Preparing for Retirement: A Lifetime of Financial Good Health

The key to a secure retirement is to build a sound financial base today. Once you start to think about a lifetime money plan—a plan that covers all your financial needs—you can see your retirement in a new light. Retirement isn’t some special, distant, different time. Retirement is simply another phase of your life. You may not be working after you retire, but you will go on living. In the same way, you will have less income, but you will go right on paying your bills. And like Aunt Bee, if you learn good financial habits now, you’ll have plenty of time to laugh hard and enjoy time with your loved ones. You may be thinking, “Getting my financial house in order sounds hard!” We’re not going to fool you—if your idea of budgeting is to buy what you want and pray you have enough to cover it—then it may be hard.

 But we’ve broken it down into five simple steps: 1. Balance your basic bills. 

2. Pay off your debt. 

3. Build your emergency savings. 

4. Pay off your home. 

5. Build your retirement savings. 

These five steps will help you build a strong financial base that will see you through all of your tomorrows—before and after you retire.