Retirement is a Family Affair Video from Savant Wealth Management

Download our complimentary guide books, checklists, and other useful financial resources at savantwealth.com/guides. Hello and welcome to today’s Savant live webinar. Our topic for today is Retirement is a Family Affair. I’m excited to have you. My name is Jonathan Milikin. I’m the director of planning here at Savant. And the reason I’m looking forward to today’s topic is several things. One, if you’ve gone out and researched the topic of retirement, whether that’s on the internet or strolling the aisles of your local bookstore, do people still stroll the aisles of bookstores? I do. I hope we all do. Whatever your approach is, you’ve likely found that a lot of the content and a lot of the information that you will find around retirement is around preparing for retirement. what we call in the industry the accumulation phase. It’s going to give you advice and tips on saving for retirement, what type of savings vehicles you should use, different types of IRA, for example, you know, concepts around accumulating wealth and in growing your wealth as you build that retirement nest egg, getting ready for retirement. And certainly, those are worthy topics to think about and discuss. The other area you might find some information on is the topic of de accumulation. So, what that means is you’ve prepared for retirement, you’re in retirement, you have this retirement nest egg. How do you strategically spend that nest egg? How do you mix and match social security or pension or sources of income and couple that with withdrawals from retirement accounts? Again, re really interesting topic, especially for us financial nerds in the industry. So, a worthy topic to spend time on. But there’s a third area and one that you don’t see as much information about. And that’s really the area we’re going to talk about today. It’s what we call the qualitative area. Some of these considerations around retirement of what do you want your future to look like? Have you done a good job of communicating that with your significant other or your family members? So really interesting topic. Again, one that doesn’t get quite as much attention. So we’re going to spend time diving into that today. And thankfully I’m not in this endeavor alone. Fortunate to have my friend and fellow planning team colleague, he’s a planning strategist for our planning team here at Savant Paul Elfner. Paul, great to have you and hope you’re doing well. Welcome. Thanks, Jonathan. Really glad to be here today. I’ve had the privilege, you know, of working with people as they retire for many years. First as an adviser, now, as you mentioned, as a planner, and retirement really truly is a family affair. And as we know, families have lots of opinions. I certainly know mine do. So, we do have some tips and tricks here today to help you hopefully avoid contention and miscommunication. So, let’s get started here today. So, here’s what we’re going to cover today on this webinar here. So why retirement planning is important. We’re going to talk about retirement lifestyle and personal goals as well as housing and living arrangements considerations, health care, and also estate planning and some legal steps to consider. And finally, we’ll wrap it up with next steps for you and your family. So please feel free to ask questions as we go here today. So why is this important? So, let’s start with the big picture. So, retirement isn’t just a financial milestone. It’s a life transition that’s going to affect the entire family. Nearly 7 and 10 Americans ages 50 to 74 do not have a formal retirement plan. So, what we are seeing there is a really big percentage of Americans that really don’t know exactly what their retirement is going to look like. So that can certainly cause some misunderstandings, maybe some uncertainty about what that future will entail for them. , and that’s part of what we’re trying to discuss here today is really, you know, set a picture of what that retirement is going to look like with you and share that with your loved ones and your significant other to make sure that everybody is on the same page. So, the choices that we make today are going to influence our relationships, our lifestyle, our financial security, and our legacy. So, we want you to think beyond the numbers and really how do our values and family dynamics shape our retirement vision. So, we really want you to consider what does a successful retirement look like for you and your loved ones. Open communication, open conversations now can prevent misunderstandings and stress later once you are closer to retirement. So that discussion is really going to go for both couples and your families. You know, knowing what both couples want to do with their time in retirement as it’s going to allow you to establish a plan that is going to be able to meet both of your needs in retirement. and recently we came across work with some people that one of their starting to understand what retirement looks like for them and one of the spouses shared that they wanted to do a certain activity and the other spouse wasn’t aware that that was actually something that they plan to do with their time. So, it really opened up an honest conversation and sort of a surprise between the both of them that they weren’t really on the same page. So having those discussions early can help you plan and have a better idea of what both of you would like to do in your retirement. So, we also want you to ask what concerns or hopes do you have in retirement that you haven’t shared with your family? How do you think that retirement is going to change your family’s daily life? So, over the next decade or so we’re going to have a really big demographic shift here in the United States. And by 2030, all baby boomers are going to be older than age 65. And seniors are going to make up over 21% of the US population. And of that, 51% of retirees say spending time with family was important in their decision to retire and 17% actually retired in part due to care for extended family members. So great, we can jump to the next section here. So, retirement lifestyle and personal goals. So, retirement is going to be the opportunity for you to design the life that you want. You’re really going to want to ask yourself, what do I want my days to look like? And how do I want to spend my time? So, I really want you to think about what’s that ideal day going to look like? Who do you want to spend time with? , are you going to be spending time with your immediate family? , are there hobbies that you would like to incorporate? , so I know for me, you know, I really enjoy spending time with my family. , I have two young nephews, , who are three and two. , and they’ve just really been a joy to watch grow up. So, for me to be able to spend time with them as they grow, certainly something that I want to be able to do. And as my parents age, I really want to be able to spend time with them while they’re still, you know, physically able to do a lot of things, do the things that we like. So that’s something that’s really important. And from a hobby standpoint, you know, I’m a big golfer, so I love to golf. A lot of my family likes to golf. So being able to golf with them would certainly be something that I would like to incorporate. So, how does this all fit into your current financial plan? So, really, you can go to the next slide here. So, once we really have that vision set of what your retirement and your ideal day is going to look like, we have a couple things here, to go through. So, you have that vision set. Then, we’re going to be looking at goals and then also an action plan. So, if you notice, we really haven’t talked about money yet, and that’s intentional. So, your financial resources are going to be tools that support your goals and not the starting point. So, you want to make sure that you set clear, actionable goals and stay disciplined in any of those goals that you have set for yourself. So, we want you to consider, you know, establishing smart goals. So, this process is really going to involve setting goals that are specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and timebound. So, by using this process, this is going to help you stay on track and really increase the likelihood of you achieving