The idea of another recession has been lingering for a few years now, and Barry Bulakites keeps getting asked about it as 2022 continues. People were easily talking about the expectation of it back in 2019, and when the pandemic arrived, folks definitely thought the drop in market value had come. However, everything bounced back up, and the economy has generally continued to push far beyond comfortable, healthy levels in most opinions. Now, as inflation pounds away at the buying power of the dollar in 2022, many are expecting a final, late arrival of the economic retraction period to hit and a lot stronger as well.

No surprise, many are wondering if it’s more than time to pull their retirement money out of investments and protect the value they have today. Tomorrow might be the inevitable wipeout. Bulakites points out that risk isn’t forgotten; thousands saw their retirement accounts destroyed during the 2009 Recession just at the point when they were ready to leave the workplace, years of saving and building being cut in half in a matter of weeks when the market imploded that year. Ultimately, it all came back, but for those who had decided to jump, that recovery was bittersweet by 2013.

Today, many folks have seen serious gains off the market over the last nine years or so. However, the signs are in place for a rocky path going forward. Barry Bulakites warns by example that those who took the high-risk road of playing around in cryptocurrency have already realized their winter and crash in the last year or so as Bitcoin slammed down from a high of $65k to its current fluttering under $20k per digital coin.

Barry Bulakites advises that the first part of knowing how to move forward is clearly understanding what a recession means. It’s a retraction of the domestic or global economy, where the gross domestic product measurement is in the negative two-quarters straight. For the average person, this doesn’t mean much. However, the effect of a recession can result in job loss, which does hit home directly if one happens to be one of those getting the pink slip.

For retirees, the more dangerous part of a recession is losing buying power and investments going south. As companies sell less and cut back, their value decreases, reducing retirement account values invested in those companies. At the same time, one’s cash value loses buying power while bills and living costs go up. Bulakites cautions that that combination is painful for a retiree if exposed to too much risk.

The clever moves to make involve paying down debt to remove unnecessary bills. That increases cash flow. Second, pull out of risk positions with a good chance of falling. Instead, stabilize in more robust, more conservative positions. Have cash ready to buy good assets for sale, but don’t be so quick to catch investments that will never come back (i.e., falling knives). Build up cash reserves for liquidity and emergency resources. And finally, look for ways to add a bit of extra income. It never hurts to bring in some extra cash, and that additional money can be convenient in tight spots, such as a car repair. Easy ways are recycling, freelancing online, spending a few hours a day doing gig work, or selling things online, such as on eBay. Finally, Barry Bulakites notes that the bigger one’s cash reserve is, the better you are in a recession.