Retirement planning can be a daunting and overwhelming experience, no matter what stage of life you are at. Cockatoo residents looking to plan their retirement know that seeking advice and doing everything in advance is the best way to ensure that your big dreams are met.
Aurora Wealth provides retirement advice to Cockatoo residents, helping them to achieve their retirement goals. We are passionate about seeing our clients gain freedom in their life to focus on what matters to them and what makes them happy.
Our Cockatoo financial advisory team can help you determine the best plan for your retirement.
When you plan on retiring
In Australia, there is no set age for retirement, but there is a minimum age before we can access superannuation or government-issued pensions. Some factors that influence retirement include employment opportunities, health and superannuation plans. Our Cockatoo financial planners can help to strategise your ideal retirement age so you best optimise your working years.
Factors that might go into when you choose to retire include:
- Your health
- Financial situation
- Employment opportunities
- Individual goals
- Superannuation plans
Your current financial position
Your current financial position will be the gauge for what steps you will need to take for future financial planning. Our financial planners can assist by assessing how much is in your savings account, your current assets and investments including super and create a strategy based on your retirement goals. Assets also include considering any debts that you currently have and whether they will carry into retirement. Any debt reduction before retirement will alleviate both financial and mental stress once you no longer receive a disposable income.
Our Cockatoo financial planners can look at consolidating debts, comparing what you owe against what you earn and spend, advisement payment plans to avoid charges, where additional payments can be made and investigate different providers who have lower interest rates and fees.
Your current financial situation will include factors such as:
- How much is in your savings account
- How much you’ve invested, and where it’s invested
- What assets you currently have
- How much is in your super and how that’s invested
Your ongoing spending needs
The amount of money required for retirement differs from person to person based on a variety of factors. There are some key questions you can ask yourself to work out how much money you’ll think you need when you retire.
These include:
- What sort of lifestyle do you want to live in retirement?
- How much income will you need to fund that lifestyle?
- Will you be taking regular holidays? Are they going to be local or international?
- Will you be going out for dinner?
- Would you like to spoil your grandchildren?
- What kind of social activities do you plan to do?
There’s a lot of information out there that will tell you that you need a certain amount of money to retire comfortably. In truth, there is no one size fits all solution, and this figure will depend on you and the lifestyle you want to live. Our Cockatoo financial planners will be able to help you out. A financial planner will be able to help you live out your dream retirement.
Everyone’s dream retirement looks different. Some may want to live simply, while others imagine lavish holidays. Most people don’t want to spend their retirement wondering how they’re going to afford their next bill. Knowing what you want to spend your money on can help you determine how much you’ll need and allows you to budget accordingly. Financial planning is key to living out your dream retirement, talk to one of our financial planners today.
Your housing situation
It’s worth thinking about where you’ll be living during retirement and what events may cause a need to change your housing situation. There are many choices on where to live during retirement, and where you go should depend on the lifestyle that you want to live.
Some common choices for retirees are:
- Downsizing
- Moving to a new location
- Home sharing
- Over 55’s or retirement living
- Aged care
- Caravans and RVs
Each of these options will depend on the lifestyle you want to live, and each has different financial requirements. Knowing where you want to be living during retirement can help you set a budget for how much you’ll be spending on accommodation during this time. This is why working with our financial planners is key when it comes to your retirement planning.
What changes as you get older are how financial planning takes place. For example, you may start in your 20s by putting away a few dollars here and there to set up good habits. Ultimately, there’s no one size fits all solution, but the older you get, the more you should be thinking about the best way to set yourself up for life after work.
An experienced retirement financial planner such as Aurora Wealth will be able to help you create a plan and advise you on where to invest your money, depending on your age, position and goals.
Some of the benefits of having a good retirement plan include:
- Having a plan gives you a measuring stick with which to gauge how you’re going towards achieving your retirement goals and can reduce procrastination. It is also a confidence boost when you see movement towards achieving your goals.
- Planning encourages you to think about timelines. Knowing what age you want to retire will give you a clearer understanding of what you’ll need to work towards and what timeframe.
- It can guide you towards making the right investments. While some are riskier than others, there are times when these risks are a good idea when there is time to make adjustments. Working with financial planners can help you mitigate these risks and invest your money in a way that works with your retirement goals. It is important to speak with registered tax agents about investments while you are still working.
- Working with our Cockatoo financial planners, we can provide a good savings strategy, instead of just putting a chunk of your income into a different account. A savings strategy takes into account your income, superannuation, budget and remaining working years.
Retirement plans ensure you have the finances to have a stable life after you retire from work.
- Setting realistic goals – Our financial planners can help you set realistic saving goals, keeping you on the right path and limiting procrastination.
- Reducing stress – By consulting financial planners, you can reduce the amount of stress you place on yourself by calculating how much you need to retire comfortably. Our Cockatoo financial planners can help clear your mind so you can focus on other things.
- Creating a tailored plan – Financial planning can help you to look at your current situation including income, debts and assets, and create a tailor-made financial plan that takes into account every aspect of your life so you can have the retirement of your dreams.
- Giving you confidence – Financial planning can help you create your retirement plan and helps you to have a clear focus and strategy, giving you the confidence to know that you are on track to financial security in your retirement.
- Expertise – Our lead retirement financial planner, Micheal, has had over 10 years of experience as a financial planner, working with clients in many different financial situations, helping them to reach their financial goal.
- Your current savings – Depending on how much money you have saved for your retirement can result in how comfortably you can spend your money.
- Your lifestyle – Your lifestyle will have a large influence on how long your money lasts. This can include any travelling or holidays you’re planning or your hobbies.
- Your current debts – If you currently have any unpaid debts, you have to consider how much you have to pay off when you aren’t receiving any disposable income.
Our financial planners can help you decide how much you need to have a comfortable retirement and develop a plan to help you achieve that goal.
- Age Pension – more info here
- Pensioner Concession Card – more info here
- Low-Income Health Care card – more info here
- Housing – You will need to consider what payments you will have to make whether you are renting or owning your own home. You will also need to think about any renovations or unexpected repairs that may occur.
- Car – You will need to think about your current car and if it would need any repairs or maintenance in the future or if you would like to purchase a new car.
- Family – You will need to think about your children and family and the financial support you wish to give them in the future.
- Health – You will need to consider any health issues that may arise in the future including appointments and treatments.
- Lifestyle – Your retirement is an opportunity for you to try new experiences and hobbies, as well as continue to enjoy the ones you are currently doing. You will need to consider the cost of these hobbies in your retirement plan.
Providing financial advice is what our Cockatoo financial planners are a great help in when managing your expenses and your income to ensure that you can have financial freedom after you retire.
Our experienced retirement financial advisor
Leading the way at Aurora Wealth is our expert financial advisor, Micheal Anderson. Micheal has worked in the finance industry for 18 years and has spent 15 of these as a financial advisor. He has achieved the designation of Certified Financial Planner and is a registered member of the Financial Planning Association of Australia.
Outside of the office, Micheal is a father to three children and enjoys being outdoors and staying active.
Micheal is passionate about helping all his clients reach their financial goals and hopes to see the result in happiness and fulfilment. At Aurora Wealth, we take a deep dive into your goals and aspirations, creating a personalised retirement plan. We handle your financial planning to help ease the stress off your mind so you can focus on what is important to you. Our financial plans are flexible, changing depending on your needs.
We are based at Narre Warren and service the entire Casey area, including Cockatoo, Dandenong, Lynbrook, Cranbourne, Hallem, Clyde, Keysborough, Doveton and Lysterfield. We can either meet you face to face in our office or in your home or can meet you online on Skype or Zoom.
