Your Pre-Retirement Checklist

Is your retirement savings headed in the right way? Well, it's no secret that Mark Biller is one of our favorite guests around here. He's Executive Editor and we've been working on this article that we're going to be talking about today, your retirement planning checklist. You compare it to a pre-flight checklist, which, by the way, is a great analogy for our topic today, isn't it? Well, thanks, Rob.

It is. It's helpful. You know, we all know that before takeoff, airline pilots will go through a meticulous checklist to make sure the flaps are in the right position, there's enough fuel in the plane. Basically, that everything is as it should be.

for a safe flight. And while our retirement planning doesn't have that same life or death implication, before a person wraps up their career, they really owe it to themselves and their family to go through a similar checklist, make sure that everything is as it should be, and they're as prepared as they can be for a safe transition into retirement and post-paycheck living. And so, hopefully, this will be a helpful checklist to see if there are any items that need attention so that everybody can land safely in retirement.

Yeah, that's exactly right. By the way, folks, you can check out the article at soundmindinvesting.org and we'll be walking through it today. Mark will also be here answering your questions, specifically on investing-related topics, also on retirement, preparation for retirement, whatever's on your mind today.

Related to those subjects, we'd love to hear from you. 800-525-7000. That's 800-525-7000. You can call right now. Mark, let's begin to dive into this and we'll mix some calls in along the way.

What's first on the list? Yeah, well, the first step, Rob, is setting an intended retirement age. And, you know, the natural starting point for retirement is to make sure that everybody has a job. It's not always quite as simple as it sounds because, you know, different people may really like their work or they may want or need to keep an income stream flowing. Some people prefer to keep their workplace health insurance instead of transitioning over to Medicare. But, you know, for everybody, I think it's worth thinking about the fact that retirement is really kind of a relatively modern idea. And this typical retirement age is 65.

It's pretty arbitrary. That said, most people do, for either health or family reasons, transition away from full-time work and away from a full-time career. So it is definitely something to be praying about, asking the Lord how He would have you spend your later years. And, of course, if you're married, you want to pray and talk about that together with your spouse.

Yeah, that's exactly right. That spousal communication is key. You want to make sure you're on the same page.

I remember Ron Blue's wife, Judy, saying to him as he was entering this season, she said, Ron, I married you for better or worse, not for lunch. She said it tongue in cheek, but the point was well taken, right? Yeah, absolutely.

You definitely need to communicate about that. And, you know, after you set that retirement age, then you want to really test how realistic that is. There's a pretty big disconnect in the data between the number of people or the percentage of people, maybe I should say, that are currently working, that plan to work beyond age 65, contrasted with today's retirees, relatively, few actually do that. So a lot of people plan on it, very few actually do it. So it's worth being conservative and projecting how long you're going to work. Work with a more conservative target if you can. Yeah, always better to aim for that earlier date. And if you can work longer, great. It'll make all the numbers that much better. But if you do retire early, you'll be glad that you move that target up a little earlier in your journey.

All right. We're just getting started here today. We're talking about your retirement planning checklist, and we're taking your calls and questions on anything investing related or retirement related with Mark Filler, 800-525-7000. Back with much more right around the corner. The opinions offered during this program represent the personal or professional opinions of the participants given for informational purposes only.

Any information provided is not intended to replace advice from a financial, medical, legal or other professional who understands your specific situation. Hey, great to have you with us today on faith and finance live. I'm Rob West. We're taking your calls and questions today while Mark Biller is here on anything investing related. We're talking your pre-retirement checklist, which is the subject of a great new article at soundmindinvesting.org. You know, as you think about preparing for that season of life during your working years, what are those things you need to think about and consider? Mark Biller is working through several of them today, drawing from that article. You know, we talked about just this importance of a checklist, and then we talked about that intended retirement age.

What's next on the list, Mark? Yeah, so once you've settled in on that intended retirement date, then the next step is moving over to the money side, estimating your retirement budget. You know, how much are you actually going to need to live on in retirement? It's a fundamental question, not always the easiest to answer, and that's partly because some of your expenses are going to change. So some expenses from your working years are likely to disappear entirely.

