Helping Canadians Retire with Confidence

Do This Tax Trick Once & Never Worry About Retirement Spending Again

Source: Willems Wealth Planning Group

Taxes can quietly become one of the biggest threats to a successful retirement — especially when most of your savings are in registered accounts like RRSPs or RRIFs. In this featured video, Willems Wealth Planning Group explains a powerful retirement income strategy that uses smart tax planning to reduce lifetime taxes and help your income last longer.

This is a great watch if you’re planning for retirement and want to understand how taxes can shape your long-term income and spending in Canada.

Key Takeaways from This Video

• Why retirement spending problems are often tax problems in disguise
• The value of doing one smart tax move early to simplify future withdrawals
• How coordinating RRSP/RRIF drawdowns + government benefits can lower lifetime tax
• The risk of waiting too long (higher brackets later in retirement)
• A practical way to think about tax smoothing over decades, not years

Why we selected this video:
It’s 100% retirement-focused, Canadian, and aligns with Tomo’s goal: helping you build a plan that’s simple, clear, and optimized for real-world retirement outcomes. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4T95iJZOki4

The Retirement Risk Zone (And What To Do About It!)

Source: advice.ca

As people approach retirement, there’s a period — often called the retirement risk zone — where financial vulnerabilities are at their highest. This phase typically spans the 5 to 10 years before and after retirement, when individuals are transitioning from saving to spending and are exposed to sequence-of-returns risk, market volatility, inflation pressures, and uncertain income streams. The video explains why this period is uniquely challenging, how common planning mistakes can amplify risk, and outlines several practical strategies to protect your financial security during this transition.

Key Takeaways from This Video

• What the retirement risk zone is:
  The period when you shift from building wealth to relying on it, and why simultaneous market, inflation, and longevity risks can compound during this time.
• The danger of sequence-of-returns risk:
  Early down markets right after retiring can have an outsized negative impact on long-term portfolio sustainability.
• Strategies to manage risk:
  Approaches to smooth withdrawals, preserve core income, and protect essential spending — often by pairing lower-risk assets with cash reserves and thoughtful withdrawal sequencing.
• Retirement is not one moment, but a phase:
  Planning needs to anticipate changing spending and income needs over time rather than assuming a fixed withdrawal strategy.
• Practical mindset shift:
  The video encourages viewing the risk zone as a period for prepared response rather than fear — and emphasizes simple, robust planning steps to reduce avoidable losses.

We chose this video because:

• It’s 100% retirement-focused: The content directly addresses a core challenge many nearing retirement face — vulnerability during the transition from saving to spending.
• It’s Canadian-relevant: The risk zone realities apply to Canadian retirement investors facing CPP/OAS timing decisions, RRSP/RRIF sequencing, and market exposure.
• It aligns with Danoke’s educational goals: The video simplifies a complex but crucial concept.
• It helps build confidence: Understanding how the risk zone works empowers people to make better decisions about asset allocation, timing, and withdrawal sequencing as they prepare for or enter retirement.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DD11M2bowv0