What My Parents Have Taught Me About Retiring Well – and Right

For the holiday, I traveled to be with my elderly parents. They are at an age when medical issues start to catch up and make life challenging. Helping them for the last few years has taught me some lessons that we all should heed, whether we are still working or in retirement.

My parents are both in their early 90s. They retired at ages 59 and 62, meaning they have been retired for 30 years! When they retired, they had a financial plan completed that worked with a life expectancy of 75 years.

Obviously, they beat that by a wide margin. But just 30 years ago, 75 was considered about the max lifespan. Now, when we hear of someone passing before they are 90, it feels like they went early.

That’s why, for those of us in our 50s and 60s, we shouldn’t be looking at current life expectancy when we plan. It seems logical that we should be planning to live to well over 100.

Here’s what that means…

Retiring at 65, that would mean looking forward to possibly a 40-year retirement. Our society will eventually start pushing expected retirement out further, which makes sense.

Let’s look at some financial considerations. According to the Bureau of the Census…

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