Our process
The Next Phase Plan®
How it works, in one paragraph
We split your retirement into five-year segments and give each one a job. Segment one is stable and predictable — that is your paycheck. Later segments are invested for growth because they have years before they are needed. As each segment is spent, the next has been growing to replace it.
The result is that your income for the next several years does not depend on what the market did this morning. Move the controls below and watch the allocation change.
Segment 1
Age 62–66
$530K
to fund today
Pays you now
Stable and predictable, not exposed to the market
Segment 2
Age 67–71
$204K
to fund today
Pays you next
Short-term bonds and conservative income
Segment 3
Age 72–76
$166K
to fund today
Refills Segment 2
Balanced — some growth, still defensive
Segment 4
Age 77–81
$122K
to fund today
The middle distance
Growth-leaning, with time to recover
Segment 5
Age 82–86
$91K
to fund today
Later years
Growth — two decades before it is touched
Segment 6
Age 87–91
$65K
to fund today
Longevity and legacy
Long-horizon growth and inflation defense
Consistent monthly income, once it all switches on
$5,100/mo
Against a $9,000/month target
Your portfolio covers, in year one
$9,000/mo
Starting at age 62
What this plan takes to fund
$1,177,960
The starting scenario
Change one answer and the allocation changes — not just the total. Claiming Social Security at 70 barely moves what the whole plan costs, but it nearly doubles what Segments 1 and 2 have to carry — because you are funding the gap yourself until the checks start. That is why two people with the same savings do not get the same plan.
Why NextPhase
The case for planning retirement income around when you need the money rather than around a risk score.
Constrained Investor
Why someone who needs their portfolio to produce income cannot invest like someone who does not.
What we believe
Four things that make this different
Click the stack to move through them.
The honest version
What this plan does not do
Segmenting does not remove market risk. It does not guarantee an outcome. It does not mean you will never see your portfolio fall.
What it does is change what you are forced to sell, and when. If the next five years of income is already set aside in something stable, a bad year is bad news rather than a forced sale at the bottom. That is the whole mechanism.
Getting there
Three steps, about three weeks
The Next Phase Conversation
Thirty minutes. We map where your income will actually come from. If we are not a fit, we will say so.
Your Next Phase Plan
We build a plan around your real numbers: your timing, your spouse's timing, your taxes, and your outside income. Then we walk you through every part of it.
Your paycheck starts
The plan goes live at Schwab and the money arrives monthly. We meet regularly to refill segments and adjust the plan as your life changes.
Questions
Common questions
It is a time-segmented retirement income plan. We divide your retirement into consecutive five-year segments and fund each one differently — near-term income held in stable assets, later segments invested for growth because they have decades before they are spent.
The 4% rule takes one blended portfolio and draws a fixed percentage from it, which means you may be selling stocks in a bad year to fund your income. Segmenting separates the money you need soon from the money you need later, so a downturn does not force a sale.
No. Nothing removes market risk. What segmenting does is change when you are forced to sell, which buys your growth assets time to recover instead of locking in a loss at the worst moment.
It will. Plans get revisited — a spouse retires earlier than expected, a parent needs care, a market runs hot and you can refill a segment early. The structure is designed to be adjusted, and adjusting it is most of what we do after year one.
The approach tends to matter most for people with roughly $1 million or more, because that is where the gap between income like Social Security or a pension and what you want to spend gets large enough to plan around.
Let us find out what your portfolio can actually pay you.
Thirty minutes to see where your income will come from. If we are not the right fit, we will tell you.