those goals that you have set out to accomplish. So, once we have that vision, we have the goals set, the next step would be to look at what actions need to take place. So, what actions do you need to do now to be able to accomplish those retirement goals that you have set out for yourself? So, what we’ve been seeing a lot lately are more individuals that are wanting to retire early., so the average retirement age in the United States currently is about 64 for men and 62 for women. So, when we get a situation where retirement, early retirement is an attribute that they would like to do, it really requires a well-thought-out plan because you now have to plan for a longer retirement period. So, what that means is you’re also likely planning for more resources to be able to fund that retirement. So, that may include some actions today for people to be able to do that, such as sacrificing some spending today, maybe instead of taking a large trip or a grand trip, maybe you take a smaller trip to be able to increase those savings and fund that future retirement. and Jonathan also has another suggestion for people to consider as well. Yeah, great u great points there, Paul. You know, in talking with individuals, those that I would say have entered into retirement and done retirement what we would say successfully, right? Made that successful transition. I think a commonality there is they look at moving into retirement not as retiring from something but retiring to something, and that’s an important distinction. I know certainly there are plenty of times as we are entering into retirement, it is a bit of a relief of stepping away maybe from the nine-to-five or from the obligations of a career or a job. But it’s just as important too, as you talked about, Paul, to have that vision of what you’re retiring to. And so have encouraged individuals to practice retirement. And I know that that might sound a little crazy on the surface, but what I mean by that is think of like an extended vacation. Hopefully more than one week. I think it can take longer than that but think two weeks or more of kind of a station of staying there, you know, where you plan to retire and just practicing being retired. What does your day-to-day look like? Creating a routine and seeing how you enjoy that. You know what we found is some individuals find, you know, there there’s really something missing from my daily routine. I’ve gotten bored fairly quickly. but it helps to know that on the front end, you know, before you enter into retirement. Again, practice makes perfect or at least helps you prepare. And so, having a little bit of a practice run to see what would retirement look like, can be really helpful as we as you make that transition into retirement. So, with that, we’re going to move on to our next section here on living and housing. we’ve actually got few a few areas I’m going to cover. And you know, as we enter into this section, I wanted to share with you some research I found out about gosh, it’s been over two decades ago. but around late 90s MIT that we’re all familiar with they created a really unique division as part of their engineering department it was a division that they called their age lab and so the purpose of that age lab and that division that they created I’ll quote here it is it was to invent new ideas and creatively translate technology into practical solutions that improve people’s health. So, really fascinating kind of focus there that they had. And as they were developing their research and summarizing their research, I love the way that they summarize that. It’s three really simple questions. And the way that they describe these questions are here are three questions to assess how prepared you are to quote live well in retirement. And I think, you know, all of us would hope that as we move into retirement that we are living well. And so, they pose these three questions and I I’ll use those to kind of frame our conversation here as we go forward. But if you’re taking notes or if you just want to have a mental image in your mind, the first image that’s associated with this first question that I want you to think of or even sketch out on your paper if you’re if you’re taking notes is the image of a light bulb. Because the first question that MIT created was who will change my light bulbs? And again, I realize that’s a very simple question on the surface, but the point of that was to uncover, you know, the topic that we see here on the screen, and that’s housing. So, what is the cost of your housing situation? Where will you live? And then again, as the light bulb component kind of brings in, how about all of those simple elements, upkeep, home maintenance, things that you do around a home? How will you accomplish those and approach those in the future if there comes a point where you might not be able to do that yourself? And it may not be a light bulb, it may be home maintenance outside the home, lawn or yard work, whatever the case may be. I’m really thinking about how your living environment, your housing environment kind of helps either support that retirement lifestyle that you have or how you may need to plan in order to make sure that you’re addressing that as you move forward. So, I’ll throw a few facts at you. First is around aging in place. 88% of adults aged 50 to 80 say it’s important to remain in their homes as long as possible. Certainly, that’s what I see in talking with individuals. I think most really enjoy their home or they want to be in a home somewhere you know that they own and that they have control over. Second, just housing cost, housing is the largest expense for retirees. It makes up over one-third of the annual budget, 36%. So, from a line-item standpoint, there is no grouping of expenses that are more expensive than housing. And then third, I’ll share with you third fact or statistic here. 70% of older adults will need some form of long-term care and roughly 9 and a half million seniors live in some type of care facility each year. So, with that, I’ll move and we’ll go to the slide around housing options. So, this just covers several different types of housing arrangements. I think we’re all somewhat familiar with these from aging in place all the way to, you know, assisted living, retirement community or even living with family. So, there are pros and cons to all of these. , in fact, I would say, you know, many of you on this call, if you’ve not really thought a lot about this for yourself, , you may have gone through this with a parent or another family member, walked alongside them as they’ve had to make this transition over time from living independently to needing to look at other options from a from a housing and living arrangement. So again, just thinking through, you know, what does future housing look like and how does that housing help support your lifestyle? So, we’re going to move to the second question. I mentioned three questions that the MIT age lab posed. So, we’ve talked about our light bulb question. The second and the second image I want you to think of is an ice cream cone because the second question that the age lab posed was how will I get an ice cream cone? Again, very simple question on the surface, but it was meant to uncover that element of transportation. So, it’s quite chilly where I am today. So, ice cream maybe not quite as appealing. But let’s assume it’s the middle of summer. hot outside. It’s late one evening and you think, gosh, I would love to have an ice cream cone. So, that’s probably something you may think very little about today. You hop in your vehicle; you drive down to the local ice cream parlor or even a fast-food restaurant and fly through the drive-through. But what if you are not able to drive? What if that ability was taken away or you weren’t able to do so? How does again going back to housing a bit? But how does your location the community that you’re in support being able to enjoy, you know, this really simple thing in life of enjoying an ice cream cone? Do you have a walkable community? public transportation available, right? Like what are the things the elements that could help support that? again simple endeavor of going to get an ice cream cone and then we’ll kind of segue too into the third area as well of you know what type of support network do