Retirement Talk with Dr. Wade Pfau

From Retirement Answer Man by Roger Whitney, CFP®, CIMA®, RMA, CPWA®

March 18, 2026 · 1h 1m · Episode 635

About this episode

Dr. Wade Pfau joins Roger Whitney to discuss retirement income planning and the advantages of the RISA assessment over traditional risk tolerance questionnaires.

💬 Show Notes Wade Pfau, author of The Retirement Planning Guidebook and creator of the Retirement Income Style Awareness (RISA®) assessment joins Roger for a wide-ranging conversation on the big questions of retirement income planning. Wade breaks down why the RISA is a better fit for retirement than a traditional risk tolerance questionnaire, how to think about real estate and reverse mortgages as retirement tools, and what the research actually says about annuities — including when to buy, whether to add inflation protection, and how fixed index annuities with living benefits really work. This podcast is a replay of a recent Rock Retirement Club meetup where members were able to join live and ask questions. Outline Of This Episode Of The Retirement Answer Man (00:00) Roger previews the episode and invites listeners to register for Noodle Live — a Saturday morning Zoom on March 28 at livewithroger.com CONVERSATION WITH DR. WADE PFAU (02:00) Roger introduces Wade Pfau, author of The Retirement Planning Guidebook (04:15) RISA vs. risk tolerance questionnaires (10:45) How to use The Retirement Planning Guidebook (12:00) AI in retirement research (14:30) RRC Member Question: How…

People in this episode

Host: Roger Whitney

Guest: Dr. Wade Pfau

Topics covered

retirement income planning
RISA assessment
real estate in retirement
reverse mortgages
annuities

Keywords

retirement planning
RISA
real estate
reverse mortgages
annuities
tax rate
income planning

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: Retirement Income Style Awareness (RISA®), Rock Retirement Club

Books & works: The Retirement Planning Guidebook