You don't have to save for retirement anymore. For example, your commuting costs may come down, but then there are some other spending categories that are likely to go up in retirement, like entertainment or travel. It's also worth kind of considering how your budget may change as your retirement progresses. You know, most people are likely to spend more on travel, entertainment, that sort of thing early on during the go-go years of retirement, and then that tends to taper off as you move through your retirement years into the slow-go and maybe even the no-go years. Of course, health care costs tend to go the opposite direction as someone gets older.

For our purposes today, though, Rob, really the best you can do is try to estimate as closely as you can what that initial retirement budget is going to look like and then plan to re-evaluate that each year as you're in retirement. Yeah, that's really helpful. All right, we'll continue to work our way through this list. We're also going to take some of your calls and questions today on investing or retirement for Mark Biller. We've got a few lines open. The lines are filling up, but we've got room for you at the moment. 800-525-7000.

Let's go to Anderson, Indiana, WGNR. Becky, go right ahead. Did you say Becky? Yes, ma'am. Yeah, so I'm interested in your thoughts about financial advisor fees.

I've heard that some are percentage, there could be flat fees, and what is reasonable to expect just on the financial advisor fees. Yes, very good, Becky. Would you mind me asking roughly what the assets under management would be that you're talking about? So, a couple of millions.

Okay, yeah. So, Mark, your thoughts on, I mean, with active money management where you have an investment advisor giving discretion over the management of a couple of million dollar portfolio, what would you think would be a typical range there? Yeah, so it used to be a lot more complicated, Becky. You had a lot of different ways that advisors would be compensated. You had load funds and commissions and that kind of stuff. It was a little harder to sort through.

These days it's a little bit easier, I think. Most advisors seem to have moved to kind of a straight percentage of assets under management kind of model. I would say that, you know, 1% is pretty standard. You may find a little bit better deal as the asset level goes up.

So, for a couple million you might get a little bit less than that. You know, if somebody's charging more than that, it's not necessarily an immediate disqualifier, but it should kind of just put a little flag up to say, okay, well, what other services are they providing me? That are worth that additional fee. And really, I think that's really the bottom line in evaluating the fees of any advisor is to be very, very clear about what exactly am I getting for my money?

What are you doing for me? What services are included? And then you can kind of compare one versus another. And of course, if you have any way to have references or anything like that, that's always helpful too.

If somebody's doing a lot of estate planning, tax planning, some extra things that not all advisors necessarily are going to include in that fee, then it makes sense that their fee might be a little bit higher than somebody else's. So I would just say, you know, the plain vanilla starting point is probably around 1% and then up or down from there, depending on the level of services. Rob, of course, you've got a lot of expertise in this area. Your thoughts?

Yeah, well, I completely concur. I think the other thing, and Mark alluded to this, is asking the question, what other services are you providing beyond the investments? So they may roll in comprehensive financial planning.

There may be an additional flat fee or hourly charge for that. But typically, I think around the 1% mark, especially with a couple of million dollars, is very appropriate. Now, keep in mind, there could be additional costs, either transaction costs, if they're buying directly stocks and bonds, if they're using mutual funds, then you've got the mutual fund management fee on top of that. But at the end of the day, it's ultimately about, is this somebody who can really get to know you, perhaps shares your worldview, can help you manage your whole financial life, provide accountability to the extent that's required? And then ultimately, with regard to the investments, what does that performance look like, net of fees, and are they doing the job to protect and grow your money appropriately?

And if so, even though that's a lot of money, I mean, $20,000 on 2 million, you're paying for a very valuable service to protect and grow appropriately your hard earned money that you all have spent a lifetime amassing. But is that helpful back here? Do you have follow up questions? It's very helpful.

And I don't really have follow up. I think you addressed everything that was on my mind. So I greatly appreciate it. No problem. Thank you for your call today. By the way, if you want an advisor in your area, you can find a certified kingdom advisor at faithfi.com.

Just click find a professional. Let's quickly go to Chicago Dottie. Go right ahead. Hi, Dottie, are you there?