you have around you so that third question or that third area I mentioned so we’ve gone from the light bulb to the ice cream cone and the third question the MIT age lab posed is and in the image I want you to have in mind so think of a place setting you’ve got a dinner plate and a fork and a knife the third question is who will I have lunch with. And so, this really speaks to your social network. And I don’t mean online social networks. We’re all familiar with that, but I mean your actual, you know, nearby acquaintances, nearby family or friends., who will you have near you in retirement that you would be able to call or text and say, you know, let’s go grab lunch? saw a really interesting statistic that said 40% of women over the age of 65 live alone. So that that’s really interesting and again really reinforces the need to have a good network around you of friends or family. I’m actually experiencing the opposite in a way in in my own family. my father, my father-in-law, both widowers. So, they’re experiencing this on the other side, you know, of looking for friends that they can connect with or family to have lunch with. So, important element to think about, right? Who are those nearby that you can go grab lunch with and connect with on a daily, weekly, kind of monthly basis. So, those are the three questions. You know who will change my light bulbs? How will I get an ice cream cone? And who will I have lunch with? You see that that third question there on the bottom of the screen. How have you communicated this to your loved ones? And that goes, you know, directly back to kind of the core of what we’re talking about today with retirement being a family affair. It’s very likely you’ve got a pretty clear picture or if you don’t, you can certainly get one a clear picture of, you know, how you might tackle each of these areas, what retirement may look like. But then the challenge is you need to take that and communicate it. Communicate it to, you know, your spouse and a significant other. Communicate it to children or other family members. Make sure that you’re on the same page. I’m reminded of a story I heard years ago and talking with a couple situation was the wife had retired a few years earlier. It had kind of had that time period of being retired and being at home. The husband was about to retire. So, he was entering into retirement. We were just talking about what retirement looked like, kind of what that would be like on a daily and a weekly basis. And the husband made a comment something along the lines of, “Well, I’m really looking forward to retirement. Really looking forward to having lunch every day with my beautiful wife.” Or something along those lines. And I’ll never forget she turned to him and with really a grin on her face said honey I when we said our vows I promised that that I would be there for better and for worse, but I didn’t say for lunch. And so, it was really funny as they both laughed about that. You know she had a routine. She had kind of retirement life that she was living and he was entering into that routine that she was already accustomed to. So again, that just reinforces the need for good communication, and it may not be between spouses. It may be between, you know, yourself and adult children, you may have grandchildren, you may have again really clear vision of how you want to spend time with them, but really important to bring them in the loop on those conversations as well and make sure that you’ve got that that shared vision. So, I’ll move now to the screen which you know really talks about the flip side of you know what if you’re not proactive in those conversations. what’s the risk in waiting and there certainly is one. I mean, you know, says it pretty clearly. Do you want to be part of the decision or do you want the decision to be made for you? I mentioned earlier, many of you watching today that are with us may have gone down some of these same paths and had some of these same experiences with parents or older loved ones. And no one likes to be in the position of having to make decisions for others. And so that’s why, as I said earlier, I think today’s topic is so important so that you can think through these well in advance. Think about, you know how you want to approach these areas, be proactive about them. You know, the power of being proactive is it’s going to give you more choices. When you’re not proactive and you step into that reactive stage, then you’re going to be limited in your choices often times because the world and the environment that you’re in at that point may dictate a lot of your choices. Think of making a housing change and making a move. If you’re having to sell a home, what does the real estate market look like at that point? If you’re taking that approach more proactively then then you have a little more control versus being forced into some of these very important decisions and financially significant decisions often times as well. So, with that let’s move on to our next section and I’ll be covering this as well. We’re going to move to health care, and you know before we jump into this, I’ll give you another kind of story and another framework that I heard years ago. Many of you may have heard this terminology and these phrases before, but you know it has occurred to me as we talk through these different items. some of these things like a retirement community or you know assisted living or some of those areas that may be the farthest thing from your mind. You may be just prior to retirement or early into retirement and have you know many different things that you’re focused on versus some of these other items. And that really speaks to this framework that I heard years ago. and the way it was structured to think about the different phases of retirement is it divided our retirement time frame and retirement life into three distinct phases. And so, the first was what is called the go-go phase. Then the next is the slow go phase. And then last is the no-go phase. And so pretty self-explanatory on the surface, but I’ll add some color to each of these. The go-go phase, as I mentioned earlier, may be the one that many of you are in just prior to retirement or you’re entering into retirement. You’re in good health. You’re energetic. Looking forward to so many activities, having time to enjoy these activities that maybe you did not have before as you were engaged in your in your career, in your job. And so really looking forward to being a doer to having that activity. And it may be travel maybe world travel, hopping on an airplane and seeing countries and places that you’ve not been able to visit before. I’ve talked with individuals before that are anxious. They said they want to rent an RV and travel the United States and you know that’s their idea of being on the go and having a great retirement. And then others have no desire to travel at all. Their vision is, you know, would love to be at a lake house kind of enjoying each day on the water, having friends and family come and visit them. So, whatever that looks like, that phase is often characterized by activity and doing of some variety. And then we move into the slow go phase. And I think we can all admit that the aging process comes for us all. I’m reminded every morning as I descend the stairs in my house and my knees sound like a bowl of Rice Krispies with the snap, crackle, pop. Aging is coming for us all. And so in in the course of retirement, there is going to be that time frame where we do slow down. And that may be by desire kind of waning. Maybe we’ve been on the go and had a lot of activity or it may be for health and physical reasons which I do think tends to be, you know, one of the main drivers of that. Maybe we’ve got, you know, mobility issues or just something as simple as, you know, gosh, my back pain, you know, I really don’t like long car rides or sitting on an airplane for a long time. Whatever the case is, there is a phase there where we do slow down in retirement. And then that third phase and look admittedly I know none of us really like to talk about the third phase the no-go phase but it’s very likely that that many of us will enter into that phase where again for physical reasons could be health and mobility it could be cognitive we don’t quite know what variety that may come