Retirement Planning Basics (2025)

RPB
$12.99 - one-time purchase
Your instructor: Quincy Hall

Fulfill retirement planning competence with 2025 Retirement Planning Basics, an exciting and comprehensive course from Advice Only®, and available from the Google Play and Apple stores. This self-paced course, enriched with original written and video-based content, is designed to make your learning experience enjoyable and relatable with amusing anecdotes. Taking approximately 6 hours to complete, this course includes informative assessments, exercises, explainer videos and quizzes to ensure a thorough understanding of the material.

Our user-centric and privacy-protected course platform allows users to comfortably record and share their experiences. We prioritize your data security and privacy and have implemented robust measures to keep your information confidential. Success in this course is using the knowledge gained and tools provided to begin to develop an investment and financial planning philosophy.

Course objectives

By the end of this course, students will have a comprehensive understanding of retirement planning and the confidence to begin shaping the design of their retirement plan. They will be able to effectively communicate their retirement planning objectives and personalized preferences to loved ones and trusted professionals. Students will also strive to discover their objective truth and what they independently determine as their “perfect” plan. Upon completion, students can expect to clearly understand their plan’s overall viability and its general strategic direction, leaving no room for uncertainty.
Start by downloading the Advice Only® app from the Google Play and Apple stores. This app is an integral part of many retirees’ retirement planning. It provides a convenient platform to access critical course content, track progress, and potentially work directly with a course instructor. The app’s user-friendly interface and intuitive features make it easy to navigate and use, enhancing a student’s learning experience.
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Chapter 1: What is the Perfect Plan?
Individuals have a vested interest in the outcomes of their own financial decisions. As such, with all available information, the individual is the best judge for the appropriateness of the consequential decisions that affect them. Gain a fresh perspective on financial services; this course provides learners with an objective, solicitation-free environment to explore and better understand financial concepts for themselves. Without judgment or outside scrutinization, identify and ideally settle on personal preferences, affinities, and lifestyle prioritization.
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Chapter 2: Expenses
Understand why financial plan sustainability requires a reasonably clear idea of personal expenses. Track expenses easily with a spreadsheet. Learn to categorize and isolate certain expense variables for later in-depth analysis. Factor in an estimate of longevity, rates of return, and inflation assumptions to have a realistic, well-informed, and adaptable financial framework that can withstand known and unknowable financial life events.
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Chapter 3: Cashflow & Net Worth

Particularly for retirees, cash flow and net worth statements are the primary documents for evaluating a financial plan’s overall health and long-term sustainability. These documents show how future income, expenses, taxes, and total portfolio assets interact to create a transparent “vector” to achieving retirement goals.

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Chapter 4: Types of Accounts
There exist many places to save for retirement. Several factors influence a retirement savings plan, including age, access to employer-sponsored plans, tax situation, other assets, and timing assets for use. Strategize around retirement distribution rules, leverage taxable and non-taxable contributions, and consider what makes sense personally. Take a closer look at pre- and post-retirement contributions to understand how any account type (e.g., Traditional, Roth, and Taxable type accounts) can be equally viable planning vehicles depending on the individual situation, existing assets, and anticipated need.
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Chapter 5: Guarantees
Guarantees are promises to be paid by corporations, insurance companies, and government entities. Payouts are generally perpetual for life, calculated based on an individual’s life expectancy, sometimes years of service, and may or may not include a cost-of-living adjustment (COLA). Compare hypothetical long-term growth investment vehicles and contrast a guaranteed benefit against market risk and their ability to act as a reliable income source for essential expenses. Evaluate and generally decide the “right” amount of a guarantee, establish personal preferences and evaluate realistic growth assumptions. Finally balance taking a guarantee and opting for a rollover or lump sum payout.
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Chapter 6: Distributions
Individuals will likely need to withdraw money from their accounts throughout retirement to cover personal and other expenses. Many of these consequential decisions are mandatory and irreversible. Gain insight into the importance of developing an effective distribution strategy and how specified requirements must align with a plan and personal preferences. Develop a process to withdraw or transfer funds and decide when and why it makes sense to leave certain accounts where they are.
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Chapter 7: Investments
An investment aims to generate a greater and greater return on principal over time, ideally minimizing risk throughout the process. Ongoing portfolio construction will utilize diversification, among other strategies, to help mitigate risk and ultimately maximize these returns. Learn to incorporate existing plan strategies, measure and rebalance the weighting of various asset classes, maximize employer opportunities, navigate tax complexities, and determine post-retirement risk tolerance. Learn to incorporate personal preferences and affinities and build a more cohesive investment portfolio supported by an overarching investment philosophy.
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Chapter 8: Insurance
As retirees approach retirement, they often have accumulated significant wealth. A substantial financial loss at this point can erode this wealth and potentially jeopardize long-term retirement plan viability. Objectively explore the landscape of available insurance options, their role in planning, and the sustainability of premiums. Better understand the applicable high-risk situations, decide what’s practical, and learn to pre-qualify or disqualify oneself for specific insurance concepts and solutions.
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Chapter 9: Estate Planning
Estate planning is a crucial process that involves making arrangements for managing and distributing one’s assets and property upon death. Everyone will have some kind of estate plan, either ahead of time by the decedent or done for them after death. While estate taxes apply to only a very small number of Americans, many are surprised that many of the best tax-saving estate planning techniques require minimal due diligence and apply to anyone who owns property. Avoid unnecessary complications and beneficiaries missing out. Be remembered for kindness and generosity, not for costly estate planning missteps.
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