All right, looks like we don't have Dottie at the moment. You know, Mark, as we talk about this, and we've got maybe a minute or so before our next break, you know, the other item on the list is your debt free plan. As you think about retirement, what should folks be thinking about there? Yeah, you know, paying off all your debt, including your mortgage by the time you're retired, it's going to just be a huge help and simplify your retirement cash flow. So as much as possible, you want to align your payoff date with your retirement date. And that may mean if you're still working on your mortgage, you know, prepaying a little bit more each month to try to speed up that payoff date. And of course, the same applies for all your other types of debt, but the mortgage is usually the big one.

So I would focus your attention there. Just try and get to retirement debt free if at all possible. Yeah, that's going to really take the pressure off with regard to estimating that retirement budget if we can eliminate all debt service.

There's no question about that. We're talking today with our good friend Mark Biller. He's executive editor at Soundmind Investing. If you want to check out this article, we're making our way through today, your retirement planning checklist. Well, visit soundmindinvesting.org and you can check it out today.

You can even literally check things off on the screen as you work through it. We're also taking your questions today. 800-525-7000.

Call right now and we'll be right back. So thankful to have you with us today on Faith and Finance Live, where we understand God is our ultimate treasure. He's also the owner of everything and therefore we're stewards of everything he's entrusted to us. And that includes the wealth that not only we use to give or to provide, but also that which we save for the future. And today we're directing our focus of that to our long-term savings, i.e. that season of life where we may be redirected away from paid work to whatever God has next for us and preparing appropriately for retirement. Mark Biller, along with us today, our good friend and executive editor at soundmindinvesting.org. And you can check out the article we're referring to when you visit that website, again, soundmindinvesting.org.

Mark, before we dive back into this topic, a really important topic. You know, it's March, which means it's basketball season. I assume you guys are right down the street from University of Kentucky, aren't you? We are.

It's our professional sport here in Kentucky. Are you a Wildcat fan? I am. I'm not as diehard as some of those around here, but yeah, I pull for them in March. All right.

Well, I think you guys are a three seed, so we'll have to watch what happens over the coming weeks. But I'm sure a lot of eyes will be focused that direction from your part of the world. Oh, for sure.

All right. We've got some lines open today. Taking your calls and questions.

800-525-7000 is the number to call. Mark, before we dive into some more phone calls today, we talked about your retirement age. We talked about your estimated retirement budget. We even talked about being debt free and the importance that plays in retirement planning.

What's next on the list? Yeah, so the next thing is figuring out what your living arrangements are going to be. And the big question for most people is are you already in your forever home where you plan to spend your retirement?

Or do you think you're going to be living somewhere else? Now, if you're planning on staying put, you probably already have a pretty firm grasp on the typical expenses, taxes, insurance, utilities and so on. But if you're planning to move, then you want to do a little homework on what those costs are going to look like.

And, of course, if you're staying in place and you've got any big remodeling type ideas, then you want to build those into your budget as well. The other factor there that's a little bit unpleasant is just since we're going through this retirement checklist anyway, it's an appropriate time to be thinking about down the road in retirement. If you get into a situation where you can't live on your own anymore, have you accounted for that? Do you have a plan for that? Do you have adult children that might help out? Have you talked to them about that?

Should you consider moving closer to them? Those are the types of questions that you want to work through. It doesn't necessarily seem urgent at the beginning of retirement, but you don't want to wait too long until you have a crisis either. So, good to think about some of those things.

Yeah, important considerations. All right, let's head back to the phones. By the way, taking your calls and questions on retirement and investing today with Mark Biller, 800-525-7000. We have a few lines open.

Let's go to Illinois. Hi, Mark. Go ahead, sir. Hi, this is Mark and Moline.

I haven't been on nationwide radio. I hope I don't get tongue tied. You're sounding good so far, Mark.

Yes, I practiced that line. I'm running my own money. We've got about a half a million. I have Schwab account.

I've been doing fairly okay, but I feel like I'm going all alone. We've got a CKA that I go to, and he's been just wonderful for tax planning, but he's absolutely worthless for individual stocks. And he says, nope, I don't look at that. And I say, yep, but I don't buy annuities, and I only buy the insurance for the things that I can't afford to cover. And I've got to learn better. Now, my dad started more than 60 years ago trying to teach me about stocks, and I can do the bigger ones.

