Ageing well: Health and money decisions to make in your 50s, 60s, 70s and 80s – Hannah McQueen

Ageing well: Health and money decisions to make in your 50s, 60s, 70s and 80s – Hannah McQueen

---

Our 50s may be the most important decade for ageing well, yet we’re juggling careers, mortgages, teenagers and ageing parents. We are the filling in the generational sandwich, short on downtime and trying to hold it all together.

Financial yardstick: Aim to be mortgage-free by your mid-50s and saving 20% of gross income. Get both right and retirement should be manageable.

Falling short? Get cracking. Know what you’ll have at retirement, how long it will last and whether smarter investing could help. Enlist an adviser if you need.

Find someone you’ll listen to who’ll tell you the truth about where you’re heading and how to get where you need to be.

Your levers: work longer, save more, repay debt faster, invest smarter or adjust expectations. Most need several at once.

Mick Jagger promised time was on his side. By our mid-50s, I’m not so sure.

Health yardstick: “Establish a baseline for cardiovascular, metabolic, bone and cognitive health, strength and balance,” says Cheryl Johnson. “You can’t manage decline without knowing your starting point. Prioritise nutrition, bone mass, muscle strength, exercise, stress reduction and sleep. Address any cardiovascular risk factors that may be present.”

And here’s where finances creep back in. Financial stress can wreck sleep. During the day, you’re too busy to dwell on debt or retirement; at night, your brain decides to revisit every problem you’ve avoided. That’s the worry loop. A financial plan won’t magically solve everything, but it can help quieten it.

Family yardstick: Family goes both ways: children and parents. Both affect retirement.

If you help adult children buy homes or manage financial setbacks, calculate the cost before your savings shrink.

Your parents’ health, housing, finances and care decisions may affect you financially, emotionally and logistically. Talk while everyone has choices. It’s better to have an awkward conversation now, rather than an inherited crisis. Encourage your parents to put enduring powers of attorney in place.

Retirement is approaching. This is the business end of working life.

Financial yardstick: Employability is a major asset. Protect cognitive and physical health so you can keep working if you choose. Don’t default to stopping work at 65. Work as long as you can.

Five years before retirement, know how long savings will last. If downsizing, decide when, what capital you’ll release and how to invest it. Try to downsize within two years of retirement.

Your investment strategy may be the biggest variable in how long money lasts.

Some want to help children now; others prefer an inheritance. Both shape the investment strategy.

Health yardstick: “Protect mobility, strength, balance, bone health and cognition,” says Johnson. “Address hearing and vision changes and manage chronic conditions before they accelerate.

“Many changes we associate with ageing could have been detected and managed years earlier. By the time symptoms become obvious, the opportunity to intervene may have narrowed.

“Don’t wait until you notice decline to investigate the cause. Identify emerging risks early and target interventions before they compromise your independence.”

Your 60s are when the tolerance for inaction reduces. It’s not about doing everything. It’s about knowing where your greatest risks lie and acting on them.

Family yardstick: Set boundaries on financial help for your adult children, signalling early if it must stop. Understand your parents’ retirement, housing and care preferences. Update the enduring power of attorney.

The focus shifts from employability to maintaining independence.

Financial yardstick: Can your home, investments and cash support changing needs, whether that’s help at home, a retirement village or residential care?

Is your investment strategy sufficiently flexible? You’re entering a decade that could demand your biggest financial adjustments, with decisions carrying significant long-term consequences.

This isn’t the time to go it alone. Have someone to protect your financial flank and help you navigate big decisions before your options narrow.

Understand the cost of unmanaged decline versus proactive care, retirement village contracts, residential care costs and subsidy eligibility.

Remember, retirement villages are usually a choice; residential care often isn’t. The earlier you plan, the more choices you preserve.

Health yardstick: Know your risks of falls, fractures, medication harm and cognitive decline. A minor fall can undermine confidence, activity and strength.

Review medications, maintain strength and balance, and investigate changes rather than dismissing them as inevitable ageing.

Johnson’s preference is to check her clients’ wider health every six months to detect silent decline before crisis. “Our goal is to get ahead of it,” she says.

Family yardstick: Identify who steps in when circumstances change. Usually one child carries the load, often because of geography. Ironically, the sibling doing the least sometimes has the loudest opinions.

Agree on who manages appointments and emergencies, and how time and expenses are reimbursed. Unrecognised costs breed resentment.

Document arrangements and legal authority. Refresh your enduring powers of attorney to better describe your lifestyle preferences while you can still speak up for yourself.

Age doesn’t determine capability. Some remain fiercely independent; others need considerable support. But your 80s are when residential care becomes more likely. If that’s an outcome you want to avoid or delay, slowing decline requires more than good intentions. It takes deliberate investment in your health, with targeted interventions to protect your independence.

Financial yardstick: Know home-support and residential-care costs, funding options and who can help with decisions.

Health yardstick: Identify deterioration before crisis. A fall, medication problem or illness can make hospital admission a pathway into residential care.

Family yardstick: Agree responsibilities before crisis. Adult children juggle care, careers and retirement; the person carrying the load needs support, not criticism.

Health, financial and estate plans must work together while choices remain.

Perhaps the best legacy isn’t inheritance, but sparing children decisions we could have made.

Ageing well takes action, not intentions. And the right plan today must evolve as we do.

1. Know your numbers – health and wealth

Know your blood pressure, bone health, cognitive risk factors, falls risk and financial position. What you don’t measure, you can’t manage. Establish a baseline and track changes before problems become obvious.

2. Don’t confuse having a plan with having a good plan

Your investment strategy at 55 shouldn’t necessarily be your strategy at 75. Equally, your health priorities change. Review both regularly, ideally with someone who’ll tell you what you need to hear, not what you want to hear.

3. Make independence the family goal

Help your children become financially independent, and help your parents remain physically independent. Both require boundaries, planning and sometimes uncomfortable conversations. Better to make decisions together than have a crisis make them for you.

4. Knowing isn’t doing

You don’t need to fix everything. Identify your biggest emerging risks, prioritise the interventions that will make the greatest difference and enlist support to follow through. Good intentions won’t protect your health, wealth or independence. Action will.

Hannah McQueen is the founder and director of Age Brightly, and the host of The Next Bit podcast on iHeart.com

Latest from Lifestyle