Audiobook
Listen to the Foreword
Richard Paul, CFP®
Novi, Michigan
2026 Updated Edition
When we sat down to revisit this book, we genuinely thought we'd be making a few small touch-ups. A statistic here, a regulation there. Maybe update the cover. Send it back to print.
That was the plan, anyway.
Three chapters in, we looked at each other and realized this was going to be a much bigger project than we had anticipated. The pension landscape we wrote about in 2019 is, in many meaningful ways, not the pension landscape Big Three retirees are walking into today. The world changed. Our book hadn't kept up.
And honestly? Looking back at everything that's happened in the last seven years — it's wild to see just how much has truly changed.
Just a Few Things That Are Different Now
A short, non-exhaustive list of what's shifted since the original edition:
The interest rate environment went through the most dramatic cycle in modern history — and pension lump sums went with it
The SECURE Act and SECURE 2.0 rewrote the rules around RMDs, inherited IRAs, Roth accounts, and early retirement distributions
Pension de-risking — corporations transferring pension obligations to insurance companies — went from a notable headline to an industry-wide trend
Inflation went from "barely a concern" to a 40-year high — then back down again
Social Security got its biggest update in years with the Social Security Fairness Act
The Strangest Shift of All
And maybe the strangest shift of all: how people are getting their financial advice in the first place.
Today? Retirees are getting financial guidance from TikTok influencers with millions of followers and zero credentials, YouTube personalities packaging strong opinions as financial planning, and now — most strikingly — AI chatbots like ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini.
I'll be candid: these tools genuinely are useful. They can summarize the SECURE Act in 30 seconds. They can explain what a 72(t) distribution is. They've raised the floor of basic financial literacy for a lot of people.
What they cannot do — what they may never do — is truly know you. They don't know your spouse's health. They don't know your pension election deadline. They don't know your tax situation, investor psychology, your sequence-of-returns risk in the first three years of retirement, or what you'll regret in 15 years.
They produce confident-sounding answers regardless of whether they're right, and a confident-sounding answer is exactly what people want to hear when they're staring down the most consequential financial decision of their lives.
If you're using AI or social media to learn, that's a great use of these tools. If you're using them to decide — please, slow down. We talk about this more in Chapter 7.
What Stayed the Same
Every one of these changes gets the full treatment in the updated chapters. We've rewritten every chapter of this edition to reflect the current rules, the current rate environment, the current planning opportunities, and the current realities of retiring from Ford, GM, or Stellantis in 2026 rather than 2019.
If you read the original edition, much of the framework will feel familiar. The five (now six) million-dollar questions are the same. The fundamental factors are the same. The seven mistakes to avoid are still here — with one new one added for the 2026 era. The principles are durable. The application of those principles to today's environment is what required the rewrite.
And One Personal Update
I'd be doing readers a disservice if I didn't mention one other change since the original edition: my own.
When the first edition of this book came out, I was working full weeks, in the office every day, doing what I'd done for decades. As of this writing, I've taken a step toward my own retirement years — with my two sons and the rest of our team carrying the day-to-day load with the same care and rigor we've always brought to clients.
I'm still involved. I'm still writing. I still meet with longtime clients every now and then, and I'm proud to put my name on this updated edition alongside Steve. But my hours sure do look different now than they did in 2019.
And let me say this, plainly, to anyone reading this book: retirement is amazing. I'd recommend it.
That doesn't mean it isn't earned, or that the planning doesn't matter — it absolutely does, which is why this book exists in the first place. But after a career spent helping other people navigate this transition, I've now had the privilege of walking through it myself. The decisions feel different from the inside. The relief of having a plan, of knowing the math works, of being free to spend your time with the people you love... it's real.
If anything, my own transition has reinforced the message of this book: get the big decisions right, and the rest of retirement takes care of itself.
A Final Word
A book that was meant for a quick revamp turned into a top-to-bottom revision. The world moves fast. The rules move with it. Even the way people learn about retirement has changed beyond recognition. Our job, and the job of any good fiduciary advisor, is to keep up.
Our underlying belief hasn't changed: Big Three retirees deserve straightforward, accessible, fiduciary-grade guidance through the most consequential financial decision of their careers.
Thank you for reading. Thank you for trusting us with your time. And whether or not you ever decide to call our office, I hope this book gives you the framework — and the confidence — to make this decision well.
— Richard Paul, CFP®
Novi, Michigan
2026 Updated Edition