Stepping up to ease COVID-19’s impact on America’s retirees
We learned this morning that this past April saw the biggest increase in unemployment for U.S. workers in a single month since the Great Depression. Since then millions more have filed for unemployment as the effects of COVID-19 continue to ripple through the economy.
Americans weren’t doing great financially before this pandemic. Lack of savings and access to trusted advice have been the primary barriers, but as businesses continue to cut headcount and salaries, blue collar and part-time workers are disproportionately hit the hardest.
While younger people should (hopefully) be able to adjust their finances and eventually recoup lost income, those who were hoping to retire in the next few years face incredible future uncertainty.
So now millions of older Americans are facing terrifying social, emotional, and financial decisions as they are forced into an early retirement or to delay their retirement plans. The fact that 80% of this demographic doesn’t have access to proper financial guidance only makes things worse. To help, we’re offering Free Retirement Planning Sessions to anyone impacted by the pandemic.
Finding new ways to help
Before the pandemic hit, our team at Retirable was focused on building a retirement solution for Americans overlooked by the traditional financial system. Our early growth has been exciting, as we have provided accessible and actionable retirement advice to tens of thousands of pre-retirees, but we wanted to figure out what more we could do.
After speaking with our clients, they reported needing to figure out how to plan for a prolonged loss of income, how to avoid being pushed into an early retirement, or how to plan around the sudden loss of a partner. It was heartbreaking to say the least.
As a tech company, our first instinct was to build a new app, or calculator, or other DIY tool. However, after witnessing the emotional distress pre-retirees are facing each day as they grapple with their future prospects, we realized the best way we could help is to ensure our personalized advice is available to anyone who needs it.
Free retirement planning for everyone
Starting today, Retirable will provide Free Retirement Planning Sessions to anyone needing to regain financial peace of mind. Our team of CFPs is setting aside time each day to answer your most pressing retirement questions — either through video chat or text — and provide unbiased, professional advice to help think through your options. We believe building trusted, personal connections for financial empowerment is more important than ever as we all adapt to new social realities.
We quietly released this a few weeks ago to our current clients and are quickly seeing sessions fill up. We connected with a mechanic who is scrambling to pay his mortgage after having his hours cut, and we helped him think through the scenarios of filing for Social Security early and how to lower expenses while adding part-time income.
We also had a session with a substitute middle-school teacher to plan how to get through the next six months with no income now that her school is closed. She tried to speak with other advisors who simply pushed annuity products on her even though she had limited liquidity, and she expressed her gratitude at our fiduciary-first approach.
How you can help
COVID-19 has affected all of us in some way and we hope to help as many pre-retirees as possible: whether this is their first retirement planning session or they need to rethink the plan they had in place.
Please share this article with anyone whose retirement plans have been impacted recently and can benefit from unbiased professional advice. With so much day-to-day uncertainty about how to defeat the virus, the Retirable team hopes to do our part to help Americans nearing the end of their careers plan for a better future.
Click here for more information about our Free Retirement Planning Sessions.
