Retirement Profiling...

Retirement Profiling is the process we use for establishing your retirement income goal, utilising state of the art technology. The most important part of this process is to think deeply about the lifestyle that you would like to lead throughout your reti

This may involve thought-provoking questions on your dreams for you and your family, whether this is to travel the world or fund a charitable project. This is the fundamental root of your retirement plan, otherwise you have no basis to know how much income you will need! Information is then gathered about the potential sources of retirement income, along with details of your everyday expenditure. The information is then used to determine if your projected retirement cashflow is adequate to fund your needs, and can also highlight possible avenues to help achieve the desired lifestyle in retirement.

Retirement profiling is centered on the use of a lifetime cashflow forecast, which will help determine if the retirement income from all available sources is adequate to provide the required income throughout retirement.

The first stage to retirement profiling is to establish an accurate and realistic retirement income goal. This is done by forecasting future expenditure. Careful consideration needs to be given to all areas of expenditure in order to accurately forecast the desired level of retirement income.

Both day to day expenditure, together with non-regular and large ticket items (such as a new car, children’s wedding, holiday of a lifetime) need to be accounted for. The proper consideration of your financial and personal needs and wants will enable an accurate cashflow forecast to be generated.

All potential sources of retirement income will be incorporated into your cashflow analysis and need not just include pension schemes, but other assets that can also produce capital or income. So as Financial Planners we would look at what your assets are and what they are worth today. We’d take into account likely growth rates (based on your tolerance for risk), adjusted for how inflation will affect you personally. 

Your retirement profile forecast will show expenditure against income, capital and all other available liquid assets on a year by year basis, until age 100 (for example), to ensure all your retirement lifestyle planning needs are considered for the duration of your life. The forecast will help determine if the projected retirement fund (income and capital) is adequate for your needs, based on the personalised assumptions for growth and inflation.

In some cases further planning for retirement may not be possible, due to budgetary restraints. However most people should be able to find ways of improving their investments to get closer to their goals.