in but there will come a point where we’re we have all slowed down and just are not on the go. we’re more home centric and then that you know relates back to previous discussions of you know really becomes important of what that home environment looks like where are you what kind of access do you have to different types of care so that kind of frames some of the conversation as we lead into this health care discussion and I’ll start here as we think about those three you know phases of retirement medical needs certainly can change and will change over time and through those phases and they’re somewhat unpredictable. We don’t know exactly when we may transition from one phase to another. We don’t know how long each of those phases may take, but I mentioned earlier how housing is the number one line item or grouping of expenses in the budget. Well, you may be able to guess what the number two item is, and that’s healthcare expenses. They’re the second biggest cost in retirement after housing. And this a pretty interesting statistic here or number. So, a 65-year-old retiring in 2025 can expect to spend an average of about $175,000 on health care and medical expenses during retirement. And that’s 175,000 per person. So, if we’re talking about a couple and spouses now and we’re talking $350,000 today that a 65-year-old would spend. So, you know, that that’s a that’s a sizable expense to incur over the course of our retirement years. And so, you can understand why the next statistic which says 80% of retirees are concerned about funding health care costs in retirement. And why wouldn’t you be when you see, you know, numbers and expenses like that. So, certainly important to think about health care costs what those may be. I think the numbers I mentioned, those are good rules of thumb. There are other resources online and elsewhere where you might find calculators or estimators that could give a more tailored kind of detailed or specific projection for you tailored to your situation. Again, though very difficult to predict exactly what our health care needs may be in the future. And so, as we looked at this look at this slide here. So, thinking about what those estimated costs are certainly important. What are the funding sources of those? From retirement assets to, you know, some of you may have access may have contributed to health savings accounts over the years. Long-term care insurance. I’ll pause there for just a moment. You know, I heard the phrase years ago and I like this. I use this myself, which is I don’t know that everyone needs long-term care insurance, but I do know that everyone needs a long-term care plan. And what I mean by a long-term care plan is, you know, one element of long-term care needs is the cost certainly and those can be relatively high depending on, you know, if you’re in some type of a retirement community or an assisted living facility. So, there’s the cost aspect, but the other element is who is providing that care. And so, you know, for those of you or those of us that want to have care provided at home, is that a family member providing that care? You can see there at the bottom of the page, right? Who is providing that care? A family member and there really is no cost to that or are we bringing in outside caretakers and there is certainly a cost associated with that. So, whatever that may be, kind of your idea of that long-term care plan. Again, going back to our theme, have you communicated that to your spouse, significant other? Have you communicated that to your adult children? You know, you may be looking to adult children one day to help provide for your care. Are they able to do that from a financial standpoint? Are they able and will they be able to do that from a geographic standpoint? You know, will you be living nearby where they are? So, there’s not necessarily a one right answer for long-term care. but I think having a good discussion around that and making sure that you know everyone is on the same page as you begin approaching right later years into the slow go and no-go years. I think that’s really important. I’ll hop to our next slide here and so you know wow I know we’re just really uplifting here as we enter into the end of life wishes. So, I’m not going to talk about each of these in a moment. Paul’s going to talk about estate planning. in a little more detail but I do want to touch on a few of these elements here because I do think it’s important to think about what steps can we take now what can we be doing to prepare for health care needs and so you know very simple and this doesn’t have to be you know being in your latter slow go or no-go years but you see there on the bottom left who in your family has access to your healthcare information doctors do they know who your doctors are do they know what prescriptions you take do they have an idea of your health conditions? that may not be quite appropriate at this moment for you to share, but certainly you need to be thinking about that in the future because none of us know when we could have a health crisis of some type and how helpful would it be to have someone alongside us that is familiar with you know again who we see from doctor visit standpoints and just our health history. and then kind of that lower right is someone checking on you regularly. You may live somewhere where you know you’re not having regular contact with family members. Do you have someone you’re checking in with routinely always good to have, you know, someone even if it’s a nearby neighbor if you don’t have family nearby, but someone there to watch out make sure you know if you were to experience an accident at your home or a fall that there’s someone there that that would notice that and be able to help. The last area I’ll I will dig into a little bit is there in the upper right where it says five wishes. So, I want to expand on that. So, this is a really interesting resource. You can research this and yourself and look more into it. The website for this is fivewishes.org. And I will go ahead and give a bit of a disclaimer there. As you visit that site, it mentions that this five wishes and there is a document that they have available that it can be a legal document in some states. I would caution you some states is the key phrase. It is not a legal document in all states. So, do be careful about that and certainly consult with an estate attorney or your lawyer to be sure that you’re handling that well from a legal document standpoint. But the five wishes or the five questions that it poses, I think do a great job of hitting on some of the key areas that you do want to consider here as we, you know, are entering into that no-go phase of life. So, the first wish the first question that is posed is the person I want to make care decisions for me when I can’t. And that ties into healthcare, power of attorney, and some of those end-of-life decisions. Who do you want to be able to speak for you? The second wish is the kind of medical treatment I want or don’t want. and so that gets into, you know, all of those fun topics of ventilators and feeding tubes and, you know, just those medical decisions, what you do and would not want there if you are in that health situation in the future. The third wish is how comfortable I want to be. So that deals with pain relief and just comfort measures, some of those hospice related items that that we’re all familiar with. Wish number four is how I want people to treat me. So, I think that’s particularly important for anyone that’s you know had a family member that’s dealt with cognitive issues, Alzheimer’s or dementia or something along those lines. How do you want people to treat you there? if you’re going through that. Also, for caretakers that may be in your home at some point in the future, how do you want them to treat you? So just having that documented in advance and being able to share that you know with family members well before you are in that situation. And then wish number five, what I want my loved ones to know. And so, this goes to that just messages you would want to communicate to family members there and also you know your wishes for a funeral or memorial service. Gosh what a gift to have those documented and being able to pass those on to your family is any of us who have gone through that to plan