Financial Planning for Retirement and Aged Care
Retirement Planning, Income Streams and Aged Care Advice
Retirement brings connected decisions about when to stop work, how to draw an income, the Age Pension and the cost of care. We can help you weigh each one and plan an income for the years ahead.
Our Financial Advice Team Is Here to Help You
We Can Help You
- Work out what income your super may be able to provide
- Plan a retirement date around what you can afford
- Turn super into an account-based pension
- Plan the move from your own business into retirement
- Consider a transition to retirement while still working
- See whether an Age Pension entitlement may apply
- Consider a downsizer contribution after selling the home
- Work through what aged care may cost your family
- Prepare Centrelink forms and supporting evidence with you
- Review the retirement plan as the rules change
Who We Help
- Pre-retirees wanting to understand their retirement income options
- Families arranging aged care for a parent or someone they love
- Self-funded retirees planning how to use what they have built
- Business owners retiring whose retirement plan is the business itself
- Recent retirees wanting a plan for how long their money may last
- Couples retiring apart finishing work years away from each other
- Anyone claiming the Age Pension working through the assets and income tests
- People downsizing the family home and looking at what the proceeds should do
- Retirees with larger balances managing the transfer balance cap
What we advise on
The Retirement Decisions We Can Help You With
Working Out When You Can Retire
We’ll help you work out what would need to be in place for your chosen retirement date.
A retirement date depends largely on what your assets may produce as income and what you plan to spend. The same balance can support very different dates depending on whether a mortgage is still running, your partner’s position if you have one, and how long the money may need to last.
Together, we’ll work through:
- What you spend now, and how your spending may change once work stops
- What your super and other assets may produce as an income, shown in today’s money
- Whether an Age Pension entitlement forms part of that income, now or later on
- How long the money needs to last, planned to a realistic age rather than an average
- Your preservation age, and the condition of release that lets the income start
- Whether stopping fully or cutting back to part-time changes what’s possible, and by how much
- What a year either side of the date does to the answer, so you can see the trade
- How spending may change across the early, middle and later years of retirement
Account-Based Pensions and Income Streams
We can show you how an account-based pension turns your super balance into a regular income.
An account-based pension pays you an income from your own super, at a frequency you choose within the fund’s options. Earnings supporting it are generally taxed differently from accumulation, and a minimum must be drawn each year, based on your age. Whether moving across suits you depends on your other income and plans.
Together, we’ll work through:
- When to move from accumulation into pension phase, and what that changes
- The minimum drawdown for your age, and how much above it suits your plan
- How the earnings behind a pension are taxed once the payments start
- Keeping part of the balance in accumulation, where that suits your position
- Whether a reversionary nomination is available and suitable, so the pension could continue to your spouse
- What happens to the pension on your death, and how it may be taxed for the people who receive it
- Whether to take a lump sum alongside the pension, and what that does to the payments after
- How the pension is counted under the Age Pension income test, and what that may mean for any entitlement
Annuities and Lifetime Income Streams
We can compare an annuity with an account-based pension for the income you need.
An account-based pension pays from a balance that can run out. An annuity converts part of your savings into an income for a set term or for life, usually in exchange for less flexibility and access. Some retirees use one to help cover essential costs, with an account-based pension providing the rest.
What we weigh up with you:
- What an annuity pays, for how long, and what is given up in exchange
- A lifetime income stream against a term certain, and which suits the gap you have
- Whether an annuity could help cover essential costs, with a pension providing the rest
- How an annuity is treated under the Age Pension assets and income tests
- What happens to the capital on death, and what your estate may receive under the annuity’s terms
- The trade-off between a more certain income and access to your capital
- Inflation, and whether the income keeps pace or stays flat
- Where an annuity fits if you’re worried about outliving the money
Making Your Money Last
We’ll help you settle on how much to draw each year, and which account to draw it from.
How much you draw each year affects how long your savings may last, and pension accounts carry a minimum that rises with age. The order you draw from can matter too, because super, an account-based pension and money held outside super may be taxed and assessed differently. We check the tax side with your accountant where needed.
