Using a combination of these options

It’s important to understand your costs/outgoings throughout your retirement - as when considering combining products, you need to first understand how much you will need as a minimum to survive on in your retirement. Essentials such as heating, housing and food are bills that you can't really afford to take risks with and so it’s worth considering a guaranteed income (such as an annuity) to cover these as a starting point. Where you then have additional pension money you may want to think about how flexible you need it to be and when you need it, as well as what level of risk you are prepared to accept with it.

As you become older you may decide that you want to worry less about investment volatility and put more money into a guaranteed income, or you may become ill and need to review your finances perhaps considering care costs.

Although we often focus on the here and now, and getting through the next few years - people are living longer and with that in mind you need to make sure your retirement planning looks further ahead and consider such scenarios.

You may consider using your property - be it a buy to let, down-sizing or using a product such as equity release to help in your later years, but it’s worth considering your options now so that you don’t find yourself in difficulties in later life.