Financial Planning in Kansas City: From Your Saving Years to Your Spending Years

Financial planning is rarely a one-time decision. It shifts as your income and your goals change over the years, and a plan built with taxes in mind at each stage tends to hold up as life transitions. Here is how the focus tends to move across the stages of your financial life.

Early and mid-career: The priority in this stage is building. Contributions to workplace retirement plans and IRAs do the heavy lifting, and how you divide savings between tax-deferred and Roth accounts sets up choices you will draw on decades later.

Peak earning years: Higher income raises the stakes on tax planning. Coordinating your investments with your tax picture tends to matter most at this stage, from the accounts you fund to how investment gains are handled.

Approaching retirement: As you near retirement, the focus must shift from paycheck to portfolio. The order you plan to draw down from your accounts, and the tax bracket you expect to be in begin shaping decisions well before your last day of work.

In retirement: As you enter retirement, the mindset suddenly shifts from “save” to “withdraw”. The key task at hand during these years is to draw income efficiently. Required minimum distributions (RMDs) from traditional retirement accounts generally begin at age 73, and lower-income years can open a window for Roth conversions. Which dollars you spend, and when, affects how much of your income goes to taxes.

Across every stage, the tax picture and the investment picture move together. At Holistic Planning, that coordination happens under one roof, where Kyle Hogan, CFP®, works alongside Dani Beavers, CPA and our tax team, so tax planning stays part of the conversation throughout the year.

Whichever stage of life you are in, from your first serious savings to your first year of withdrawals, a plan that accounts for taxes at each turn leaves more room to adjust as life evolves. Learn more about Holistic Planning, a Kansas City financial planning firm working with families across the metro and Overland Park.

Kyle Hogan, CFP®, is a partner and advisor at Holistic Planning – Kansas City.

Holistic Planning – Kansas City provides investment advisory services through Uptick Partners, LLC, an SEC-registered investment adviser. Registration does not imply a certain level of skill or training. This article is provided for educational purposes only and does not constitute investment, tax, legal, or accounting advice, or a recommendation to buy or sell any security.

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