Are We There Yet?

Are we there yet?

How much longer?

I just recently got back from a road trip with my kids down to Branson, Missouri. And needless to say, I heard those questions quite a few times.

If you’ve ever taken a road trip with kids, you probably know exactly what I’m talking about!

Anyway, I hear those questions all the time just in a different way from people we talk to.

Can I retire yet?

Will I be okay?

Will my retirement last?

To answer those questions is the same as answering the kids, “Are we there yet?” It depends on where we are going.

At one point I decided to play with them. I said, “Hey, do you want to go to Mexico instead?”

They all said, “Yeah!”

“Great, we’re here!”

They looked at me like I was a little crazy, but I pointed out the sign that said Mexico.

Did you know there’s a Mexico City in Missouri?

Answering the retirement question is similar, it depends on what you want retirement to look like.

That’s the first step into knowing when you can retire or if you’re going to be okay in retirement.

It really comes down to thinking about what do you want retirement to look like?

What do you want to be doing?

In a sense, where do you want to go?

That’s going to determine how much you need and how long it can take for you to get there.

Or maybe you’re already there, just like we were in Mexico!

We find the half the people we talk to can actually retire earlier then they thought with more retirement income then they planned.

The next thing we have to do is once we think about where we want to go is to figure out where we’re at now.

I had also had my teenage sister Angel with me as well, and realized that the concept of reading maps has become old school.

Now we have a GPS.

But there is something about pulling that map out and saying, okay, here’s where we’re at, here’s where we’re going.

Then we can answer, how long is it going to take and when we will be there.

Again, the same is true about retirement.

Not only do you need to know where you’re going, but you also need to know where you’re at.

It starts with an inventory, but the goes beyond just the balance.

Where’s your income coming from?

How much of your retirement income is stable income?

What’s your risk level?

What type of risks do you have?

Knowing where you’re at will also determine how long it’s going to take you to get there or when you arrive.

So if you’ve asked those questions similar to my kids, let’s take a step back and think about our destination.

Where are you going?

Where do you want retirement to look like?

Then, let’s pull out that map and figure out where you’re at now, so that you can answer with confidence, exactly how long it will take you to get there.

Or maybe you’re already closer than you think!