MONEY Go Gently Into Retirement
Through careful planning, more people are easing into their post-career lives. ::
BY GREG BROWN R
etirement is a life-changing moment, whether you plan for it carefully or circumstances thrust it upon you. How will you adjust to not working? To a diff erent income
level? To long hours each day unoccupied by work? Some folks avoid the issue at all costs, working until
an employer nudges them out of the picture. Others look forward to that last day on the job, only to fi nd the lack of routine is a tough adjustment. Still others keep working by necessity long into old age.
RETHINK RETIREMENT What if there was another way? What if you could ease
into it instead of traditional retirement in which your work life suddenly comes to an end? Or, if you preferred, what if you could switch gears and try your hand at a totally diff erent career? It’s not only possible — in fact, it’s
becoming commonplace. Baby boomers are changing the notion of what defi nes retirement, says career coach Marc Miller, author of Repurpose Your Career: A Practical Guide for Baby Boomers. “I have a client who hates his job. He
MARC MILLER
makes tons of money but wants to quit. He wants to be his own boss. So, we’re
looking to help him buy a business,” Miller says.
TEST THE WATERS For those already running a business, retirement can
be a diff erent sort of challenge. So much of the life of an entrepreneur is integrated with his or her business that it can be diffi cult to let go, says James Krause, owner of LongShot Golf in Clinton Township, Mich., near Detroit. Krause is slowly giving up responsibilities as he nears
retirement. That means letting go of details, which for a business owner runs counter to every experience of building a successful venture. “When a company is closely held, all of the decisions are kind of in your head. So I bought a database program to offl oad all of the information about all of the big accounts,” Krause says. “Now I come in two or three days a week, or work from home and start at noon. Instead of having 10 phone calls
74 NEWSMAX MAXLIFE | MARCH 2013
or 10 decisions a day, I’ve set it up so other people can make those decisions.”
CUTTING EXPENSES Another tack is to downsize expenses to gain fi nancial
freedom. Robin Navarro, 58, retired in June 2011 from a life of teaching. Her husband George retired at 62. “We had a house with a big payment, but we wanted
to travel more, and we didn’t want to be bogged down by a big house. I wanted to get back to things I did in my 20s, like painting and music,” says Navarro, who lives in Hennet, Calif. “So we decided to sell the house. We used that to pay off everything we owed and put the profi t in the bank.” Also, Navarro eased into retirement by leaving classroom teaching to become a teaching coach. Good planning is the key, says Kris
Miller (no relation to Marc), author of Ready for PREtirement. She recommends looking ahead
KRIS MILLER
by buying long-term care insurance, setting up a living trust, and purchasing annuities to ensure permanent, safe
income. Says Miller: “A lot of my clients waited until 70 or 80 to plan, and that’s not the best way to retire.”
MAN/PHOTOALTO/LAURENCE MOUTON/GETTY IMAGES /
M.MILLER/COURTESY OF MARC MILLER
K.MILLER/COURTESY OF KRIS MILLER
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