Retirement planning
Retirement Planning Readiness Checklist
Ten sections covering everything a retirement plan has to account for. Check off what is handled, see what is still open, and print the result.
A retirement plan has to answer more than "do I have enough." It has to account for where your income comes from, what it has to cover, how your accounts are taxed, who inherits what, how healthcare gets paid for, and where the paperwork is when someone needs it.
This worksheet covers ten sections and about sixty items. You will not check them all off, and you are not supposed to. The unchecked boxes are the point: they show you exactly where the plan is thin, in a form you can hand to someone who can help with it.
There is no signup, nothing is saved, and nothing is sent. Fill it in on screen and print it, or print it blank and work through it on paper.
These tools are educational. They are built to help you ask better questions, and they do not replace a personal review with Anthony.
Work through the checklist
Check off what is genuinely handled. Leave anything you are unsure about unchecked, because the open items are what makes this worksheet useful.
0 of 61 handled(0%)
Your readiness summary
Nothing checked off yet. Work down the list and be honest rather than generous: an item you are not sure about should stay unchecked, because the unchecked items are the useful output of this worksheet.
Sections with something still open
- 1. Income sources
- 2. Spending and budget
- 3. Debt and mortgage
- 4. Retirement accounts
- 5. Beneficiaries
- 6. Insurance policies
- 7. Healthcare and long-term care
- 8. Legacy goals
- 9. Documents to gather
- 10. Questions for Anthony
Suggested next steps
- 1Pick the one section with the most unchecked items and work only on that this week. Trying to do all ten at once is how a worksheet like this gets abandoned.
- 2Get your Social Security estimate from ssa.gov if you do not already have it. Almost every other number depends on it.
- 3Check your beneficiary designations. It takes twenty minutes, it is free, and it is the item on this list most likely to cause real harm if it is wrong.
- 4Run the Retirement Income Gap Calculator with the income and spending totals you wrote down here.
- 5Bring your unchecked items and your written questions to a conversation with Anthony. The gaps are the agenda.
Nothing you type into this worksheet is saved or sent anywhere. It stays in your browser until you close the page, so print it or write it down if you want to keep it.
How to use the result
The score at the bottom is the least interesting part of this worksheet. What matters is the pattern in what you left blank.
If the gaps are concentrated in sections 1 through 4, you are missing information, and that is the easiest kind of gap to close: statements to pull, an ssa.gov login to set up, a list to write down. Most of it is an afternoon's work.
If the gaps are in sections 5 through 8, you are missing decisions, not information. Those are harder, because they involve tradeoffs and often involve other people. Beneficiaries, survivor elections, long-term care, and who inherits what are all decisions with consequences, and they are the ones most worth a second opinion.
If the gaps are in section 9, you have probably done the thinking and not the filing. That sounds minor until a family has to find a policy number in a hurry.
Common questions
- Do I need to create an account or give my email to use this?
- No. There is no signup, no email gate, and no download form. The checklist works immediately and nothing you type is saved or transmitted. If you want a copy, use the print button, which produces a clean printable version including anything you wrote in.
- What is the difference between a retirement planning checklist and a retirement budget worksheet?
- A budget worksheet focuses on one section: what you will spend each month. A planning checklist covers the whole picture, including income sources, account structure, beneficiaries, insurance, healthcare, legacy intentions, and documents. Section 2 of this worksheet is the budget portion, and the Retirement Income Gap Calculator on this site handles the arithmetic once you have those figures.
- How far before retirement should I work through this?
- Five to ten years out is ideal, because most of the items on this list are easier and cheaper to fix with time available. That said, several sections matter just as much after you retire, particularly beneficiaries, required minimum distributions, healthcare, and documents. It is worth revisiting the whole list every couple of years and after any major life event.
- Which section matters most?
- Beneficiary designations, section 5, cause more avoidable harm than anything else on this list, because they override your will and because people rarely revisit them after a marriage, divorce, or death. The long-term care item in section 7 is the largest financial exposure. Between those two, section 5 takes twenty minutes and section 7 takes a real conversation.
- Is anything I type into the worksheet stored?
- No. Everything lives in your browser's memory only, and closing or reloading the page discards it. That is deliberate, because this worksheet asks for sensitive details. Information only reaches Anthony if you separately choose to fill out and submit a form or call him.
Sources
Primary sources for the figures and rules this worksheet asks you to confirm.
- Social Security Administration: my Social Security account
For the benefit estimates in section 1.
- Medicare.gov: what Medicare covers
The official source for section 7, including what Medicare does not cover.
- Medicare.gov: long-term care
Confirms the limits of Medicare coverage for extended custodial care, which is the assumption most plans get wrong.
- U.S. Department of Labor: taking the mystery out of retirement planning
A free government workbook covering account inventory, income, and the gap between them.
- Consumer Financial Protection Bureau: planning for retirement
Independent guidance on Social Security timing and retirement income decisions.
Important disclosures
- This tool is provided for general education and planning discussion only. It is not financial, tax, or legal advice, and it is not a recommendation to buy, sell, or keep any product.
- The results depend entirely on the numbers and assumptions you enter. Change an assumption and the answer changes. Nothing here is a projection of what will happen, a quote, or a guarantee.
- No product prices, premiums, interest rates, or payout amounts are quoted anywhere on this page. Any figures specific to a product would come from the issuing company in writing, after a personal review.
- This checklist is a discussion tool. Checking every box does not mean your plan is complete or appropriate, and leaving boxes unchecked does not mean anything is wrong. It means there is something worth reviewing.
- Nothing you enter into this worksheet is stored, transmitted, or received by anyone. It stays in your browser until you close the page.
- Estate, tax, and legal documents mentioned here should be prepared and reviewed with a qualified attorney and tax professional.
- Anthony D. Morrison is an independent financial professional licensed in Florida. For advice about your own situation, including tax questions, talk with Anthony and with your own tax professional.
The next step is a conversation, not a purchase
A calculator can show you the shape of the question. It cannot tell you which order to draw from your accounts, when to file for Social Security, or what your plan should do about taxes and healthcare. Anthony's retirement questionnaire is how that review starts. There is no cost and no obligation.
Prefer the phone? 407-942-7689
Keep going
Start here. These work through the questions that come before any product conversation: what income you will have, what it has to cover, and how long your savings need to last.