Twelve Months to Drawdown — The Five Retirement Decisions That Get the Money Down the Mountain

The Twelve Months Before Retirement Income Starts: five decisions that set up the drawdown years

Chris Maduri compares retirement to climbing: years of preparation go into reaching the summit and almost none into getting back down, which is exactly where people get hurt. In nearly two decades of retirement planning, and as the founder of Vibrant Retirement, he has seen the final twelve months before the paycheck stops do more damage than any bad market year. He walks through the five decisions that belong in that window — when income starts, what is guaranteed, what stays invested, what covers care, and what the day after work actually looks like — and why leaving them until the last month is too late. Having worked with about 70 insurance companies across 15 years, he can say plainly which structures hold on the way down and which were only ever built for the way up. Listeners leave with a twelve-month order of operations they can start from whatever month they are in.

About Chris Maduri

Chris Maduri, podcast guest

Retirement & Life Transitions Expert

Nearly 20 years Helping people prepare for retirement4 Pillars of sustainable retirement planning3 Buckets in his wealth-building approachSales Director Named by Financial Marketing Group in 2013

Chris Maduri has spent nearly two decades helping people prepare for more than retirement - he helps them prepare for the life that comes after work.

Because retirement isn't simply the day the pay cheque stops.

It can change your identity, your marriage, your relationship with your time, your health, your family and your sense of purpose. And Chris believes that's the part of retirement planning most people don't talk about.

Chris began his career just before the 2008 Financial Crisis, an experience that fundamentally shaped how he thinks about risk. Watching carefully constructed plans come under pressure taught him that assumptions can fail - and that a retirement plan needs to work in the real world, not just on paper.

But after nearly two decades in the industry, Chris has come to see that financial preparation is only one part of the equation.

The bigger question is: What are you actually retiring to?

Chris describes retirement as the "fourth quarter of life" - and, if you've done things right, a little overtime.His work explores what it takes to make that chapter meaningful: having financial confidence, maintaining your health, protecting the people you love, staying connected to a sense of purpose and knowing how you want to spend the years you've worked so hard to create.

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