Does Your Life Include a RIPE Plan—Planning Tips for Retirement, Investing, Protection, and Estate Planning – Part 1 (Retirement)

by: Janet L. Hall

No matter what your age or years of work, it’s almost never too late to start planning for your retirement. As a matter of fact, the younger you are, the less chance you will have of becoming destitute, or a * bag * person. I’m not trying to be funny, it can happen to you if you don’t watch what you are doing and PLAN for the future.

Ponder for a minute on the questions below:

~~ What kind of life do you want in your * golden years *?
~~ How will you use your retirement time, meaning, what activities, interests, or travel might you want to pursue?
~~ Will you need or want to change your housing and lifestyle completely or do you hope you can * stay where you are, doing the same things you’ve always done *?
~~ If you are planning on living in a different area, what are the standards of living in that area OR what are the chances of the standard of living increasing or decreasing where you are currently living?
~~ How might your health affect your retirement?
~~ Will you need to continue to work part-time after retirement to * make ends meet *? How will that affect your benefits?
~~ Do you want to start your own business, many people do after retirement, and how will that affect your benefits?
~~ What * support * systems do you have or need to have in place?

If a company employs you, you need to FIND OUT:

~~ if they have a retirement plan (benefits), such as a pension or 401(k)
~~ what your TOTAL monthly or lump sum disbursement will be
~~ how much you can contribute
~~ length of service required to be eligible to collect benefits
~~ age required to be eligible to collect benefits
~~ if the plan will meet your needs/lifestyle after retirement

Take the time and schedule an appointment with your employer’s * benefits person * and discuss YOUR retirement plan. Ask them about YOUR Statement Of Accrued Benefits (SAB). This is YOUR personal account and will tell you the benefits you can expect based on your salary and retirement time.

If you’re self-employed, as many of us are, you need to establish your own retirement plan. The easiest plan is an IRA at which you can only contribute $2,000 yearly. If you’re young (years away from retirement) check out a non-deductible Roth IRA. Other plans include SIMPLE, SEP-IRA, and Keogh Plan. If you want to learn more about these plans, check our Reviews section near the end of the newsletter.

Please don’t think you can live on Social Security (in the USA) alone! If you have no idea what you MIGHT have already accumulated into Social Security, FIND OUT! (Link for SSA in Reviews section)

WARNING and a TIP: Just when you thought you were covered! One thing that can zap you financially is a divorce (I hope this never happens to you) and your pension plan could be one of your largest assets to be DIVIDED up (I’ve seen this happen). SO, if you’re married, I sincerely hope you stay so happily and forever after!

Smiles, not Piles,
Janet L. Hall
Professional Organizer, Author, and Speaker
http://www.overhall.com
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Many people hear "retirement" and think— what? 401K? Roth vs. Traditional IRA? Stocks, bonds, mutual funds? Do they?

Or do many people put money away according to the suggested amount and then simply hope that when retirement comes all will work out?

One report I read estimated that 66 million Americans have put away a Whopping $0 towards retirement.

Many people are still thinking there might be a thing called Social Security around when they retire. Social Security: as of 2004, the average annual Social Security retirement benefit is approximately $11,000. That is not a lot to live on folks. Plus, we all hear the news periodically that there might not be any Social Security around when we get older and need it.

And as a further WAKE UP call, I found a calculator which estimated (without Social Security):
* a couple at 40
* bringing in $90k a year (together)
* with very modest investments
would need to save an additional $2,690,000.00 ( yes 2 million +) in order to retire at 65-- OR – plan on working an additional 29 years!!

Now before you get overwhelmed and click over to another article—lets put our heads together and simply cover a few very very basic start up basics.

1) Standard Of Living: You need to know at what standard of living you will want to live during retirement.
2) Basic Living Expenses: You will need to calculate the cost of basic living expenses (at that level) i.e. electric bill now of $200 = what in 2030?
3) Hobbies and Leisure Activities: Know what type of hobbies, and leisure activities you will keep busy with and what their cost might be then.
4) Family Visiting / Travel: Realize that more and more children move away when grown. So while they work out of state—YOU may need to do the traveling to see them. Plan for these costs.
5) Convalescent Care (nursing home costs) provincially run about $100/day median. You will need to multiply that times the same 4% inflation rate. Then multiply that times the number of years before you may need it—to approximate how much you may need to afford for your housing when you need assistance. Truth be known—WE need to plan to handle that cost ourselves, rather than think our children will be able to take on that kind of additional cost.

You will need to total yearly amounts. You will need the approximate yearly cost to live (at your desired level) during regular healthy retirement. And, you will need the total yearly amount of costs to live in assisted or full care living facilities ( for each – you and mate).

Multiply each yearly amount by the number of years you might be living in that circumstance. Example: Retire at 65. Live healthy retirement- 15 years (so 15 x yearly cost of healthy living) . Live assisted – 8 years ( so 8 x yearly cost of living in care).

You now have two totals that when added together equal your estimation of the total dollar amount you will need to draw from in order to live after retiring. NOW you are ready to begin planning your investments in such a way that you can achieve that TOTAL number by the time you retire.

Here are some tools to help you now that you are ready to take that first step:
USA Today retirement cost calculator: http://www.calcbuilder.com/cgi-bin/calcs/RET2.cgi/usatoday
Motley Fool’s retirement area http://www.fool.com/retirement.htm?source=PFinAg
Metlife’s retirement area http://www.metlife.com/Applications/Corporate/WPS/CDA/PageGenerator/0,1674,P1946,00.html
About.com’s HUGE retirement resource area: http://www.retireplan.about.com/

Until next time—all the best,
Kate