Pension Selection, Challenges of Age Gaps, The Forgotten Costs – Mailbag Episode

<p style="margin: 0in;"><span style= "font-size: 14.0pt; font-family: 'Arial',sans-serif; color: #0e101a;"> In today’s show, we’re going to open up the listener mailbag and answer questions about pension selections, questions about the challenges you could face if there’s an age gap between you and your spouse, and then discuss the hidden costs you might not be seeing in your retirement income.</span></p> <p style="margin: 0in;"> </p> <p style="margin: 0in;"><span style= "font-size: 14.0pt; font-family: 'Arial',sans-serif; color: #0e101a;"> Each of these questions we’ll tackle today cover pretty common scenarios so you might find wondering about these down the road. Scott will provide some great thoughts and insight, recommendations, and strategies that could potentially be used in these situations. We always enjoy taking the strategies and tactics discussed on the podcast and apply them to some real life scenarios and that’s exactly what we’ll do today.</span></p> <p style="margin: 0in;"> </p> <p style="margin: 0in;"><strong><span style= "font-size: 14.0pt; font-family: 'Arial',sans-serif; mso-bidi-font-style: italic;"> Key discussion points in this episode:</span></strong></p> <ul> <li class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style= "font-size: 14.0pt; font-family: 'Arial',sans-serif; color: black;"> Should I even bother taking the spousal continuation option for my wife to keep getting the monthly payment if she outlives me?</span></li> <li class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style= "font-size: 14.0pt; font-family: 'Arial',sans-serif; color: black;"> My husband is 11 years old than me, and I probably have better genes than he does too, so it seems likely that I’ll be a widow for a significant portion of my retirement years. What sort of financial planning challenges does this create for me?</span></li> <li class="MsoNoSpacing"><span style= "font-size: 14.0pt; font-family: 'Arial',sans-serif; color: black;"> I need about $5,000 to live on each month in retirement, and my Social Security and pension will total about $5,300. Does this