Retirement Planning

 

 

Retirement Planning

The decisions you make when retiring are incredibly important as they will influence not only your retirement and wealth for the rest of your life but also the lives of your family.

When considering your retirement options there will be products and information that may be new to you such as drawdown and annuity. Making major financial decisions alone can be overwhelming and very confusing.

At Howard Wright, we understand that every client’s ideal retirement is unique.

Some of the key things to consider when selecting options for your retirement income are:

  • Your desired level of income for your lifestyle in retirement.
  • Would you like an element of guaranteed income in retirement?
  • How healthy are you today and the affect that this will have on your pension income in retirement?
  • What income security would you like for your spouse’s income if you were to pass away before them? 
  • The effect of inflation on your retirement income.
  • • Planning for life’s future surprises, family events, holidays of a lifetime, or that one retirement present you’ve always promised yourself and understanding how this will impact your retirement plan.

Annuities

Pension annuities provide a guaranteed income for life; however, this is not as straightforward as it seems.
You will need to decide if you wish your income to increase each year and be payable to a dependant in the event of your death and if this means a reduction in the level of income. All of these choices will impact the level of income that you will receive from your Annuity.

Annuities can be underwritten based on your health (enhanced annuities) and you should always compare the market to maximise the level of income you may receive.

If an annuity is appropriate for you it is generally advisable that you should reduce the investment risk within your portfolio as you approach retirement. This will negate large investment fluctuations as you draw near to retirement.

Drawdown

As annuity rates are near all-time lows, some of our clients prefer to leave their capital invested and draw a regular income, this is known as drawdown. Drawdown enables you to retain flexibility over your pension options and allows you to delay purchasing an annuity until you feel that an annuity provides value for money.

The drawback to having flexibility is that your Pension fund remains invested. This means that if investment returns are poor or there is a substantial fall in the value of your investments, then there is the chance that your fund could deplete before your life expectancy.

At Howard Wright, we provide a range of risk-focused actively managed investment portfolios designed to assist our clients in achieving their income objectives in retirement.

If Drawdown is suitable for you, then there is usually no need to reduce the level of investment risk you are taking before your retirement.
Further considerations may need to be made if you intend to withdraw a tax-free cash lump sum.

Your existing arrangements need to be reviewed to ensure that they offer drawdown if this is to be an option to be considered.

Retirement Options Report

To help simplify the process of your retirement planning, our Chartered Advisers can create a tailored retirement options report for you. This report will highlight all the options available to you, from guaranteed incomes known as annuities to investment linked approaches known as drawdown. One of our Chartered Advisers, will guide you through the report discussing all of the advantages and disadvantages, helping you to truly understand the option or combination of options that will work best for you and your family in retirement. Your Chartered adviser will then recommend and implement a suitable product or range of products to turn your pension savings into a pension income designed to meet your retirement needs and objectives.

What to do next?

To discuss your retirement planning with one of our Chartered Advisers, you can call us on 0345 688 4939 or fill in our enquiry form below, it only takes 20 seconds to complete.

Once you have done this one of our Chartered Financial Planners will then contact you as soon as possible, to discuss our Retirement planning process and how we can help you achieve your goals and objectives.

“I have been a client of Howard Wright for several years and have always been looked after well and been given good advice particularly latterly by Gareth Robinson. I can highly recommend this company”
Mrs S Worrall

“Following my recent annual meeting, I was very pleased to learn that my balanced portfolio has seen investment growth of 10.93% over the last year, even when taking my annual drawdown I was left with a healthy capital growth on top.

I feel that Howard Wright have managed my portfolio extremely well over recent years and i would certainly recommend them”

J Zuanella

“Eleven years ago I retired and not being financially educated I was faced with what was the legal and financial implications in accessing my retirement fund. Initially it was panic stations with the plethora of options and pitfalls to overcome.

At this point I was introduced to the Howard Wright Organisation that was very local. My first meeting quickly unravelled the options available, and without any external pressure I was able to make my decision concerning a Draw Down Option.

Considering the volatile  market and financial nightmares over these past 11 years my decision has been proved correct. They have protected my fund and allowed me to sleep at night by operating a brilliant  flexible system that continually updates me, plus a brilliant start of year meeting so I can assess the way forward for any upcoming period.

We are so pleased with the outcome that when my wife retired she went along the same route”

Mr FJ & Mrs AM Thorneycroft

Testimonials

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