesla, it’s red add shiny, sitting on display in his driveway.  You overhear the owner of this beauty telling the neighbor on your left how much he loves cars and wants four more. It just so happens that this neighbor to the left owns a Yugo from the 1980s. The Yugo’s owner responds by saying, “I hate cars, they are the worst, I never want another car!” The word car recalls four wheels that get you from point “A” to point “B”, but you can’t put a Tesla and Yugo in the same “car” category, just like you can’t put all annuities into one “annuity” category.

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Designing a Retirement Asset Allocation for Safety, Growth & Income for Life

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retirement asset allocation

An Examination of ‘Bucket #1’ and How to Fill It

The following article features an excerpt from Momma’s Secret Recipe for Retirement Success, by Dan Ahmad, Jim Files, and Jack Canfield. Get your copy here!

In our book, Momma’s Secret Recipe for Retirement Success, we discuss “The 7 Rules To Live By For Retirement Security,” some of which we have also written about on this blog and you can find linked below:

  1. Avoid Large Losses – Use the 5%-10% Rule
  2. Minimize Fees
  3. Significantly Reduce Volatility
  4. Earn a Reasonable Return Rate
  5. Manage Taxation
  6. Generate “Certain Income” from Your Assets that Will Last for as Long as You Live
  7. Have a Written Retirement Income Plan

If you are like most retirees, you probably love the idea of having a “Retirement Planning Roadmap” like this, right? It’s designed to help you plan for retirement income you can count on – for life.

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Annuities 101

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annuities

Everything You Need to Know About this Polarizing Term

What would you guess is the number one reason why people decide not to purchase a fixed index annuity with an income rider as part of their overall retirement income plan? It’s not because of surrender charges, fees, or lower returns. It’s because the benefits of a fixed index annuity with an income rider simply sound too good to be true.

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What Type of Retiree Are You?

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type of retiree

Everyone Approaches this New Chapter of Life with a Different Outlook

Retirements are like snowflakes; no two are going to look the same. Some people dream of a retirement that’s full of adventure and travel, while others imagine their retirement surrounded by family and good books. And just as there are many ways to envision retirement, there are multiple types of retirees, too.

Nancy K. Schlossberg, author and former counseling professor, discovered throughout her work that there are six main types of retirees. Read on to learn more about each one – and to determine which type of retiree you may be.

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Understanding the Biden Tax Plan

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Biden Tax Plan

The Democrats’ Tax Plan Would Raise Capital Gains and Corporate Tax Rates

Monday saw the release of the Democrats’ full tax proposal, which details their plan to pay for expanding access to paid family leave, education, and healthcare, as well as efforts to combat climate change. The proposal is expected to provide more than $2 trillion in new revenue over the next ten years, mostly from high-income households and companies, and the House Ways and Means Committee is expected to vote on it this week.

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Use the Correct Process for Financial Success

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financial process

Are You Among the 99% Following a Faulty Retirement Plan?

The following is an excerpt from Momma’s Secret Recipe for Retirement Success, by Dan Ahmad, Jim Files, and Jack Canfield. Get your copy here!

Many retirees do not have their assets allocated properly to give themselves the highest probability that they can receive a high level of consistent income, will never run out of money for as long as they live, and will never suffer a big stock market loss like 2008 again.

In a previous blog, we described in detail the differences between Stage One of Retirement Planning – Asset Accumulation, and Stage Two of Retirement Planning – Income Distribution and Asset Preservation.

When you meet with your financial advisor, even after you’ve retired, the conversation will often be focused on your portfolio. Your advisor may talk about:

  • The growth of your portfolio (even though it actually hasn’t probably grown much).
  • How the market is doing “so well” and you need to ride the wave.
  • How you are diversified by having your 20-30 mutual funds.
  • Adding bonds to the portfolio, if you are worried about risk.
  • How you are in it for the long-term and no matter what, you should “ride out all market volatility.”
  • How they have the best money managers.
  • How they will get you high rates of return.
  • Maybe they will throw in some technical terms like alpha, beta, Sharpe ratio, and standard deviation.
  • How it’s best to defer IRA distributions as long as possible, until age 70 1⁄2, to minimize income taxes.

The advisor might say you are now invested moderately, or conservatively, but they probably don’t define what this means in potential losses. So, your advisor says “moderate” or “conservative,” and you are thinking “low risk,” even though your current portfolio could lose -30%, -40%, or even -50% or more. In many situations, the risk is caused by the portfolio’s primary focus on growth.

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Adjusting Your Retirement Mindset

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retirement mindset
How to Manage Common Challenges in this Phase of Life

At Peak Financial Freedom Group, we work with people every day who are preparing for retirement. We talk about when they’d like to retire, any goals they have, and what they envision their retirement lifestyle looking like. We review things like assets and liabilities, and we discuss cash flow. We use conservative risk-reduction strategies to help them protect their investments and provide the opportunity for growth. In short, we help our clients start working toward achieving the financial freedom they desire so they can enjoy a retirement free of money fears.

Alongside all this financial preparation, though, we have found that it’s also important to prepare your mindset for retirement. It represents a significant life change – and a massive psychological shift, too. That’s why you shouldn’t go into this phase of life unprepared from any standpoint. So, let’s discuss a few common mindset issues, and what near-retirees and recent retirees can do to overcome them.

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