Your 60s are the decade when retirement stops being an abstraction. The finish line of full-time work is visible, the pension statements have real numbers in them, and a series of decisions — some of them irreversible — arrives in quick succession. Handled well, five financial moves in this decade can add security to the thirty years that follow. Handled on autopilot, the same decisions can quietly cost a household a great deal.
1. Get the Timing of Retirement Income Right
The single biggest lever most people control is when to claim state and workplace pension income. In the United States, claiming Social Security before full retirement age permanently reduces the monthly benefit, while delaying up to age 70 increases it — a trade-off the Social Security Administration lays out in its retirement guidance. The right answer depends on health, savings, a spouse’s earnings and whether you will keep working, but the wrong way to decide is by default. Run the numbers for at least three claiming ages, and remember that the higher earner’s delay also raises the survivor benefit a spouse may one day depend on.
2. Build a Tax Plan Before the Withdrawals Begin
Retirement income usually arrives from several pots taxed in different ways: pensions and traditional accounts as ordinary income, some investments at capital-gains rates, and tax-free accounts not at all. The years between stopping work and being forced to take required distributions are a valuable window — income is often temporarily low, which makes it the cheapest time to convert some traditional savings into tax-free accounts or to realise gains deliberately. A few evenings with a calculator, or one meeting with an adviser, can shape your tax bill for decades. Our business and money coverage returns often to this point: in retirement, the order you spend money matters almost as much as how much you have.
3. Price Healthcare Before It Prices You
Healthcare is the expense retirees most consistently underestimate. Before eligibility for public programmes begins, private cover can be expensive; afterwards, premiums, supplemental policies and out-of-pocket costs still add up, and long-term care sits largely outside standard cover. The smart move in your 60s is to cost this honestly: get quotes, understand what is and is not covered, and consider whether dedicated savings or insurance for long-term care fits your situation. The Consumer Financial Protection Bureau offers retirement planning tools that help households test their assumptions rather than guess.
4. Stress-Test the Portfolio for the Decade Ahead
A portfolio built for accumulation is not automatically right for withdrawal. A market fall in the first years of retirement does outsized damage, because you are selling into it rather than buying through it. Many households respond by holding a few years of planned spending in cash and low-risk assets, letting the rest stay invested for growth. At the same time, going too cautious has its own risk: money that must last thirty years cannot hide entirely from inflation. The goal in your 60s is balance — enough safety to sleep, enough growth to last.
5. Put the Estate and Paperwork in Order
The final move is the one families are most grateful for later. Update your will, check that beneficiary nominations on pensions and accounts still match your intentions — they usually override the will — and make sure powers of attorney and healthcare directives exist and can be found. List accounts, insurance policies and key contacts somewhere your family can access. None of this is morbid; it is the administrative kindness that turns a difficult week for your family into a manageable one.
None of these five moves requires wealth, timing genius or a appetite for risk. They require attention in the one decade when attention pays best. Your 60s will pass either way — the opportunity is to reach the end of them with income timed deliberately, taxes planned rather than suffered, healthcare priced, investments steadied and paperwork in order. That is what a good retirement is built on. More money guidance is on our homepage.
