Summer Vacation Planning and Retirement Planning

With Summer upon us, many people are planning their big summer vacations. Most Americans spend more time planning their vacations than they spend planning their retirement. While we don’t necessarily need to spend more time every year committed to planning a retirement that may be 20 years away or more, it does deserve some attention today.

Because retirement is probably much farther into the future than this Summer’s vacation, we don’t need to have all details mapped out today. Also, in modern times, most of us aren’t using a travel agent to plan our trips. We do most of the planning ourselves, from travel to accommodations and activities, which requires some dedication of time and ​​resources. Fortunately, the internet age has given us the tools to research destinations, hotels, and activities. And most of us know what we like in our hotels and what we don’t like in our hotels. So, reading a series of hotel reviews can usually give us a reasonable expectation of what we’ll face when we get there.

With retirement planning, if you’re wise you are using a travel agent of sorts, your financial advisor. Working with a financial advisor will take some of the burden of the planning process off your plate. Just like travel planning, there are plenty of online resources to research investments and financial planning topics, but many people don’t have a solid understanding of financial markets and investments to decipher the data found online. And online sources need to be considered, as there are lots of opinions and agendas out there, most of which doesn’t have your best interest at heart. Further, a mistake in planning your retirement can be financially devastating, where a mistake in picking a hotel may only cause a few days of frustration and disappointment.

As an advisor, I’ll talk with you about what sorts of accommodations and activities you want to include in your biggest vacation (retirement). I’ll work with you to understand your travel preferences (investment preferences, risk tolerance) and help you arrange for the plans that best serve your needs.

We’ll figure out a savings budget on how much you need to be setting aside each year to get you to 57 % ​your goal. We’ll monitor your progress along the way. We’ll make sure we put some contingency plans together to help you make sure we’ve factored various risks. All told, I can help you plan your retirement while saving you time and effort in the planning, and putting your plans together for the retirement you envision.

So, you may not necessarily need to put the time and energy every year into retirement planning that you put into vacation planning. However, put a little bit of time and energy into it, and find a trusted advisor to help plan your biggest vacation, retirement. Please feel free to contact me if I can help.