But when I go looking at little companies, I can't find anything. Who can I talk with and pay so much an hour to talk with about these? Yeah, well, let me say a couple of things on this.

First of all, you did a fabulous job there, Mark, so well done. Second of all, the Certified Kingdom Advisor designation is for those men and women who've met high standards and character and competence and demonstrated that they can bring a biblical worldview. But they all have a different focus of their practice and a different business model. A lot of investment CKAs will not work with someone who wants to basically buy and sell their own individual stocks and just kind of weigh in on those. That's just not how their business model works. They typically will take discretion over the funds, meaning they make the buy and sell decisions. And even then they may not use individual stocks. They may use ETFs or mutual funds. So you have a lot of options there.

And I would say you could interview several other CKAs to find one that might fit for you, although the model you're describing is one where I think you're going to have a little harder time finding someone. Because if I understand correctly, you want to make the ultimate decision. You just want somebody to give you their opinion on the individual stocks you're evaluating.

Is that right? Well, but an informed opinion. I mean, I can't afford or I'm not willing to afford to buy subscriptions to Bloomberg and all of the other places that might tell me some of these things.

But if I could find a guy that has that subscription and for 50 bucks or 10 bucks or pick a number so much an hour, say, what do you know about this funny little 600 million dollar company on the New York Stock Exchange? Yeah. Yeah.

Yeah. Unfortunately, they're just their business models are not set up to work that way because they have certain responsibilities if they're going to weigh in and give you advice and then, you know, just to give you their opinion and then you're going and executing. They're just typically not set up that way. I mean, certainly you could call around to the other CKAs in your area. If you had to faith five dot com and and then click find a professional and but I think you're going to struggle, Mark, to find someone who's willing to operate in that regard.

They just given the way not only the business is set up, but also just the legalities with regard to, you know, what they're attesting to and even, you know, taking responsibility for that model is just not a good model for a typical adviser. Unfortunately, I've got to take a break. We'll get Mark's opinion on that on the other side and make sure I'm not missing anything. So, Mark, you stay tuned. Listen up. But thanks for your call today and we'll be right back. So thankful to have you with us today on Faith and Finance Live.

I'm Rob West. Have you checked out our brand new four week study Rich Toward God? It tackles the parable of the rich fool dealing with some really important topics as it relates to our view of God's money and how that plays itself out in terms of true abundance and living rich toward God and the uncertainty of tomorrow, even the pride we can have in prosperity. Well, it's a great resource. And if you have a small group, you're looking for a topical study that dives deep into scripture that you and the rest of your group will enjoy. Well, check it out. You find it at faithfi.com.

Just click shop. Look for our study Rich Toward God at faithfi.com. We're talking today with Mark Biller. He's executive editor at Soundmind Investing and we're talking about our pre-retirement checklist. And it's a helpful guide as you think about whether you're 30 or 55 or retirement is right around the corner. It really will help you think through some of the key considerations for retirement.

You'll find it at soundmindinvesting.org. We will make our way through a few more of these points. But first, let's head back to the phones. We've got room for maybe three or four more questions between now and the end of the broadcast.

800-525-7000 with your investing or retirement related questions you can call right now. Let's go to Tennessee. Hi, Sandra. Go ahead. Hi.

So I have a quick question. My home will be paid for hopefully within 15 months. And I don't really have a pension plan. But my question is, when my home gets paid for, is it worth to get started?

Because I'm planning on working maybe about four to five years after the home is paid off. Yeah, so you won't need that money. That'll be surplus once the house is paid off, correct? Yes, it'll be surplus, yes.

Yeah. Mark, your thoughts about a Roth at that point? Yeah, I love the idea of a Roth IRA at that point, Sandra.

You know, the main criteria there is that you have earned income. So if you're planning to keep working for a few more years, then that's a great way to kind of create your own retirement plan. And that's a great way to save. You'll definitely save money on the taxes.

There are some rules about the holding period with that. But if you're planning to keep it into retirement and if you're going to be funding it for four or five years, you're probably not going to have any kind of issues with any of those holding periods or any of those sorts of things. So it's a great approach.

