Retirement
The part of retirement planning most people skip
Accumulation gets the attention. The order in which you draw money down has a comparable effect on how long it lasts.
Upstate Corporate Wealth Team · March 25, 2026 · 9 min read
Two retirees with identical portfolios can experience very different outcomes depending on the order of withdrawals and the market conditions in the first years of drawdown.
Selling assets during a decline to fund living costs locks in losses that later growth cannot fully repair. A cash buffer exists to prevent exactly that.
Build a buffer before you need it
Holding one to two years of planned withdrawals in cash or near-cash means the portfolio is not forced to sell into weakness.
The buffer is refilled in good years. It is deliberately unexciting, and it is the difference between a plan that survives a bad start and one that does not.
Review, do not react
Annual review of withdrawal rate against portfolio value is enough. Monthly reaction to markets converts a long-horizon plan into a series of short-horizon guesses.
Any projection is illustrative: markets, charges and legislation all change. The plan should be robust to being wrong.
This article is general financial education, not personal advice. Consider your own circumstances, and seek regulated advice where a decision is significant.
Put it into practice
Speak to our team, or model the numbers first with our calculators.