Is It Too Late for Financial Planning?
By Allen Davis and Lou Davis | Davis Financial Group
Published in Northampton Living | October 2025
You might think so, if you’re 60, 70 or even older. But financial planning can in most instances benefit you, even if you’re comparatively late in getting started. In fact, the financial planning process in some ways can become more efficient for older folks.
Time Is on Your Side
Consider this: When a 40-year-old begins working with a professional financial planner, they’re looking at a 50-year-or-more time horizon. That’s a lot of uncertainty to imagine, illustrate, analyze and plan for. But when you do financial planning later on, you’re faced with fewer unknowns about your health, income, expenses, the markets and many other details. You’re clearer about your needs and priorities. You still have “what-ifs” to consider and decisions to make, but you’re dealing with a narrowed range of possibilities.
We recently were referred to Georgia, a 75-year-old widow. When we met, she wondered whether she was “too old” to do financial planning – she thought she hadn’t saved enough. What could she do at this age? She said she worried about whether she would “be okay” and let us know that she never understood anything about her investments, which had not been reviewed since her late husband’s death.
What It Takes to “Be Okay”
Georgia was very nervous about what she would learn from a financial planning process. It was like getting X-ray results, she said, but she screwed up her courage and called us for an appointment; after all, there was a lot at stake for her and her children.
We did a complete analysis, including a personal risk tolerance assessment. We saw that her husband had invested heavily in stocks – but there were no bonds or cash to balance the risk. The portfolio had performed well, but now Georgia would have much less time to recover from a bad market than she and her husband did 20 years ago.
Allen Davis and Lou Davis
Financial Planner
Davis Financial Group
413 584 3098
ldavis@davisfinancialgrp.com
davisfinancialgrp.com
We found that given her age, risk tolerance and the composition of the portfolio, there actually was a much lower probability that she would “be okay” – the odds were too close for comfort that she could actually run out of money. We showed her how she could improve her chances of success by diversifying her portfolio with bonds, cash and other financial instruments. This could lower the risk dramatically and would give her much more confidence that she would have what she needed. She was incredibly relieved – far from being “too late for planning,” she now felt she was planning “just in time”!
Stop Beating Yourself Up
Maybe you chastise yourself for having lost the opportunity to save more for retirement. But even during the retirement years, there can be ways to improve your position through financial planning. Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good – don’t let getting a late start keep you from giving us a call.
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