Together, we’ll work through:
- A drawdown rate set against your age, your assets and what you spend
- Which account to draw from first, and how the order may affect tax and any Age Pension
- Whether a cash buffer could reduce the need to sell investments during a market fall
- Sequencing risk in the first years after work stops, and how the plan could respond to it
- Drawing the minimum against drawing what you actually need, and the gap between the two figures
- How the plan may hold up through a long run of poor returns, tested before you rely on it
- Where a one-off cost, a car or a trip, is funded from without disturbing the rest
- A review point as markets and your spending move, so the rate can be adjusted
Transition to Retirement
We can show you how a transition to retirement pension works while you’re still working, from age 60.
A transition to retirement pension can let you take an income from super before you stop work. It may help you reduce hours while supporting your take-home pay, or be combined with salary sacrifice. Whether it helps depends on your income, tax position, balance and plans, with the tax side checked with your accountant.
Together, we’ll work through:
- Whether a transition to retirement strategy is suitable for your position
- Reducing your hours while supporting your take-home pay, and what that may cost your super
- Salary sacrificing more and drawing from super to replace the difference, modelled on your income and balance
- The drawdown limits that apply to a transition pension while you’re still working
- How the earnings behind a transition pension are taxed in the years before you retire
- What changes on the day you meet a condition of release
- What the strategy may mean for any insurance held inside your fund, checked before you start
- Whether the result justifies the extra account and the paperwork it brings
The Age Pension and Centrelink
We’ll explain what the Age Pension pays, and what the two tests count.
Entitlement is assessed under both an assets test and an income test, and the test producing the lower payment applies. Eligibility also depends on age and residency. Even a part payment generally comes with a Pensioner Concession Card, which may provide additional value.
Together, we’ll work through:
- Whether you qualify now, or may at some point as your balance draws down
- How the assets test and the income test each treat what you hold, and which one binds
- What the family home counts towards, and what it does not
- Deeming, and how financial assets are assessed on deemed income rather than what they earn
- The gifting rules, and how a gift above the allowed amounts may still be assessed
- What moving in with family or a granny flat arrangement may change, with your solicitor’s input on the agreement
- Whether you may be eligible for the Commonwealth Seniors Health Card if the pension isn’t available
- The forms, the evidence and the follow-up, prepared with you so the application is complete
Downsizer Contributions
We can show you how a downsizer contribution works, and whether a home sale may qualify.
A downsizer contribution sits outside the usual contribution caps and doesn’t require a work test, subject to eligibility. Conditions apply to your age, the property and how long it was owned, and the contribution generally must be made within 90 days of receiving the proceeds. We check eligibility before anything is sold.
Together, we’ll work through:
- Whether the property and your circumstances qualify, checked before anything is sold
- How long the home must have been owned for a sale to count
- How much can go in, and whether both members of a couple can each contribute
- The window after settlement, and exactly what starts the clock
- The way this contribution sits outside the usual caps and balance tests
- How the contribution may affect any Age Pension entitlement, once the sale proceeds sit in super
- What your options are if you need the money back soon after contributing
- Whether super suits the proceeds at all, given your other goals and need for access
Aged Care Costs and Decisions
We’ll walk you through what residential aged care costs, and how the payments are structured.
Residential aged care can involve an accommodation payment, which may be a refundable lump sum, a daily payment or a combination, plus contributions towards care and everyday living. What applies depends on your means assessment and when care began. The rules changed on 1 November 2025, so we first establish which set applies.
Together, we’ll work through:
- What a place would cost, across the payment structures a home offers
- A refundable lump sum, a daily payment, or a combination, and which suits you
- How the family home is treated under the means test
- The hotelling contribution and the non-clinical care contribution, and whether they apply under the means assessment
- How aged care costs and any Age Pension entitlement may affect each other
- Support at Home services and costs, where staying at home is the plan
- Which decisions have time limits, and which can wait until the family is ready
- Talking the decision through with the family members you’d like to involve
Retiring From Your Own Business
We can help you plan how your business may fund your retirement, and set out what that involves.
What a business earns and what it may sell for are two different numbers. Moving sale proceeds into super may be supported by the small business CGT concessions and the CGT cap, if the conditions are met. We work alongside your accountant on eligibility, ideally well before a sale.
