Withdrawal Strategy
What to do when markets fall
A short list of actions that are useful during a decline, and a shorter list of actions to avoid.
Withdrawal Strategy
Safe rates, guardrails, buckets and sequence-of-returns risk.
Withdrawal Strategy
Withdrawing in a way you can actually follow
The best withdrawal strategy is the one that gets executed, which usually means the simplest one that works.
Withdrawal Strategy
Concentrated positions and what to do about them
A large holding in one company is the most common serious portfolio problem, and unwinding it has a tax cost that makes people freeze.
Withdrawal Strategy
Bonds in a retirement portfolio
The role bonds play changed considerably in the past few years, and the reasons for holding them are worth restating.
Withdrawal Strategy
How much to hold in cash
Cash has a genuine role in a retirement portfolio and a real cost, and the right amount depends on what it is for.
Withdrawal Strategy
Home equity as a retirement resource
For many households the house is the largest asset, and the options for accessing it all involve real trade-offs.
Withdrawal Strategy
Spending flexibility as a planning tool
The willingness to adjust spending is worth more to a plan than almost any change to the portfolio.
Withdrawal Strategy
Rebalancing, and how often is enough
A maintenance task with a clear purpose, a modest benefit, and a lot of unnecessary complication around it.
Withdrawal Strategy
The bucket approach and what it does
A popular framework whose main benefit is behavioural rather than mathematical, which is not a criticism.
Withdrawal Strategy
Annuities, and when they are worth considering
A product category with a poor reputation, some of it deserved, containing one type that solves a genuine problem.
Withdrawal Strategy
Sequence risk and why the first decade matters most
Two retirees with identical average returns can have completely different outcomes, and the difference is timing.
Withdrawal Strategy
Which account to draw from first
The conventional sequencing advice is a reasonable default that is wrong for a substantial number of people.
Withdrawal Strategy
The four per cent rule and what it was actually claiming
The most cited number in retirement planning came from a specific study with specific assumptions, most of which get dropped in the retelling.