Aug 22, 2026 · 32 min
Retirement planning starts before the finish line
Crucial Steps for the “Pre-Go” Years Before Retirement
The decade before retirement can determine whether people withstand market shocks, manage taxes, spend confidently, and prepare for life after work.
- 1Gradually reducing portfolio risk before retirement can create flexibility when the timing of work’s end remains uncertain.
- 2The years before required minimum distributions may offer valuable opportunities to manage lifetime taxes through strategic withdrawals.
- 3Retirement planning must address emotional purpose and later-life decision-making, not just income, investments, and spending.
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Anspach recounts a client’s depression after leaving a business, showing how retirement can remove social connection and a sense of contribution.
The brief
Robert Brokamp and Dana Anspach frame the decade before retirement as a distinct planning phase, when uncertainty about timing makes flexibility more valuable than precision.
Anspach argues for gradually reducing investment risk roughly ten years before retirement, rather than leaving a portfolio exposed to a downturn just before work ends.
The period between retirement and required minimum distributions can become a tax-planning window, while the healthy go-go years may justify spending sooner.
A red-yellow-green framework helps sort decisions such as mortgages, Roth conversions, and Social Security timing by how clearly the analysis points.
The conversation’s emotional turn comes with the arrival fallacy: leaving work may remove purpose and social connection, making later-life planning as important as financial preparation.
Anspach closes by urging people to plan for slow-go and no-go years while they still have the health and clarity to decide what they want.
Featuring
Dana Anspach
Robert BrokampMentioned
Living Off Your Acorns, Your Guide to the Four Phases of Retirement
MedicareBooks & mentions
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