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Just like football players don’t want to fumble the ball in the red zone, you don’t want to fumble your finances as you get close to retirement. We’ll explain how to protect your finances during these crucial years on today’s episode.
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Show Notes
Today we’re talking about the financial red zone. It’s a crucial time when you’re getting close to retirement and need to keep your finances in check.
We define the financial red zone as the 10 years before and after retirement. These are critical years where you don’t want to make costly financial mistakes. Just like in football, when you’re in the red zone, every second counts, every play counts.
The red zone also spills into retirement. You need to pay attention to this time as well because time is no longer on your side. You’re shifting from a company paycheck to no longer having a paycheck. You’re using all of your retirement resources to live your lifestyle.
When you get to retirement, you have to make a lot of decisions, including pension decisions, Social Security decisions, and how much risk you’re willing to take, because you don’t have any more earning years left.
The decisions you make are more important the closer you get to retirement. If you’re 25 and make a financial mistake, you have a lot of time to recover from that. But you can’t recover as quickly when you’re at or near retirement age.
You also need to consider how things like inflation can affect your financial security. With inflation, your income stays level but the expenses continue to rise for the rest of your life. So you’ve got to project out how inflation could affect your future.
Listen to the full podcast or use the timestamps below to jump to a specific section.
[3:49] – What is the financial red zone?
[5:50] – Planning in retirement
[7:24 ]– Mistakes
[12:45] – Work on your plan
[15:13 ]– Don’t wait for the red zone
[18:28] – Listener question: Am I stuck?
Thanks for checking out this episode. We’ll talk to you again soon.
“Time is no longer on your side. You’re shifting from a company paycheck to no longer having a paycheck. You’re using all of your retirement resources to live your lifestyle.”
-Scott Sierens
