The theme this week on the Retirement Quick Tips Podcast is: Nowhere to Hide. It’s been a rough year, with threats of a deepening recession and continued, sticky inflation dominating the minds of most investors. It really feels like there’s nowhere to hide and nothing you can do to stop the train wreck. But alas, there is always something you can do. 

And today, I’m actually talking about something you shouldn’t do - abandon your plan. 

Hopefully if you’re getting close to retirement or if you’ve retired in the last few years, you have some type of written plan. Now this doesn’t have to be a massive 80 page financial plan, but it’s important to have some type of plan in place that provides the foundation for making decisions when it comes to your money. 

You should have a target asset allocation or a mix of stocks and bonds, and you don’t want to deviate from that - especially now when fear could be driving you down the wrong path.

You should have a plan for how much cash you’ll keep and how much of your income you’ll save for retirement this year. Dwindling your cash or stopping your savings because of inflation is not part of the solution…it will only make the problem worse in the long term. Aim to reduce your discretionary spending to keep cash savings healthy, and keep those retirement plan contributions in place. If you’re still working, those contributions are buying more shares of the funds you’re invested in, because their values are lower. 

Your plan may call for some adjustments. Maybe you delay retirement this year because of the economy or the fact that your portfolio is now 15 or 20% lower than it was last year. It’s ok to tweak the plan and you should as circumstances change. 

But never let fear or a negative outlook about the future cause you to abandon your investment strategy or the plan you hopefully have in place that governs your big picture decisions about retirement. 

That’s it for today. Thanks for listening! My name is Ashley Micciche and this is the Retirement Quick Tips podcast.

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Tags: retirement, investing, money, finance, financial planning, retirement planning, saving money, personal finance