those types of arrangements for a family member. You know what a helpful benefit that is that we have someone that has already thought through that and we have a guide as we enter into those into that planning. So, with that on gosh again not necessarily a high note but I’ll Paul, I’ll flip it to you so you can kind of pick up the baton there as we talk about estate planning. Well thank you Jonathan. And so yeah, so to kind of continue along that realm there, so estate planning and legal considerations is our next topic here. So, estate planning is going to ensure that your wishes are honored and your family is protected, so I wanted to share just a few sort of statistics that we found that we found very interesting around estate planning and maybe you know how overlooked sometimes estate planning can be. So, 56% of Americans believe estate planning is important, but only 45% have documented their end-of-life plans. So as Jonathan’s mentioned, you know, we know this isn’t the most exciting topic. Unfortunately, it’s something that we will all experience one day. and you know, having an estate plan that is set out for you can help alleviate some of those concerns. I know from my family my parents always hate talking about that day someday and they tend to avoid it. So, it’s very interesting. And another one is only 24% of Americans have a will in 2025 and that is actually down from 40% in 2016. So, we’re actually seeing a decline in the number of Americans that have a will., and 35% of US adults say they or someone they know have experienced a family conflict due to lack of estate planning. So once again, as this webinar has sort of touched on, you know, have you shared your estate planning desires or your wishes with family members? , you know, typically when those situations come about or nearing end of life can be a very stressful time on a lot of families, all family members, things like that. So having clarity around what you want to have happen with your estate planning and how your family fits into that can really be a benefit and sort of one less thing that you know family members would have to worry about going through a really tough time. And lastly, there’s going to be a huge wealth transfer over the next couple decades here. And it’s estimated that over $105 trillion will transfer in the United States over the next 25 years and $2.5 trillion alone in 2025. So, we’re really talking a lot of assets that are going to move hands here over the next couple decades explaining some of that importance around having that estate plan updated and documented as you would like to see. So, we really recommend, you know, as the slide suggests here, reviewing and updating your estate plan regularly. Typically, we would say at least every 5 years, you know, get out those documents, dust them off, read through them. You’re going to obviously want to include in your estate plan, you know, wills, trusts, any power of attorneys for health care or property, and also that living will. you know review those. Make sure that the executor’s named is someone that you would like to have or be in that position and also name those successors or alternates just in case that executor is unable to assume that role that you have other people there that can step into that situation for them. Same goes with trust. You know naming successor trustees. We always want to make sure with trust that the person named is someone that you would like in that capacity that is trustworthy. Naming successors in case that person’s no longer around or is no longer able to fill that role for you. So, power of attorneys, we’ll touch a little bit more on that here on the next slide. and as Jonathan sort of touched about in the previous slide there, you know, living wills end of life wishes, things like that. Make sure those documents are updated. and have expressed your desires around those treatments. So, once you have all of that estate plan updated and reviewed, if you have any necessary updates, you know, be sure to consult with your attorney on those updates, making sure that those are made. Another important item with that too is to make sure that those documents we kind of have talked about sharing this stuff with your family. Make sure that those documents or your family members know where to find them. You know, obviously there’s going to be a copy with the attorney, but where could they potentially find them at your house if they were needed? maybe specifically that power of attorney for healthcare, you know, if somebody needs to act fast or the power of attorney for property, you know, can they find those documents and can they use them rather quickly so in case a decision needs to be made in and times of importance. So, once you have that estate plan reviewed and updated, the next step would be to update beneficiaries. So obviously beneficiary designations, they’re going to operate by the contract or that beneficiary designation attached to that asset. So those are going to be treated a little differently than the will. So, you’re going to want to make sure that those beneficiary designations are updated in accordance with how you would like your estate to pass. so you’re going to want to update life insurance, annuities, any transfer on death accounts. You’re also going to want to make sure retirement accounts, any 401ks, IRA, Roth IAS, all of those accounts that those beneficiary designations are aligned with your estate plan. And then lastly, another option or thing to consider with your estate plan is an ethical will. So, this is really going to be something that allows you to express your values, lifelong lessons, maybe important things that you learned that you want family members or loved ones to know and perhaps continue your legacy. So, these sort of items will you know be passed along and allows the family members to understand really what was important to you and how can they continue to honor you after you are no longer with us. So that sort of leads into the next slide here talking on power of attorneys for property. So, these power of attorneys, they’re going to allow people to transact or, you know, make decisions related to property or assets that you own. That agent would be able to step in and act in on your behalf. So, you’re going to want to use the statutory forms when possible. You have the option to make these effective immediately, upon, you know, the document being signed or upon a physician certification., and Jonathan, I know you wanted to have a couple comments there on that. Yeah, that’s a really common question I hear individuals, pose and a topic they want to talk through. I think there are some that really prefer to have that control. And so, I think you know the latter of those two options of you know requiring a physician to certify for example that you know you are not cognitively able to kind of conduct your own affairs. That’s the lean that some people have. I would just say you know be aware that if that if you do go that route that can cause a delay. Because as Paul was saying let’s say someone needs to act on your behalf pretty quickly. There is a legal process, you know, check boxes, so to speak, that you have to go through to have that certification issued by a physician. And then, you know, candidly, there are also times when, you know, there’s a conflict within a family. You may not feel like you are at the point that you need to have someone step into your shoes financially and conduct business on your behalf. Your family members may feel like that they do need to take that step. And so, you know, we’ve created a conflict there. So again, not to say one option is right or wrong. But just be really cognizant and you know if you do have family members very close friends that you would feel comfortable naming immediately right that as soon as you sign that document and you would trust that they would only act on that when it’s in your best interest. That can certainly be more efficient, more quick be able to address needs more quickly if and when they arise. Thanks. Those are great points. So, you also want to name multiple successor agents. Once again, just like the wills or the trust, you know, other people that could step into that role should the primary not be able to act in that capacity. And then another