2025 Retirement Countdown

It’s January 1, and my retirement countdown app says “5 months and 29 days”! Now that it’s 2025, it really seems close.

I have a bunch of financial tasks of my winter quarter sabbatical/pre-retirement list and have already taken care of the first two:

1. Increase (double) contributions to my tax-deferred accounts (403B/457). With over-50 catch-up contributions, in 2025, I can contribute $31,000 max to each account, or $62,000 total. Since I’ll only be working for six of the 12 months, this allows me to take full advantage of the IRS limits for 2025, and that will help us come tax time next year. I had to double check what the limits are because my contributions can’t exceed my income for those six months, but I should be fine. Now, that’s a lot of upfront money, and our cash flow will tighten for six months, but we can tighten our spending and/or backfill from savings for that period if need be.
2. Change my investment allocation for my retirement accounts. I’ve been using target date funds (Vanguard for my rollover IRA and Fidelity for my current work accounts) for years and had them all set for 2025, the year I planned to retire. But because we’ll be living on pension and eventually Social Security income, and because tax/retirement laws have changed, I won’t need to make Required Minimum Distributions until I turn 75, in 2035. So I’ve changed my target date funds to 2035. I may reconsider the whole plan investment in the coming months, but for now, 2025 seems too conservative when I won’t likely be touching the money for years.
3. Research Schwab (where my rollover IRA is), Fidelity, and Vanguard and decide where I want my IRA to live. I will roll my current Fidelity accounts into an IRA somewhere for simplification.
4. Make initial Medicare choices. I turn 65 on August 1. My husband will turn 65 in May. We are currently covered by his retirement plan from the state of California (CalPERS), and that will become secondary coverage once Medicare kicks in. I attended a CalPERS webinar about this in 2024, and I know that we can choose between traditional Medicare and Medicare Advantage plans. I’ve read enough here to know that we want traditional Medicare.
5. Update my “last instructions” documents. I have pretty well developed versions of these, but they need work. That will happen during this winter sabbatical period.
6. Look into “final arrangements” plans and consider getting on a waiting list for the local CCRC. There are actually two in town, but the one we want has a pretty long list. I’ve read enough here to know that sooner is better in this regard. Also, going through my mother-in-law’s move to memory care in 2024 and then her death in August has made me acutely aware of how stressful it can be to not plan ahead for these things.

I’m sure I will add more to the list, but all of the above happen in the next 5 months and 29 days, it will be time well spent. I also plan to spend time thinking and researching other things (weight training gym, local volunteer options, etc.), but the above is my initial financial to-do list.