Retirement Income Planning for the Next 30 Years, Not the Next 12 Months
Before retirement, your focus was growth — saving, investing, and building. After retirement, it becomes income — creating consistent cash flow from the savings you spent decades accumulating. That shift changes everything: how you invest, how you withdraw, and how you manage risk.
Without a clear strategy, the transition from saving to spending creates real uncertainty. For most people, the biggest fear isn't market volatility. It's running out of money. Heartland Retirement Group helps pre-retirees and retirees replace that fear with a plan that accounts for every moving piece of their financial life — and we do it for families across the Midwest and around the country.
Why Income Planning Matters
As you approach retirement, the rules of money change.
How We Build Your Retirement Paycheck
Strategies for a Confident Retirement Income Plan
A strong income plan balances what you can control — timing, taxes, and structure — with the variables you can’t, like markets and longevity. Here’s how we help you bring it all together:
Social Security Optimization
Social Security is more than a monthly benefit — it's the foundation of your income strategy, and for most retirees it's the only income source that's inflation-adjusted and guaranteed for life. The claiming decision is also close to irreversible, which is why it deserves modeling rather than a rule of thumb. We run multiple claiming scenarios against your income, health, tax picture, and long-term goals so you can make the decision that maximizes your lifetime benefit, not just your first check.
Where you live matters here too. As of 2026, eight states still tax Social Security benefits at the state level, and most of them exempt retirees below certain income thresholds. The other 42 states and Washington, D.C., don't tax benefits at all. If you're planning to relocate in retirement — or you already have — that changes the math on when to claim and how to sequence the rest of your income.
We help you evaluate:
- Optimal claiming age based on your health, income needs, and long-term goals
- How your claiming decision affects your taxes, spousal benefits, and total lifetime income
- How Social Security integrates with other income sources — pensions, IRAs, and 401(k)s — for a cohesive plan
- How a move across state lines changes your claiming strategy and your after-tax income
Saving, Investing, & Guaranteed Income
Your retirement paycheck should come from multiple sources — investments for growth, guaranteed income for stability, and smart withdrawal strategies that help your assets last. We design income plans that blend flexibility with security, giving you a clear picture of where your income comes from each year
We guide you through:
- How much to keep in reserve so you feel secure without sacrificing growth.
- Investment strategies that balance protection with long-term potential
- Ways to use guaranteed income to cover essentials while investments support growth and lifestyle goals
Tax Planning in Retirement
Taxes don’t stop in retirement — but the way you manage them changes. Smart tax strategies can extend the life of your portfolio and help you keep more of what you’ve earned.
Our tax-focused income planning includes:
- Coordinating withdrawals to minimize your lifetime tax burden.
- Planning required minimum distributions (RMDs) to avoid unexpected tax bills.
- Evaluating Roth conversions to create tax-free income later in retirement.
Your Retirement Income Questions, Answered
Straightforward Advice, No Hidden Agendas
When should I claim Social Security?
The right age depends on your health, your savings, your income needs, and your tax picture — including which state you'll be living in when the checks start. We run scenarios for you so you can see exactly how different claiming ages affect your lifetime benefits and your overall plan, rather than defaulting to "as early as possible" or "wait until 70."
What's a safe withdrawal rate from my savings?
There's no universal number. We stress-test withdrawal strategies against your actual expenses, market conditions, and timeline to build a plan designed to last — not one built around someone else's assumptions.
Can I create guaranteed income in retirement?
Yes. We explore options like annuities and pension choices that provide a stable income floor, while keeping enough flexibility in your portfolio to support growth and lifestyle goals over time.
What if inflation or rising healthcare costs affect my plan?
We build cost-of-living adjustments and healthcare cost projections into your income plan from the start, so it adapts as circumstances change rather than leaving you exposed.
Does it matter where I live when I retire?
More than most people expect. State treatment of Social Security, pension income, IRA and 401(k) withdrawals, and estate transfers varies widely, and so does the cost of long-term care. Two identical portfolios can produce meaningfully different after-tax income depending on the state. If relocating is on the table, we build it into the plan rather than reacting to it afterward.
Independent, Fiduciary Retirement Planning — Midwest Roots, Clients Across the Country
Heartland Retirement Group is an independent fiduciary firm — which means we're required to act in your best interest, not ours. We have no Wall Street affiliations and no proprietary products to sell. Our team of 10 advisors, including founder Brandon Bose with 18+ years of retirement planning experience, works with pre-retirees and retirees to build income plans built entirely around their goals.
We're headquartered in the
Des Moines metro and we've built the practice around clients across the country. When you work with us, you get advisors who answer to you — and a planning process that covers income, taxes, investments, estate, and insurance under one roof.
How We Work With Clients Across the Country
Retirement planning doesn't require a drive to an office. Our planning process is built to run the same way whether you're twenty minutes from our office or two time zones away.
- Video and phone meetings as the default, not the exception. Review meetings, plan updates, and annual check-ins all run remotely, on your schedule.
- Secure document exchange and a client portal so account paperwork, beneficiary updates, and plan documents move without a trip to the mailbox.
- Assets held at national custodians — Schwab and Fidelity — so your accounts sit with institutions you already recognize, not with us.
- One named advisor. You get a person, not a call center or a rotating service team, regardless of where you live.
- In-person when you want it. Clients in the Des Moines metro meet at our office or at home, and we're glad to do that.
Heartland representatives conduct business in the states where they are properly registered. If you'd like to confirm we can work with you where you live, ask us — we'll tell you straight.
