Retired life has its perks. Find your purpose to enjoy your life in retirement to its fullest, and meet the financial advisors for retirees who can help.

As a retiree enjoying your golden years, you may be thinking about hiring a financial advisor for retirees who understands the unique financial planning challenges and opportunities of individuals and couples living in retirement. Fortunately, many financial advisors specialize in helping retirees ensure they can afford their retirement lifestyle and not outlive their savings.

Before hiring a financial advisor, it’s important to first consider your own financial planning priorities in retirement. In this guide, we’ll share hidden dangers to look out for in retirement and why it’s important to find your purpose. Then, we’ll share a few quick tips to help you get started in your search for a financial advisor and introduce you to financial advisors for retirees featured on Wealthtender you may want to add to your shortlist.

How to Avoid the Hidden Dangers of Retirement

You have worked all your life to make retirement a reality. You have toiled away at a career and worked for a series of bosses, some of whom you meshed with and others you merely tolerated. You have put off the things you wanted in the moment, knowing that saving money and investing well were the right things to do.

Now that moment is finally here, and all that stands between yourself and your post-work life is a final sendoff party, a few well wishes from your soon to be former coworkers and perhaps a gold watch in your pocket. Now your retirement dreams have finally come true, and you have grand plans for all the great things to come.

That is the rosy picture of retirement, but things do not always work out as positively as those now former workers thought. Like so much in life, retirement can harbor hidden dangers, and falling prey to those risks could tarnish your golden years and leave you pining for a career you had wanted so desperately to escape. Here are some of the biggest dangers retirees face, and how to overcome them.

Social Isolation

Many retirees do not realize how much of their life was tied up with their work. Those newly retired workers are often surprised at just how much of their day involved coworkers and the social side of work, and they end up missing the office or factory they had been so anxious to finally leave behind.

Social isolation can be a huge challenge for retirees, and those feelings of loneliness can have actual physical consequences. From heart disease and diabetes to certain forms of cancer, rates of disease and chronic illness are higher among the socially isolated, so fighting those feelings could literally save your life.

There are many ways to fight back against those feelings of social isolation, from volunteering at the local food pantry to becoming more active in your church or religious community. Social isolation does not have to be a consequence of retirement, and you can stay active and engaged even when your coworkers are no longer with you every day.

Retirees Need to Find Purpose in Retirement

In addition to the social isolation and loneliness, retirement can often come with a lack of purpose. Many new retirees end up feeling adrift, especially if their identities were tied up with their careers and what they did for a living.

Like social isolation, this lack of purpose can have serious health consequences, not only physically but psychologically as well. Staying engaged and active in retirement is vitally important if you want to stay off the couch and find a source of purpose in your post-work life.

Retirees can find purpose in many different ways, from starting their own business to finding a part-time job that really matters. Volunteering in the community can also impart a sense of purpose, giving retirees the direction they need to avoid burnout and enjoy happier and healthier post-work lives.

Savings That Do Not Last as Long as Expected

The dangers outlined previously have all been non-financial in nature, but that does not mean money is not a major consideration for retirees. In fact the financial side of retirement is often the most problematic and if your savings do not last anything else, not social isolation, not a lack of purpose and not even simple boredom, will matter nearly as much.

No matter how carefully you planned your future retirement or how diligently you saved and invested, some factors will always be outside of your control, and that means that running out of money will always be a risk.

Whether that risk is large or small is somewhat within your control, however, and there are some things you can do to reduce the dangers. If a sudden and unexpected period of inflation threatens to eat into your nest egg, for instance, taking a job temporarily could help you preserve everything you have worked for. The fact that wages typically rise along with underlying inflation could make the dollars you earn go that much further, all while preserving your investments and stopping you from tapping them too soon.

Working in retirement on even a part-time basis could also pad your future Social Security payments if you have not yet started claiming the benefit. At the very least doing a bit of work now can give you peace of mind later.

Retirement should be a time of fun and new beginnings, a chance to start over again doing the things you wanted to do before but did not have time for. It should be a time for friends and family, and a chance to pursue your favorite hobbies, all while structuring your day in the way you want to.

If you want to enjoy your retirement more and worry less, recognizing the hidden dangers is a good place to start. Now that you know the financial and nonmonetary risks to your retirement, you can take proactive steps to avoid and overcome them, so you can live a happier and less stressful post work life.

Smart Tips for Finding a Financial Advisor for Retirees

Before hiring a financial advisor, here are a few quick tips to help you find the best advisor for you.

Get to Know Financial Advisors for Retirees

📍 Click on a pin in the map view below for a preview of financial advisors who specialize in working with retirees can help you reach your money goals with a personalized plan. Or choose the grid view to search our directory of financial advisors with additional filtering options.

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