Your retirement-readiness checklist

Eligibility is the floor, not the finish line. Reaching your Minimum Retirement Age or 30 years lets you retire; it doesn’t mean your plan is sound. Readiness is about whether the plan holds up if things go wrong.

That buffer is the margin of safety. A resilient plan builds in slack across income, savings, debt, and timing, so a bad market or a surprise expense doesn’t break it. A plan that only works in the best case isn’t really a plan (it’s a forecast with good luck built in).

Readiness spans a few areas: your income against your expenses, your savings and debt, your health coverage, and your date and paperwork all need to line up. A weak spot in one can undo the others.

This lesson is a final pass across those areas. Each links to a deeper lesson, and your free readiness score puts numbers to most of them, so you can use it as a pre-flight check before you file.

Start with income against expenses. Your guaranteed income is your FERS pension, the Special Retirement Supplement until 62, and Social Security. Compare that floor to what you expect to spend.

The TSP fills the gap. Whatever your expenses exceed the guaranteed floor, your TSP withdrawals cover, and the smaller that gap, the less market risk your plan carries.

Build in a margin. Expenses in retirement can surprise you (a new roof, a dental crown, a year of high inflation). Income that only just covers an average year leaves no room for a bad one.

Map the timeline, too. The supplement ends at 62, and Social Security can start anywhere from 62 to 70. Since your income mix shifts at those points, check that each phase still covers your spending.

Next, check your savings and your debts, starting with the TSP. It should support a sustainable withdrawal pace, with a cushion against a bad market early on. Lower debt and a cash reserve both reduce the pressure on it.

Test the TSP for sustainability. A sustainable pace, often near the 4% rule of thumb, should fund your gap without draining the balance. Sequence-of-returns risk makes the early years the ones to stress-test.

Weigh your debt. A mortgage or other payments you carry into retirement raise the income you need each month, so entering retirement with less debt lowers both your required income and your risk.

Keep a cash cushion. An emergency fund, separate from the TSP, lets you cover a surprise or a down market without selling investments low. It’s the simplest buffer against sequence risk.

Confirm your health coverage carries into retirement. To keep FEHB as a retiree, you generally need to have been enrolled for the five years of service before you retire. Missing that rule is hard to undo.

Check the five-year rule now. Count back from your planned date to confirm five years of continuous FEHB coverage. If you’re short, you may be able to fix it before you separate, but not after.

Plan for Medicare at 65, when you decide how it and FEHB work together (FEHB continues alongside Medicare). That’s a later step, but it’s worth knowing it’s coming.

Tie coverage to your date. If you’re considering an early exit, confirm that your retirement type keeps FEHB. An immediate or postponed retirement protects it; a deferred one usually doesn’t.

Last, lock in your date and your forms. For FERS, the last day of a month is usually the strongest date, so your annuity starts the next day. Your date also drives your leave payout and your survivor election.

Decide the survivor election next, because your survivor benefit election is largely irrevocable and controls whether your spouse keeps FEHB. Settle it, and get your spouse’s consent if you elect less than the maximum, before you file.

Account for your leave. Your unused annual leave converts to a lump-sum payout at your pay rate. Since the leave year and a January raise can change its value, factor both into your date.

File early. The retirement application, the SF-3107, goes to your agency, which forwards it to OPM. Submitting a few months ahead reduces the gap before your full annuity is finalized.

Pulling it together, readiness comes down to a few areas all being in shape at once. Income covers expenses with a margin, savings sustain withdrawals, and debt is manageable. Health coverage carries over, and your date and paperwork are set.

No single area makes you ready. A strong pension doesn’t help if you lose FEHB; a big TSP doesn’t help if you file the wrong date. The plan is only as strong as its weakest area.

Use the table as an at-a-glance check of what being ready looks like in each area. Where you fall short, the linked lessons and your readiness score show how to close the gap.

With that said, there’s no gut-feel substitute for running the numbers. Your free readiness score scores most of these areas and shows where you stand. Work through the checklist, close any gaps, then file with confidence.