Retirement Planning in 2025: What Expert Financial Advisors Won’t Tell You

Your retirement consultant in Fresno CA will explore how retirement planning is more complex than most advisors let on. The standard advice suggests you’ll need 70% to 90% of what you make now through savings and Social Security. This means someone making $63,000 a year should plan to live on $44,000 to $57,000 yearly after retirement.

Most financial advisors don’t mention their service fees right away. Their AUM fee usually runs about 1%, and this can eat into your retirement savings quickly. A custom financial plan costs between $1,200 and $3,000. Online financial advisors charge less because they have fewer expenses.

The real cost of retirement in 2025

The cost of a comfortable retirement keeps climbing higher. U.S. adults now think they need about $1.46 million to retire comfortably, based on Northwestern Mutual’s 2024 Planning & Progress Study. That’s a 15% increase from last year and a dramatic 53% jump since 2020. Each generation has its own retirement expectations:

Gen Z: estimates needing $1.63 million

Millennials: estimates needing $1.65 million

Gen X: estimates needing $1.56 million

Boomers: estimates needing $990,000

Right now, U.S. adults have saved just $88,400 on average. This huge gap between what people expect and what they have saved should raise red flags.

Financial professionals often skip some crucial retirement realities that go beyond basic savings targets. Long-term care costs top the list of planning factors that advisors overlook.

The numbers tell a concerning story about private long-term care insurance. Just 3-4% of Americans over 50 have coverage. This gap raises red flags since 70% of people 65 and older will need critical services before death.These policies, even when available, cost too much or come with strict qualification rules.

Most people don’t realize that Medicare won’t cover most long-term care needs. The yearly costs in 2024 paint a stark picture:

$70,800 for assisted living (private one-bedroom)

$111,325 for a semi-private nursing home room

$127,750 for a private nursing home room

Smart planning moves you can make now

Smart retirement planning adapts to market conditions through multiple strategies. Your best defense against market volatility and inflation is diversification. This means putting your money in different types of investments that react differently to market conditions—stocks might go down while bonds go up, or the other way around.

A “bucketing” strategy can help you organize your assets more effectively. Your investments should be divided into specific time-based goals:

Short-term bucket: Money needed in the next 3-5 years, invested in cash equivalents and short-term bonds

Intermediate bucket: Funds for the next 5-10 years, allocated to longer-term bonds and certain stocks

Long-term bucket: Growth investments that continue building throughout retirement

A flexible withdrawal strategy helps you balance current spending with future savings. The traditional 4% rule isn’t set in stone—you can adjust your withdrawals based on how your portfolio performs, taking less during market downturns and more during good times.

Conclusion

We have a strong team of professionals helping ensure you receive all the assistance you need not only in developing your retirement income strategy, but in maintaining it throughout your retirement. Contact us today at 559-230-1648 or visit us today at Soutas Financial to see how we can help you Retire ”Your Way!”

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