#32: Making your clients retire happy, with Tom Hegna

What are your clients doing to save for retirement? There’s a good chance the answer is “not enough.”

That’s why it’s important to actively warn customers about retirement risks. One of the best-known experts preaching this message at insurance and financial conferences in recent years has been Tom Hegna. Tom is loudly clanging the bell on the retirement crisis. He says that agents and advisors who are not talking about insurance to protect clients’ retirement are not looking after their clients’ best interests. He has a lot of great advice – so much that we’re devoting two episodes to Tom.

Tom is a popular speaker and author of several books, including his well-known Pay Checks and Play Checks and Don’t Worry, Retire Happy.

Tom Hegna

In this interview, Tom is going to sketch out some compelling strategies to help clients understand the power of insurance. He’ll also walk us through his seven steps to a happy retirement.

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SHOW NOTES:

2:40 Tom’s path to becoming a leading retirement expert includes almost 25 years in the insurance industry.

4:50 Tom talks about what he sees as the biggest problems with retirement today.

6:25 Tom says in order for advisors to educate their clients on the keys to retirement, they first must educate themselves.

7:50 As we dive into Tom’s “Seven Steps to Optimal Retirement,” the first step, plain and simple, is the need to have a plan.

9:25 The second step is to understand and maximize Social Security benefits.

10:55 Step three on Tom’s list is to consider a hybrid retirement.

11:20 Step four is to have a plan to protect yourself from inflation.

12:45 Step five toward a happy retirement is securing more guaranteed lifetime income. As Tom points out, there are a lot of ways to do this.

17:25 Step six is making sure you have a plan for long-term care.

19:05 A truly underappreciated aspect of life insurance in planning is how it affects the other assets.

20:55 Finally, step seven: using your home equity wisely.

23:00 Tom shares some other strategies for life insurance, which he says is the most efficient way to pass wealth to your children, grandchildren and even to charities.