I would definitely encourage that. You know, there is an argument perhaps with the traditional IRA, depending on your income level, which is better traditional or Roth. But there's a lot to like about the Roth because you're not going to pay tax on any of those investment gains in retirement, which can give you a lot of flexibility with your cash flow. You don't have to take the required minimum distributions out of that in retirement. So, yeah, a lot of pluses, Sandra, with the Roth IRA. Rob, I know you're a fan of Roth as well.

I totally am. So I completely agree with that. I think the only consideration is, you know, if you're at the peak of your earning years and therefore you have more in the way of taxable income, you know, do you benefit more from the deduction on the front end for the traditional IRA? And then maybe you do your giving out of that after 70 and a half and then don't pay tax on it at all because it's coming out as a qualified charitable distribution.

So that might be the only other consideration. But I agree with Mark. Roth has a lot of things to like.

Bottom line, Sandra, as long as you have earned income and you don't need that money, keep socking it away because I guarantee you you'll find a use for it down the road, whether that's for long term care, living expenses or part of your giving plan. Hey, thanks for being on the program today. Mark, one quick follow up to the call we had just before the break.

He was named Mark also. You heard the question. He's wanting an adviser just to kind of weigh in on individual stock selections that he's considering. He's obviously running into, you know, that's not typically the way advisers are set up. Any other thoughts for him other than what I shared?

No, I thought I thought your explanation was really good. It is going to be hard to find an adviser that will take on the liability of giving any kind of advice or counsel when they are not involved in actually making those transactions. The only other thought that I had was if if Mark is really set on individual stocks, there are services like value line is one that that rates and discusses a lot of individual stocks. So something like that would be an option if he's not locked in on individual stocks. Something like sound mind investing, where we talk about specific mutual funds and lots and lots of investing topics may be of interest and kind of scratch that itch as a sounding board, whether that's with our message boards, with other SMI members or just the content that we're constantly putting out about general investing topics and specific mutual funds. Now, we're not doing individual stocks, but, you know, our our DNA going all the way back 35 years to Larry Burkett was, you know, Larry's vision was the body of Christ needs kind of a consumer reports of the investing world, a Christian consumer reports for investors. And that was really the vision that birthed SMI. So if that's of interest, of course, he could check out soundmindinvesting.org.

Yeah, I couldn't agree more. That could be a great solution, Mark, if you're willing to look at mutual funds, because now you'd have the upgrading strategy or some of the other strategies that SMI is producing. You could take that data and then make your own decision.

But you'd have somebody walking alongside you with a very reasonable cost. Mark, let's head back to our pre-retirement checklist. I know next on the income or excuse me, next on the list is estimating what you all call guaranteed income. Talk to us about that piece of our pre-retirement planning. Yeah, so the first income step is looking at Social Security if you're fortunate enough to have a defined benefit pension. These are income sources in retirement that, you know, in advance what those are going to be. And what we're trying to do, Rob, is earlier we said we need to figure out what our expenses are going to look like. Now with this first income step we say, okay, what's the income we know we can count on, compare that to those expenses, and that's going to tell us, okay, how much of our expenses need to be accounted for from our investments, the part beyond this guaranteed income, beyond Social Security. So that's really the direction we're headed at this point in the checklist is narrowing down how much do I need to pull from my investments, and that's what's going to help us back into how much do we need to have saved at retirement. From there you have very obvious connections to, okay, well, can I save that much by the time that I'm planning to retire? If so, wonderful. If not, maybe then we need to rethink is that retirement date realistic or do we need to save more now? Do we need to work longer? You know, how do we bridge this together so that we make sure we have the income to fill in that hole after we account for Social Security and any pension income?

Yeah. And for that amount you save in that nest egg, are you still using a 4% withdrawal rate as a good rule of thumb? It's definitely the safest. You know, it's a good starting point and we can maybe talk more about how to get a little more specific about that after the break. Yeah, that sounds great because the more you can dial that into your specific needs, of course, the better your plan is going to be. Folks, if you want to check out this pre-retirement checklist, you can just head to soundmindinvesting.org. It's there for you, no cost, and you can read it today. All right, back with our final segment with Mark Biller and a few more of your questions as well on Faith and Finance Live just after this.

