The truth is that it’s never really too early to be thinking about retirement. We all dream of being able to spend our later years in luxury, not having to worry about money, but this is only possible if you make it possible. And this only happens with sound planning. Let’s take a look here at the major things that you’ll need to think about.
What do you want to achieve?
This first point should be obvious, but it’s often forgotten. You need to know what you want to achieve financially by the time you get to retirement age. If you don’t know where you’re going, you won’t ever get there. Having goals in mind helps enormously with planning because you can tailor things to your exact needs. Do you want to have a really strong monthly income upon retirement? Would you prefer a large cash lump sum? What do you plan to leave as an inheritance? Only you can answer this question, and it’s good to spend some time thinking about it.
Part of planning is what you want your portfolio to look like. Now, this sounds like it could be a very complex question – indeed, it might be if you’re an enthusiastic investor. For most of us though, it’ll simply mean any retirement products we have, such as pensions, and the assets that we own. Property is of course going to be a very big part of this, and is where you’re likely to have a lot of ideas.
There are many different options for instance. You may currently own a large family home, and have this as part of your portfolio. Do you keep it so that you can pass it on as an inheritance? Or do you sell it, buying a smaller place for you to retire in, giving you extra liquid cash to use for whatever you want? Again, only by going back to the first point we talked about can you figure out the best course of action.
When you’ve decided all that you want to achieve, you can put it all down into a plan so that you know exactly how to execute it. It may even be helpful to have a financial advisor go through this with you so that you know that everything is sound.