item, this is sort of newer more recently that this has been included is digital asset authority. So, what that is going to allow is for people to be able to access devices or social media things like that that somebody may have set up. So, it’s going to be able to give that agent access to those accounts. You know, potentially maybe you want to shut down a Facebook page or a Twitter X, something like that. it’s going to be able to give you access to be able to access those accounts from their behalf. So, the power of attorney for healthcare and advanced directive. This, as we sort of touched on, this is going to empower the others to be able to make medical decisions over really what could be potentially a long period of time. , maybe you’re dealing with somebody that has dementia or something like that. , those could tend to last, you know, several years. , in a situation like that, , it’s also going to include power to withhold or withdraw life sustaining treatment. that kind of goes in with the living will. It’s also going to be able to declare your desires for those life sustaining treatments without the agent having to make that decision. So, it’s going to be able to give them some guidance around truly what did you want to have happen so that can be extremely helpful there around a really stressful time period. So, you also want to make sure to provide copies of those power of attorney for health care and the living will to a primary physician. and we really want to make sure you know have you had these conversations sort of this webinar here. Have you shared these items with your family members? You know what are your desires as you go into retirement as you advance through retirement? You know Jonathan touched on those go slow go and no-go years. There’s going to be different periods in your lifetime. So, sharing that and having those open conversations can really make sure that there are no misunderstandings and can provide clarity to family members, make them feel more comfortable that they know what is going to happen as you age. So, you know, we really think, you know, have you had these conversations with your family members, your spouse and you know, what questions may you have about that process? So, I know Jonathan here has some next steps and some other considerations here. Yeah. So, we certainly covered a lot of ground but let let’s say you’ve been a great student today. You’ve taken notes. you’ve, you know, really thought through all of these areas we’ve talked about and you’ve got your thoughts, your decisions together even and you say, “Well, you know, this is great, but I know again based on our theme, I need to communicate this to my family. How do I go about doing that?” Well, one way to do that is very creatively named a family meeting. And so, h what does a family meeting look like? How would you approach that? So, I’ve had the pleasure to be involved in some of these types of meetings in the past. The first thing I’ll tell you is no two family meetings are the same. And so, what you see here on the screen are just some ideas or some you know elements to a family meeting that you may want to include. So, I would say first of all really think through what you do and do not want to cover in the family meeting. What I mean by that is you may be very comfortable sharing all of the details of your financial life. for example, maybe you’re meeting with adult children. You may feel very comfortable sharing those details. here are how many dollars I have in these certain accounts, or you may not. And again, that’s fine. Just think about again on the front end what you do and do not want to share. But I think some key elements of what can be helpful in a family meeting sharing about your retirement plan. And so, giving some information of what your financial standing is, that could be as broad as saying, you know, we’ve done a great job of preparing for retirement. We feel very comfortable, kids, that we’re well prepared for retirement. You know, we do not feel like we’re going to need to rely on you for help, in retirement. You may think that is a given. You may be very comfortable with that. I’ll tell you from experience, there are many families where there is some angst or some concern for that second generation. They are not sure where mom and dad stand financially. And so just being you know taking the lead in communicating that to your family can be very helpful. Likewise, if you’re in a position where you do think you may need help, communicating that early as well can be very helpful. U and then you see the other areas here, key decisions to make, healthcare and legal steps. you know these are u heavy topics at times but maybe you’ve gone through the process for example legal steps you’ve gone through the process you’ve updated those estate documents that Paul talked about there may come a point where you want to sit down with family and explain to them who you have named in certain roles and you know make sure that they understand what role they will play at some point make sure they are comfortable with that ideally run that by them before you have gone to the trouble of creating that that document and compensating an attorney to draft it. But good communication around those documents and those decisions and legal documents are fantastic. They’re absolutely a necessity, but they don’t always tell the whole story. So having a good conversation around those, explaining the reasoning behind maybe some of the decisions you’ve made, that can be helpful, can help alleviate conflict in the future among family members. The last tip I will give you is I think oftentimes I have seen families feel like you know gosh a great time to have this family meeting would be around the holidays. You know we’ve got everyone gathered together. What more efficient way you as we’re all gathered around the proverbial dinner table to really talk through some of these issues. If I could I would caution you against that. I would say if you can if possible, and I know logistics can make it challenging, but try to find a separate time. Try to find a standalone time, communicate to those that you want at the meeting that you know you’ve got some important topics you want to discuss. and do that outside of the holidays just so that you know you don’t have that time of the holidays, you know, kind of captured with some of these discussions. My last tip is that don’t be surprised if a family meeting is actually family meetings plural. because this is a lot to cover and it may take more than one meeting. You may want to discuss some segment of these topics at a first meeting, or you may cover all of them and then have follow-up questions whether that’s from your family that you’re meeting with, or they may have questions for you after they’ve had time to think through these issues. So, don’t feel like it’s a one meeting, you know, you’re locked into having one meeting. No reason, you can’t do it over multiple meetings and hopefully make it, you know, where you’ve entered into a good conversation with everyone. So, let’s move on from here. We’ll talk more about next steps. So, just kind of a recap of a bit of what we’ve talked through. assessing your retirement goals, you know, creating that retirement vision that Paul talked about, what you want retirement to look like, thinking through the financial aspect of that of a budget, income that’s coming in, expenses, that that are leaving, reviewing and updating legal documents, and then that lifestyle plan. This kind of goes back to those three questions I mentioned from the MIT age lab, but thinking about what your housing plans are both now and how are you preparing that those may need to change at some point in the future. How are you going to get around transportation wise? Certainly, you know how you get from place to place today, but how might that change, and you know how does your location or the community you live in kind of influence that or provide you more options or possibly fewer options? And then last who will make your health care decision. So, this crosses, you know, several of the topics that we’ve talked about, but who is your nearby network? Who can you rely on? And who are the person or persons that you want to put in a position to make some of those really important