Stick around. Great to have you with us today on Faith and Finance Live where God is our ultimate treasure and money is a tool to accomplish God's purposes. Here on the broadcast today we're joined by our good friend Mark Biller, Executive Editor at Sound Mind Investing. And we've been working our way through their pre-retirement checklist that's available at soundmindinvesting.org.

Mark, let's pick up where we left off. You talked about that guaranteed income that then leads, once you have your budget nailed down, to what your gap is and therefore the nest egg that you need to put together that will generate investment income. What else do we need to think about there? Yeah, so this part can feel a little bit complicated to people because, you know, you come up with this number, let's say after your guaranteed income is accounted for, you need to come up with another $1,000 a month or $2,000 a month, whatever the number is. Now you've got to kind of think forwards to the amount that you're hoping to accumulate and there's kind of a process there, how do I accumulate that nest egg, and then also thinking about how do I make that nest egg last once I start drawing from it in retirement. And so because that can be kind of a lot for somebody to think through, we're big fans of some of the retirement planning calculators that are available.

There are some good free ones online that you can search for that'll help with this process. Our Soundmind investing members, we've got a very robust planning tool that they have the ability to use and a lot of our members really dig into that because this is really the heart of that planning process. And this tool that they have access to is actually one of the very same ones, in fact a very highly rated one that a lot of professional advisors use for this planning process. And that can be a really helpful thing because you can get your information in there, get a good view of how things are lining up for you. But just as importantly as that, over time you can update that and see how things are changing, see if you need to make adjustments either to your saving schedule and what you're investing in as you're building up to retirement or once you're in retirement.

Am I on a good track to have this money last as long as I'm going to need it to or do I need to make on the fly adjustments as I go year by year through retirement? So getting hooked up with some kind of a helpful calculator or tool that can assist you with that is really going to be a helpful thing for most people unless of course they've got an advisor doing this for them, which is typically going to be part of those services like we were talking about with the caller earlier in the program. Yeah, very good. Now if somebody wants to go beyond the free online tool and they're not working with an advisor, I know you all have a pretty robust planning tool available to the SMI premium members, right? Yeah, we do. And that can be really helpful. A lot of our members love that tool and use it regularly.

So that's a good option for folks. Excellent. All right, we've got room for maybe one more question beyond what's already here on the broadcast today.

Mark Biller with us, 800-525-7000 if you have an investing question or something related to retirement. Let's go to Lakeland, Florida. Hi, Andrew.

Thanks for your patience. Go ahead. Hi, Rob.

Hi, Mark. I've got a Kentucky Wildcat fan here. I'm originally doing good.

Really rooting for him. It's been very exciting. Anyway, my question is we're in the middle of tax season. Tax season hasn't went well over at our household. I'm looking for some extra tax breaks. I'm using Intuit TurboTax and it told me that it's not too late to open up an IRA.

And my question is, does it count? I've got several 401Ks from a few companies and one company that went through a couple 401K accounts. So I've just got 401Ks everywhere. Could I roll some money from previous 401Ks into an IRA and does that count as a contribution or would I need to make a live contribution from my bank account for that to count? Yeah, great question, Mark.

Yeah, that's a good question, Andrew. You certainly can roll those 401Ks up into an IRA and that is probably a useful thing to at least consider doing at some point. But that isn't going to help you on this year's taxes in order to get the tax deduction for a new traditional IRA contribution that does need to be new money going in. So unfortunately, it's not going to help you there. It can be really helpful in terms of simplifying your investing life, though, if you've got, as many people do these days, 401Ks kind of scattered around in several locations. So unfortunately, not maybe the news you're looking for there, Andrew, but that is the strict interpretation the IRS gives you for getting that new tax break for this year.

Yeah, Mark's exactly right. So what are some other ways? Well, the other option is, as you said, you could make that direct contribution from cash into that traditional IRA that could give you a deduction. You could put some money in an HSA if you have one. You could see if you're eligible for the earned income tax credit. You do have to be under a certain income limit, so it only applies to some folks, but it's certainly worth looking at, although your TurboTax or Intuit should have picked up on that if you complied with that. You could do some giving and try to get up above the standard deduction as well.