Together, we’ll work through:
- What the business may be worth to a buyer, with a valuation from the right professional
- The small business CGT concessions and their conditions, with eligibility confirmed by your accountant
- The CGT cap, which can allow eligible proceeds into super outside the usual contribution caps
- Moving sale proceeds into super within the applicable caps, in a sequence agreed with your accountant
- Which financial year the sale may land in, considered with your accountant before you list
- Whether a sale, a wind-up or a handover fits what you want for the business
- Building savings outside the business alongside it, rather than relying on a sale alone
- Working alongside your accountant on the structure, in the same conversation
Transfer Balance Caps and Larger Balances
We’ll show you the limit on how much of your super can move into a tax-free pension.
The transfer balance cap limits how much you can move into retirement phase over your lifetime, and amounts above it can stay in accumulation, where earnings are taxed. Each person has their own cap, and for some couples, evening up balances over time may be worth considering.
Together, we’ll work through:
- Your own transfer balance cap, and how much of it you have already used
- Options for any balance above the cap, including leaving it in accumulation
- How earnings on that accumulation balance are taxed, and what it means each year
- Whether evening balances between a couple may help, considered well ahead of retirement
- Where the Division 296 threshold sits alongside the cap, and how they interact
- How indexation may affect your personal cap, depending on whether a pension has started
- What a reversionary pension would do to your spouse’s own transfer balance cap
- What the caps may mean for your estate plans, alongside your solicitor and accountant
Your Retirement and Aged Care, Worked Through Together
Planning Your Retirement Date
Your spending modelled against your super, other assets and any Age Pension entitlement.
Drawing a Retirement Income
Set against your age, what you hold, and the number of years it has to cover.
Pension Phase and Its Tax
Moving across changes how it is taxed, and when you do it matters too.
Age Pension Eligibility
Whether you may be eligible under both the assets test and the income test.
The First Few Years of Drawdown
A cash buffer and drawdown order considered to help manage an early market downturn.
Downsizer Contributions
Eligibility and timing checked before part of a home sale goes into super.
The Cost of Aged Care
The accommodation payment, the means test and how both may affect any pension.
Centrelink Forms and Applications
Forms and supporting evidence prepared with you, including for aged care assessments.
Proactive, Holistic, and Experienced Financial Planning
Retirement used to be a date. It can now be a long stretch of life, and the later years can look quite different from the early ones. That’s worth planning for with care, rather than hoping it works out. We’ll help you think through what these years could look like, what they may cost, and what would need to be in place to help you live them the way you’d like.
Later years are rarely planned alone. There may be a partner to plan with, family who’d like to help, or a parent needing care while you’re still working out your own plans. We’ll consider the parts of your situation that matter to the advice, and we’ll be here for the conversations that can be harder to have. The aim is to help you spend more of these years on the people and things you care about, and less on paperwork.
Every financial decision impacts the next
Your Financial Life Is Connected
Great advice starts with understanding the bigger picture. Every stage of life presents new opportunities and challenges, from buying property and changing careers to growing your family, planning for retirement and protecting what matters most. At Ryker, we help connect every piece of your financial world into one clear strategy.
Your
Wealth
- Property & Investing
- Career & Income
- Tax Strategy
- Insurance & Protecting Your Family
- Super & SMSF
- Wealth & Investments
- Life Events & Changes
- Business & Wealth
- Legacy & Future Wealth
- Retirement Planning
Frequently Asked Questions
We’re invested in your long-term success. What we do is personal, and we take it personally.
Your financial decisions connect, so we consider the parts of your financial life that are relevant to the advice you need:
- Property & Investing
- Career & Income
- Tax Strategy
- Insurance & Protecting Your Family
- Super & SMSF
- Wealth & Investments
- Life Events & Changes
- Business & Wealth
- Legacy & Future Wealth
- Retirement Planning
This is how we help you make decisions today with your longer-term goals in view.
Everybody’s situation is different, so we listen first, understand what matters to you and explain your options clearly before we make a recommendation.
There’s no single figure that suits everyone. The amount depends on the life you’d like in retirement and the resources you’ll have to fund it.
We consider several parts of the picture:
- What you plan to spend each year, in today’s money.
- How long the money may need to last, planned to a realistic age.
- What your assets may produce, and how that income may be taxed.
- Whether an Age Pension entitlement may form part of it, now or later.
Tell us what you’d like a year to look like, and we can work back to an estimate with you.
It depends on your age, residency, assets and income, and it isn’t all or nothing. Entitlement is assessed under an assets test and an income test, and the test producing the lower payment applies.