health care decisions as you go forward. All right. So, you’ll see there in the in the chat section there is a link that you can click on and schedule a 15minute call if you would like. It may be that some topic that we’ve talked about today, you say, you know, I’m really not as confident as I want to be about the financial aspect of retiring or about, you know, some of these legal considerations in decisions I need to make. Whatever the case is, maybe you feel pretty comfortable with those, but you would just like a second opinion. Whatever the case is, I would encourage you to click that link. We would be happy to talk to you here at Savant. a quick phone call, no obligation or anything like that, but it would be our pleasure to talk with you, answer the questions that you’ve got if we can be a resource for you. So, with that, we’re going to look at some of the questions that we have had submitted. Let me check our Q&A here. So, I will disclaim, we will not have time to answer all of these questions today. So, if you don’t get your question answered, I apologize, but let’s look through here, let’s see. Paul, this looks like a good one here for you. So, it says, “At what life stage do you encourage people to begin sharing retirement and estate plan details with family members?” I think that’s a great a great question there. And you know I think that can really depend on family dynamics and obviously the comfort as you just mentioned there around sharing those details with family. But I’d say for like retirement or something like that, you know, at least having that discussion with a spouse, you know, maybe several years before you actually retire. Like we said, you know, be able to share with them what, you know, what is important to you. Maybe there’s something that the other spouse really isn’t aware of. It’s going to allow you more time to be able to plan should there be a change that needs to be made. Maybe someone wants to travel more. Maybe someone doesn’t want to travel. So being on that same page is going to allow you to maybe plan a little bit more. And then I’d say sort of surrounding family members with that. You know, maybe after you and your spouse have, you know, decided on what you want to do when you want to retire, maybe a few years before you actually retire, really share that with family. You know, involve them in that and what you would like to have happen because that’s going to then allow them to plan a little bit. You know, I know you mentioned before maybe caring for grandchildren or something like that. You know, that can be a really big help to adult children. It’s going to be able to give them more time. Maybe it’s also going to maybe release some financial strain on them. So, it just is nice there to have that whole family sort of picture there. understanding of what’s going to happen. And then I think the other piece was about estate planning. So that’s another one that can really vary. I would say there, you know, maybe after you’re in retirement and once you have really that firm estate plan laid out really what you want to have happen and what you’re comfortable with, you know, having those discussions or that family meeting as you mentioned there with u with your family members and sharing that. So, you know, that could be anywhere from a few years after retirement to maybe in your later 70s or something like that. The other little item that I would think of too is if there’s impending health concerns, , you know, if there’s some health concerns on the horizon, maybe sharing that estate plan with your family members sooner rather than later would be more of a prudent decision there, you know, I like to think of, you can share too late, but you can never share too early. Yeah, great, great points. Paul, I’ll kind of piggyback off of that. Some other questions here around those family meetings, so someone asked, I’ll summarize, you know, thoughts on one-on-one meetings with family members as opposed to a family meeting. So, I’ll say again, as you’ve mentioned, you know, before, Paul, every family is different. There is not a one-size fits-all approach to this. And so, you know, if it works out well to have all of your family members together, that’s great. But if not, you know that you know if you have someone in your family that it would be best to talk with one-on-one or maybe you have individual meetings and then follow that with a family meeting. You know, really it’s a blank slate for you to create whatever works best for you in your family as you go about that. I do think though that you know having that good communication is really key. Paul mentioned the estate plan and estate documents. I think back to a story years ago where a parent had named one of their children. I believe they had three children. They had named a middle child as their personal representative, their executive to kind of handle their estate. And the older child, you know, always, you know, kind of wondered why did they not, you know, why did they not name me? Why, you know, I’m the oldest. Sometimes we sort of think that’s a bit of a birthright there of, you know, why would they not have named me, you know, and in thinking through that, you know, what the thought that I had offered was, you know, it may have just simply been for geographical purposes. The second, you know, the middle child lived nearby where the parents were. May not have been any more complicated than that. And so sometimes just simple things like that that again you may take for granted as you’re making decisions but not taking time to explain those to family members can create a bit of a riff or you know a conflict later on. So again, feel felt like we’re beating a dead horse at this point but just good really good communication goes a long way and sometimes in ways that you can’t really even predict. All right, back to our Q&A. Paul, let’s see, here’s a good – This area comes up often in retirement planning, but not one we really touched on today. So, it says if I’m considering moving states in retirement, what suggestions would you have? You have thoughts on that, Paul? Yeah, that’s a good one. So, we do get that quite often., so I would say here, you know, a lot of what people tend to look at, are just state income tax rates. So obviously that’s going to be a big important player, but there’s also a lot of other decisions. , and some of those qualitative , that I think people need to take into account. , so you know what when you are making that shift there or that potential shift, you know, what are the costs of living down there? Are there changes in property taxes? Is there a different sales tax and even gasoline tax? Those can be heavily different and can add up overtime to a part of somebody’s budget. and then on the more qualitative side, how about do you have a network? Do you have people that live where you are going to move to? Is there family? Do you have friends? You know, having that network and people to hang out with or do or spend time with can really have a big impact on, you know, what your retirement is going to look like and who you’re going to spend your time with. Actually, some other ones I can think back to is if you’re moving away and then you are traveling back home quite often, maybe your family is still where you were residing before you moved. You know, anticipating for travel costs, airfare, how are you going to get back and forth, especially as you age. , so I think all of those are important and kind of leads into two about the healthcare and things like that. If you do move to a different state and maybe family isn’t around, do you have someone there that can help take care of you should you start to need that care if you’re further away from home? So yeah, a lot of things to consider around that topic. Great point. Yeah, that kind of ties in a lot of the things we talked about having a network around you and the housing decision and considerations. I’ll stay on the theme another question around housing. What considerations should someone think of if they are thinking about buying a second home in retirement? We may tag team this one, Paul. So, I’ll state the obvious first is the cost of the second home, right? What is that cost? And making sure that you can financially, you know, afford that purchase. And