Paperback · Fill-In Workbook
Retirement Catch-Up Workbook
(2 reviews)The book explains it. This is where you do the work — on paper, in your own handwriting, at your own kitchen table. Forty-six pages of blanks, and one number they all converge on.
- ✓What you spend now, and what changes when work stops
- ✓Your Social Security, copied off your own SSA statement
- ✓Your rough monthly gap, on one facing spread
- ✓The same spread filled in, as a worked example
- ✓Three levers you test yourself, one page each
- ✓A one-page Catch-Up Plan you date and sign
Free US shipping · Printed to order · Arrives ~ 2 weeks
For the reader who's done reading
A number you wrote down yourself is the only one you'll argue with.
You can read a good retirement book, agree with all of it, and put it down with nothing on paper. Six months on, the only figure you can still quote is the one from the search bar — and it was never yours.
This is the other half. Five parts, forty-six pages, every one of them a writing surface: where you stand today, what your gap is, what can still change, what still needs an answer from someone who isn't you, and the plan you carry out of it.
UNKNOWN counts as an answer here. Page 3 says so and the pages are built to take it, because a blank you wrote down is a blank you'll come back to, and a blank you skipped is one you'll forget you left.
From the author
Watch: the number this workbook replaces
A million dollars, ten times your salary — that was never a figure you could act on. The two that replace it are the ones you write on page 14, and this is where they come from.
- ✓ The two figures that replace the million-dollar number
- ✓ Why five years still changes the answer, even if saving more won't
- ✓ Captioned · 24 sec · watch right here
Why this one
Six pages of arithmetic, and none of it is a budget
Most retirement workbooks are two hundred pages of blank trackers you'll keep up for three weeks. This one asks for a figure only where the figure changes the answer, and every calculation in it is add a column and subtract twice. Where a line genuinely isn't knowable yet you write UNKNOWN and keep going — the totals then tell you which unknowns are the ones actually holding up your plan, which is a more useful output than a tidy page. The rest is ticks, short answers, three lever tests, and one signature.
Six pages of arithmetic in forty-sixWhat you'll fill in
Five parts, forty-six pages, all of them blanks
Where you stand today
- What an ordinary month costs you now
- What changes when the paycheck stops
- Every account, at roughly today's balance
The facts you have to look up
- Your SSA figures, off your own statement
- Debt, and the date each payment ends
- Coverage between your last day and 65
Your gap, on one facing spread
- What a retirement month will cost
- What genuinely counts as paying for it
- The same spread worked as an example
The three levers you test
- Six places a plan can move, marked
- One page per lever you decide to test
- What the three together would change
What still needs an answer
- Fourteen red flags, no research needed
- A worry turned into a real question
- An answer log, with where proof sits
The plan you sign
- Eight actions, each with its next step
- The same eight across twelve months
- One page, dated, with a review date
What readers say
“Good materials included”
If you are looking for something to help prepare you for retirement this book is wonderful. The forms are great information and gives you a true picture of where you are financially if you needed to retire or where you will be when you plan to retire. I recommend this book
Becky, reader · Sep 2026
“Great workbook for soon to be retirees!”
As a person that has to write down everything and see it on paper, this is an excellent workbook! I will be utilizing this in the near future! One thing I had a question on is in the expenses it says family support. That could be more detailed as I was thinking is that if we borrow money to family or is that like child support or alimony.
Mary, reader · Sep 2026
Good to know
Common questions
Do I need the book to use the workbook?
No. The workbook stands on its own — every page tells you what to write and why it matters, and the one place it needs a judgement call it prints a worked example opposite. The book is where the reasoning lives: why a claiming date isn't free, why housing has two separate effects, what a coverage bridge to 65 actually costs. Plenty of people do the workbook first and buy the book when a lever test turns out to be the interesting one.
How much arithmetic is there really?
Six pages of it in forty-six, and all of it is addition and subtraction — add a column, subtract twice. There is no compounding, no growth assumption and no formula to look up. The rest of the workbook is ticks, dates, short written answers and one signature.
What do I do about a number I don't know?
Write UNKNOWN. That is a real answer here and the pages are built to take it — page 3 makes it the first of six rules. The totals then show you which unknowns are actually holding up your plan, so instead of a tidy page with guesses on it you get a short list of things to go and find out. Part 4 is where those become questions with a name against each one.
Is this a budgeting workbook?
No, and it is deliberately not one. It asks what you spend in an ordinary month once, as a starting figure, and never asks you to track a category or keep anything up week to week. What it is interested in is the difference between what your retirement months will cost and what will be paying for them.
Forty-six pages. Is that enough for the price?
That is the fair question, and the honest answer is that the page count is the point. Two hundred pages of blank trackers get filled in for three weeks and abandoned; this is the shortest route from the figures you already half-know to one gap number and a signed plan, and there is nothing in it you fill in twice. It is 8.5 × 11 with generous writing rules, so a page here holds what four pages of a pocket planner would.
Can my spouse and I share one copy?
Yes — the spending, coverage and gap pages are written for a household rather than a person, and there are separate lines for each of you where the figures differ, like the two Social Security estimates and the two work-stop dates. If you both want your own lever tests and your own signed plan, buy two.
What format does it come in?
A 46-page 8.5 × 11 paperback, black and white, printed when you order and mailed to you — free US shipping, about two weeks. Paperback is the only edition and always will be: every page is a writing surface, and a fill-in workbook doesn't reflow onto a screen.
Who is this workbook not for?
Anyone already retired. Most of what it asks you to test closes on your last day of work, so the levers it prices are the ones you no longer hold. It is also the wrong buy if you want someone to tell you what to do with the answer — it produces your number and your three tested changes, and then sends you to the person licensed to advise on them.
Is this financial advice?
No. It is an educational workbook: it organises your own figures and your own questions, and it names no products, funds or providers. Contribution limits, benefit rules and tax thresholds reset annually, so check any figure against the agency or plan that holds it — the workbook routes you there rather than printing a number that expires.
Ready when you are
$25.99Paperback · shipped to you
Free US shipping · Printed to order · Arrives ~ 2 weeks
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Free US shipping · Printed to order · Arrives ~ 2 weeks
