How the Regions Wealth Assessment^® can help you achieve your retirement goals.

By Mark Blackwell, Mississippi Area Wealth Executive

As you approach or settle into retirement, your financial objectives or retirement goals — whether that includes traveling the world, pursuing a dream, spending time with family or creating a financial legacy — may change significantly. You must ensure your assets are invested properly so you can generate the income stream you need to achieve them.

The Regions Wealth Assessment^® (RWA) is an innovative tool that helps you better visualize your current wealth allocation and financial risk exposure. It provides insights into building a stronger retirement income plan and can help you and your Wealth Advisor address key topics, such as:

• Determining your retirement income needs
• Protecting your assets against key financial risks
• Accessing your resources in a tax-efficient manner
• Addressing non-market based risks like long-term care needs
• Fulfilling your family legacy and philanthropic goals.

The purpose of the RWA is to create a strong connection between how your portfolio is managed and the goals and values that are most important to you. We can provide the RWA to clients at every stage of life and recommend completing a full assessment every couple of years or whenever you encounter major life events such as a birth or death in the family, change in business ownership, job loss or inheritance. For a client approaching retirement, the RWA provides a unique perspective on risk and return that is essential in refining your goals and designing a portfolio that reflects those goals.

Tailored to You

Many clients approaching retirement have special concerns that the RWA can help address. Business owners, for example, may face liquidity challenges because so much of their net worth is wrapped up in their enterprise. We recently met with the owners of two separate businesses who hoped to retire in two to three years. Each had unique concerns that were addressed through their RWA.

The first business owner lacked a succession plan and liquidity. We brought in a business valuation specialist to create a succession plan. The owner decided to sell his business to a key employee, who will purchase the business over a three-year time frame, providing the owner with increased liquidity, a smooth succession and a fully diversified portfolio of market-based investments purchased with the proceeds of the sale.

The second business owner had mature children active in the family enterprise. He chose to retain ownership of his business during his lifetime, while gradually reducing his role in its day-to-day operations and drawing a retirement income from the enterprise. An insurance specialist designed a solution that will allow his heirs to buy the business from his estate after he passes away. He, too, achieved greater liquidity, a smooth succession and a reliable retirement income. Through the guidance of the Wealth Advisor utilizing the RWA, they will each meet their goals thanks to the customized solutions developed for them.

The RWA is an essential tool that we use to understand the resources you have accumulated or will yet accumulate to meet your goals, dreams and ambitions. Your Wealth Advisor is supported by a broad team of experts — including trust advisors, lending advisors, portfolio managers, insurance specialists, land managers and others — who can be brought into the discussion as needed. They can help guide you in designing and implementing a retirement income and asset protection plan that meets your unique retirement and legacy goals. Our team approach ensures that you and your family continue to receive quality, customized advice today and throughout your retirement.