it’s not just the price of the home or the property itself, but it’s also the upkeep, right? The maintenance costs. really having a good idea of what those are. Everything from property taxes to insurance to utilities and maintenance and right all of those wonderful things that come with home ownership. What else comes to your mind, Paul? I know I’m overlooking something. Yeah. And I can think too, you know, if it’s if it’s more of, let’s say, a vacation property, you know, realistically, and kind of going back to having discussions with family members, maybe you anticipate your family members joining for trips and things like that. So, how often will you actually use that second home? You know, could it make more sense for you to actually u maybe rent a property where you’re going? You know, if you’re only going to spend, you know, a couple weeks a year there versus having the big expense of purchasing a property. The other item, too, would be sometimes we hear, well, I would help or I would rent the property to try to be able to help pay for those costs. So, you know, there’s continuing costs of having a second home so some of the considerations around that would be, you know, are you willing to rent it in sort of prime season? You know, a lot of times what I like to think of is, you know, a lot of the times when you want to, let’s say, go to the beach or something like that, you probably want to go around those more popular times, which tend to be the times that you can charge more for your place. , and then also, you know, maybe in the off season, are you going to be able to get rentals or things like that depending on where in the country you are, , and the weather surrounding that. But also, then the being a landlord, you know, is that something that you want to deal with if you buy a place and it could get beat up over time. So just some of the differences with that, you know, and just other items that may not be considered when you, you know, go to purchase a second home. So, and maybe too, maybe you vacation to that place for a longer period of time before you actually physically make that big purchase of a new home. Make sure you’re buying in the right area that you want. items like that. Yeah, great points. The housing theme continues here. Let’s see. We’ve got a next one. What are retirement community considerations for someone thinking that they may move to one at some point in the future? Yeah, Paul, you want to take jump start that one? Yeah. So, we certainly get that question a lot and you know, where I live, there’s a lot of different retirement communities here. So, you know, some of the considerations there would be obviously the biggest cost up front is going to be the entrance fee. So, are you looking to remain in single living? Do you want your own property? Would you rather have an apartment? Be closer to everybody else? So, those are going to tend to have different costs. An apartment being less expensive than having maybe your own place or your own unit to yourself. Then you get into sort of a discussion around the monthly fees. So, typically with being in a more of a single-family home or residence, you’re going to have a higher monthly fee than being in an apartment. , so when you do go to those, communities and things like that, ask them what has been their historical inflation. We always like to ask that question on those monthly costs because that can be a surprise to people because they tend to outpace , you know, typical inflation because there maybe is a medical element to that being part of sort of a continuing care retirement community. , and then also ask the questions, what do those monthly costs cover? Are there going to be any additional costs if you need additional care? If so, what are those? So, you can plan for those so that you know from a financial perspective you know what might be needed around that. And then some other considerations that come to mind are if you have a long-term care policy, I know you touched on this, how does that fit into moving into a continuing care retirement community? Can it help cover some of the, you know, costs associated with needing additional care? How does that work? So, those are all questions that if you were to meet with a retirement community, questions that you would want to ask. , and then on the flip side, there’s a lot of benefits and I always remember one of the stories individuals that we had they wish they would have moved to a retirement community sooner. And the reason was that there’s a lot of people there that have, you know, similar interests or of similar age. So, they were able to make a lot more friends. , they also really enjoyed the activities and the events and potentially group trips that were scheduled with the community. So, it just really added an element that they couldn’t really do on their own. So, a lot of planned vacations. They ended up meeting a lot of friends and they always said to us, you know, we wish we would have did this earlier when we were healthier. Yeah, that that’s interesting, isn’t it? Yeah. I think anyone that’s a social person and enjoys that social interaction. Oftentimes they, you know, can be surprised how much they enjoy that retirement community, even someone that might not have necessarily been looking forward to that. Great points. I’ll add, you know, to that kind of going back to previous slide where we talked about making some of these decisions proactively. You, many times the more popular well maybe the best so to speak retirement communities in any city can have a waiting list. And so, if there’s a particular type of unit and a size or you know just a particular community that you want to be in again going back to the point of you know if you’re reactive in that you know kind of that decision is being forced upon you so to speak because you’ve delayed that decision. You may not have the exact option that you want, but entering into that proactively can be a big benefit. You get on a waiting list that could be 12 18 months or more at times, but going ahead and getting on that waiting list and making that move proactively allows you more control over where you will be. So, great. Well, we’re going to do one more here. Our time is running out. I’ll do one last question. Paul, you mentioned long-term care insurance. So, there’s a question here. It says, should long-term care insurance be purchased before retirement or after retirement? I’ll just say that there’s really no perfect time necessarily. The one seed I will plant to think about though is, you know, as you’re progressing from your working years into retirement, it may be that you also need to transition your insurance dollars as well. And what I mean by that is while our earning years are happening, we’re maybe spending dollars on life insurance and disability insurance, but certainly with disability insurance, as our reliance on that earned income diminishes and ultimately goes away as we’re able to retire, you can what I’ll say repurpose those insurance dollars, maybe direct those towards long-term care insurance because our risk is going to shift. Our risk goes from, you know, being unable to work and earn dollars, to, you know, having a health care event and maybe having some significant expenses associated with that. So, I don’t know that there’s necessarily a right time pre- or post-retirement. Oftentimes, it’s late 50s to 60s, you know, mid60s or so, somewhere in that time frame that most individuals begin thinking about long-term care insurance. So, if you’re interested in that, I would always encourage anyone to go out and explore that. But, you know, certainly again thinking back to just that transition of insurance dollars as you approach that new phase of life. So, all right. Well, our time is up for today. Again, thanks to all of you that attended. We appreciate you spending time with us today. We hope it’s been helpful. And again, don’t hesitate to click that link in the chat feature there. Reach out, schedule a quick call with someone at Savon if we can be a resource to you. So, thanks again for attending and we hope that you have a great day. Thanks everybody.

If you enjoyed this webinar, visit savantwealth.com/guides and download our complimentary guidebooks, checklists, and other useful financial resources.