But unfortunately, it seems like this may be a problem you need to solve moving forward for a future tax year by tweaking your W-4 to have more withheld if you have a big tax bill, and you certainly don't want to repeat that. Is that helpful, though? Yeah, yeah.

It's absolutely helpful, and I appreciate it. I know it's a little bit off topic. It's that time of year. We get it. So hang in there. You'll make it through this one and hopefully can make some changes for next year. Andrew, thanks for your call today. Mark, I know the only other thing we haven't really drilled down on is the whole healthcare area as we think about retirement.

Anything else you would leave with us there? Yeah, the big thing is kind of just thinking through your plans related to Medicare. Are you planning to take it right away when you qualify at 65? If you've got good employer health coverage and you're planning to stay on that, that can impact things.

Either way, you want to estimate what your premiums are going to be, and if you're going with Medicare, then at some point at least you're going to want to think through, do I want to try to fill some of these coverage gaps with either a Medigap plan, adding that on to traditional Medicare, or do I want to go with the Medicare Advantage plan? I know some people are hearing all that going, wait, what? I don't know. I don't know how to do any of that.

The point is you want to look into that and know that these options exist so that you can start planning appropriately for what you need. Yeah, very good. Mark, we're almost out of time here. Before we wrap up today, just take us back to the beginning here and just help us think about this season of life, retirement through a biblical lens and a biblical worldview. What would you leave with our audience today? Yeah, I think the biggest thing, Rob, is it can feel a little overwhelming when we go through a list like this, and the most important thing is to understand and remember that while we definitely have a part to play, the Lord also promises to do His part. So we have to be faithful with our part, but God will be faithful with His part as well, and He promises to provide. He promises to give us wisdom when we ask, and so going through this process should not be an anxiety or fear-producing exercise. It should be something that you bathe in a lot of prayer, you bring it to the Lord, you do the best you can, and then you are trusting the Lord to help you and to fulfill His part. We know He's always faithful, and that's a big reassurance when we're going through a process like this.

Yeah, there's no doubt about that, and just taking some of the mystery out of it, I think, with a tool like the one you've created, beyond trusting in the Lord and realizing that He is our provision, I think can be really helpful. So, grateful that you all put this helpful tool together, and Mark, I always appreciate your time on the broadcast. Thanks, Rob. Great to be here.

All right, take care. That's Mark Biller. He's executive editor at Soundmind Investing.

You can learn more or download this helpful tool, your retirement planning checklist at soundmindinvesting.org. Now, before we wrap up here today, you know, from time to time here at Faithfi, we put a spotlight on ministries that God is using to make an eternal difference and give you the opportunity to connect with that work. Our spotlight ministry this month is Heart for Lebanon.

You've heard them on this broadcast. This is an organization that's meeting the physical needs of the refugee and poverty-stricken people of Lebanon, just there to the north of what's going on between Israel and Hamas. More importantly, though, they're sharing the gospel in the most democratic, free society in the Middle East. Incredible things happening there in the name of Jesus, as so many of those refugees are coming to Christ. So, in the midst of this crisis, in a very troubled place in the world right now, this is a practical way that you can bring hope, the hope that only can be found in Jesus. And so, if you'd like to learn more and give generously to what's going on here, we'd love for you to check it out. You can learn more at faithfi.com slash Lebanon.

That's faithfi.com slash Lebanon, and you can learn more about it today. You know, folks, we love being able to come alongside you every day and help you think about your role as a steward of God's money. I hope today has been an encouragement to you.

Perhaps you learned something. Maybe you feel more prepared as you think about this season of life coming down the road. But I think the big idea is that, you know, God created us to be workers. We ultimately want to be productive and in service to Him throughout the whole of our lives. And we only do that by really seeking His kingdom first, understanding He is our provider, and then looking to His word for counsel and wisdom and seeking the counsel of others. And we're so thankful that you sought our counsel today by tuning into the broadcast. Faith in Finance Live is a partnership between Moody Radio and FaithFi. Let me say thanks to my team today, Amy, Dan, grateful for Gabby T on our phones as well, and Taylor, helping with some great research.

Also grateful for Mark Biller at Sound Mind Investing. Enjoy the rest of your day and come back and join us tomorrow. We'll see you then. Bye bye.