{"id":515410,"date":"2026-01-14T11:51:12","date_gmt":"2026-01-14T11:51:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/515410\/"},"modified":"2026-01-14T11:51:12","modified_gmt":"2026-01-14T11:51:12","slug":"were-not-happy-my-wife-and-i-are-retired-in-wisconsin-with-two-pensions-and-75k-annual-income-but-our-retirement-funds-dropped-45k-this-year-help","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/515410\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018We\u2019re not happy.\u2019 My wife and I are retired in Wisconsin with two pensions and $75K+ annual income. But our retirement funds dropped $45K this year. Help."},"content":{"rendered":"

Question: <\/strong>\u201cMy wife and I are both retired in Wisconsin and we\u2019re both collecting Social Security. I have two pensions and an annual income of $75,000-plus. Earlier this year, we lost $45,000 from our retirement funds. We currently have two financial advisers but we\u2019re not happy with the results. Should we start from scratch with a new adviser?\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cI wouldn\u2019t be happy at all with my adviser if they had sold part of my portfolio during the market downturn that occurred, particularly in April of this year,\u201d says Alonso Rodriguez Segarra, a certified financial planner, CEO and founder of Advise Financial. \u201cI would be even more upset with them after seeing the spectacular growth the stock market experienced in the following months, surpassing all-time highs on multiple occasions.\u201d<\/p>\n

Have an issue with your financial planner or looking for a new one? Email questions or concerns to picks@marketwatch.com<\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n

That said, before you ditch you adviser, a chat may be in order. \u201cBefore making a change that could be attributable to a temporary, broad-market decline, have a discussion with your adviser,\u201d says Thomas J. Brock, a chartered financial analyst and certified public accountant at Annuity.org. \u201cRevisit your long-term strategic asset allocation and your access to near-term liquidity and give the adviser an opportunity to explain the near-term performance of your portfolio and highlight the asset positions that are specifically designed to provide liquidity and resiliency during turbulent times.\u201d<\/p>\n

You should also learn why your portfolio was down $45,000, adds Ryan A. Hughes, founder and portfolio manager at Bull Oak. \u201cWas this a temporary dip or was this a realized loss? Perhaps this was intentionally done to offset other gains? Furthermore, is the $45,000 loss a small or large percentage loss when compared to the rest of the portfolio?\u201d says Hughes.<\/p>\n

Without more specifics, it\u2019s hard to assume how you ended up in this position. \u201cThis has been a pretty good year to date for financial markets, so it seems unlikely you\u2019d have a loss, but that depends on what your strategy was,\u201d says Joe Favorito, a CFP a principal at Landmark Wealth Management. <\/p>\n

That said, earlier this year, markets declined significantly during tariff discussions. \u201cSome volatility would be expected depending on how you\u2019re invested. If you haven\u2019t heard from your adviser or received proactive guidance, that\u2019s probably part of the problem and it\u2019s worth getting another opinion,\u201d says Ryan Haiss, a CFP at Flynn Zito Capital Management.<\/p>\n

What to look for in a new financial adviser<\/p>\n

If the conversation with your adviser doesn\u2019t give you confidence or properly explain the loss, Brock recommends finding a reputable fiduciary financial adviser to get a complimentary second opinion. \u201cShare your general financial information and portfolio performance with them and see whether there are cracks in the foundation,\u201d says Brock.<\/p>\n

Furthermore, \u201calways remember the golden rules: look for a fee-only adviser to avoid conflicts of interest and to prevent them from trying to sell you high commission financial or insurance products,\u201d says Segarra. \u201cEnsure they\u2019re a CFP so they meet fiduciary standards and have the necessary training and make sure you feel comfortable with them and trust them. Always ask in writing about their commissions and how they generate their income.\u201d<\/p>\n

When looking for a new adviser, Haiss says, \u201cI recommend working with a CFP who specializes in retirement planning and asset allocation.\u201d The reason it\u2019s worth looking into a CFP is because they must complete rigorous education requirements, pass exams, perform thousands of hours of work-related experience and adhere to a fiduciary duty in order to earn their designation. You can use this free tool from our ad partner SmartAsset to match you to financial advisers<\/a>, as well as sites like CFP Board and NAPFA.<\/p>\n

That said, if you\u2019re only looking for someone to manage your portfolio and not necessarily financial planning help, Hughes says you might want to look for an investment adviser instead. \u201cWhile each firm may use different titles for roles, I get the impression that you\u2019re looking solely for someone to help manage your portfolio. Finding someone who specializes in this might be the right move,\u201d says Hughes.<\/p>\n

Additionally, Favorito says he\u2019s not an advocate of having more than one adviser unless they are speaking and working in concert, which is rare. \u201cWith more than one, they could be doing things independently that are counterproductive when compared to what the other adviser is doing,\u201d says Favorito. \u201cSometimes you get two half loaves of bread that don\u2019t equal one whole loaf.\u201d<\/p>\n

Have an issue with your financial planner or looking for a new one? Email questions or concerns to picks@marketwatch.com<\/a>.<\/strong><\/p>\n

Questions edited for brevity and clarity. By emailing your questions to The Advicer, you agree to have them published anonymously on MarketWatch; they may appear anonymously in other media and platforms.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Question: \u201cMy wife and I are both retired in Wisconsin and we\u2019re both collecting Social Security. I have…\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":515411,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[8392,217879,64,190838,190268,19451,190830,38360,13656,190269,216964,28016,60,230144,67891,57,190843,4313,216965,216963,94005,255,3234,190263,230143,708,47587,5660,64323,230142,67,132,68],"class_list":{"0":"post-515410","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-personal-finance","8":"tag-banking","9":"tag-banking-credit","10":"tag-business","11":"tag-ce-industry-news-filter","12":"tag-content-types","13":"tag-corporate","14":"tag-corporate-industrial-news","15":"tag-credit","16":"tag-earnings","17":"tag-factiva-filters","18":"tag-financial-investment-services","19":"tag-financial-performance","20":"tag-financial-services","21":"tag-financial-vehicles","22":"tag-funds","23":"tag-general-news","24":"tag-industrial-news","25":"tag-investing","26":"tag-investing-securities","27":"tag-mpsmartasset","28":"tag-pension-funds","29":"tag-personal-finance","30":"tag-political","31":"tag-political-general-news","32":"tag-public-pension-funds","33":"tag-retirement-planning","34":"tag-securities","35":"tag-synd","36":"tag-trusts","37":"tag-trusts-funds-financial-vehicles","38":"tag-united-states","39":"tag-unitedstates","40":"tag-us"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":"Validation failed: Text character limit of 500 exceeded"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/515410","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=515410"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/515410\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/515411"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=515410"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=515410"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=515410"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}