Two things worth knowing:
- A part payment generally comes with the Pensioner Concession Card, which may carry value of its own.
- Eligibility may begin later, even if it doesn’t apply at first, as a balance draws down.
The tests treat different assets differently, so how you’re structured may change the result. We can model it alongside your super rather than as a separate question.
Your accountant and financial adviser bring different expertise to the same decisions. Your accountant can advise on tax reporting, structures and consequences; we help you plan how cashflow, debt, super, investments and protection work towards your goals. We can coordinate before important decisions.
What an accountant does
- Prepares and lodges tax returns, BAS and financial statements
- Advises on tax structures such as companies, trusts and partnerships
- Manages bookkeeping, payroll and ATO compliance
- Provides tax advice on the consequences of a transaction
What a financial adviser does
- Sets a long term strategy across retirement, investing and cash flow
- Builds wealth from early in a working life, starting with cash flow, a first home and super
- Recommends specific super funds, investments and personal insurance
- Operates under an Australian Financial Services Licence, which is required to give personal advice on financial products
- Handles retirement planning, Centrelink and aged care strategy, and estate planning considerations
Professional roles and authorisations matter. We provide financial advice within our authorisations and work with your accountant for specialist tax advice and lodgements.
Where they work together
- Tax position. Your accountant confirms your marginal rate, deductions and carried forward losses, which shapes decisions on super contributions, investment structures and the timing of asset sales.
- Business and entity structures. Your accountant advises on the structure itself and your financial adviser works within it for investments, insurance and succession planning.
- Cash flow. Your accountant’s figures can help us understand what’s available for debt repayment, protection and longer-term goals.
- Before key decisions. We can coordinate with your accountant on contributions, asset sales and other material choices in time to consider relevant tax consequences.
The cost of residential aged care comes in parts, and what applies depends on your means assessment and when care began.
- An accommodation payment, which may be a refundable lump sum, a daily payment or a combination.
- A basic daily fee towards everyday living.
- Means-tested contributions, such as the hotelling contribution and the non-clinical care contribution, where they apply.
- Fees for any higher everyday living services a home offers.
The rules changed on 1 November 2025, so we first establish which set applies. How the family home is treated, and whether it’s kept, rented or sold, may affect both the fees and any pension entitlement. It’s worth advice before that decision is made.
A transition to retirement pension lets you draw an income from super while you’re still working, once you’ve reached preservation age, which is now 60.
It’s generally used in one of two ways. Some people reduce their hours and use the pension to help top up their income. Others keep working and combine it with salary sacrifice, which is a tax strategy rather than an income one.
There are limits on how much can be drawn each year, and the strategy doesn’t suit every balance or situation. We can model it with you, and with your accountant where needed, before you start.
An online retirement calculator can provide a useful starting estimate, but it may rely on broad assumptions about returns, spending and tax.
Advice can bring in the parts a general tool may not cover in your circumstances: how drawdowns are taxed, what the transfer balance cap allows, how Centrelink assesses what you hold, what happens to a couple’s plan if one partner dies first, and what care may cost later on. Changing any of these can shift the result.
A calculator is a good place to start. We can then work through the detail with you.
Yes, and the years before retiring are a good time to talk things through.
There’s no cost for the initial conversation. Tell us roughly what you hold and what you’d like the years after work to look like. We’ll explain how we can help and what information we’ll need to get started.
Terms such as preservation age, drawdown and the means test get explained as they come up.
Who We Help
Advice for All Stages of Life
From first job to retirement, we help you build wealth, protect it, and live well.
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First jobs, first home, first super, HECS debt, budgeting and more.
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First home buyers, new parents, school fees, single incomes, young families and more.
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Doctors, dentists, pharmacists, allied health, nurses and more.
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Lawyers, accountants, brokers, engineers, consultants and more.
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Executives, senior managers, directors, board members and more.
Public Sector & Defence
Police, firefighters, paramedics, ADF personnel, teachers and more.
Approaching Retirement
Pre-retirees, transition to retirement, Age Pension, aged care, estate planning and more.
Other Stages
Any income, any stage, career changers, separation, second opinions and more.
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Whatever’s on your mind, we’re here to help. You’ll speak with an authorised financial adviser who’ll listen first and get to know what matters to you.
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