It’s been a season full of recognition for The Retirement Team, a financial advisory firm based out of Topeka. The business recently swept The Best of Topeka finance categories, earning Best Financial Planning Firm, Best Accountants and Best Financial Planner.
“I think we’re unique in that it takes a team of professionals, each with specialized knowledge in order to really help our clients make sure they’re doing the best they can with the resources they have,” said Ryan Shumaker who won the category of ‘Best Financial Planner.’
Shumaker believes that collaborative model when serving clients is the driving force behind The Retirement Team’s sweeping of the awards.
“One of the main drivers towards us winning this year as well as in previous years is the excitement our clients feel by experiencing that team approach, particularly from the tax planning aspect.”
According to Shumaker, many large financial firms don’t allow their advisors to give tax advice, which he feels is a mistake.
“Taxes are part of good planning, and are different in retirement because there are a lot of taxes that are triggered when you retire that don’t exist when you’re working. We have clients who we’ve helped save tens and in some cases hundreds of thousands of dollars in taxes.”
Shumaker said that planning ahead for how to manage retirement accounts can mean the difference between a lower tax rate or much more substantial tax consequences on retirement savings.
“We feel that retirees are one of the highest and most unfairly taxed groups. That’s why we make sure that Uncle Sam gets the least so that our clients can enjoy more of their hard-earned dollars in retirement. Typically, most of our clients are within ten years of their planned retirement date; ten years before or ten years after. The sooner you come to see us, the better we can work to reduce taxes and increase retirement income.”
The Retirement Team also offers a free early investment warning system for anyone in the community called Wealth Guard, which is a portfolio monitoring service that monitors accounts day and night and alerts investors of future downturns.
One of the biggest mistakes Shumaker says he sees people make is allowing their emotions to creep into their investment decision-making. “A lot of people in or near retirement made some really bad choices in 2020. We know this because Fidelity did a study of all accounts and found that nearly 1/3 of those 65 or older sold everything at or near the market bottom in March,” said Shumaker.
“It is clear these people that sold either had no plan or a pretty poor one. If someone is worried about the stock market, the problem is not the stock market; it’s the lack of a good plan. It’s not a question of if, but when and how many times a bear market happens when you’re retired, unless you have a really short retirement. Failing to plan here is pretty much just planning to fail. With a properly setup plan you shouldn’t have to ever worry in retirement about the economy, elections, stock market, etc.”
The Retirement Team strives to educate its clients and the public at large through Retirement Team Radio on Saturday mornings from 7:30 to 8:30 and Sunday mornings from 8 to 9 on AM 1440. The show is also available via podcast on their website, RetireTopeka.com.
“A question we frequently pose on our radio show is, ‘If what you thought about your retirement turned out not to be true, when would you want to know about?’ Now when it’s easy to fix any potential problems or later after it might be too late?”
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Shumaker said The Retirement Team is honored to be recognized as a Best of Topeka business by the community.
“We were very happy to hear that. We feel that we really go above and beyond for our clients, and seeing that they voted us #1 in all of those Best of Topeka categories yet again that means all of that hard work is really being appreciated.”
For more information on The Retirement Team or to read recent articles they’ve written, visit RetireTopeka.com.
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