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Stage Ready Financial Planning

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Stage Ready Financial Planning

Joseph Eck, CFP® | Fiduciary Financial Advisor Serving Dayton, Ohio | Retirement Planning that stays in sync with your life.

Providing fee-only wealth management, designed to handle the math so you can enjoy the music. Fiduciary Financial Advisor Serving Dayton, Ohio | Retirement Planning that stays in sync with your life. You’ve spent decades saving for retirement, but the noise of complicated tax rules and stock market volatility can make it feel totally overwhelming. Now that you finally have the free time to travel more and spend time with the grandkids, you shouldn't have to be your own full-time portfolio analyst. Having helped clients prepare for and enjoy retirement for over a decade, I've learned that a great retirement plan isn't just about the accounts you own; it’s about your entire financial life working in sync. That's why Stage Ready Financial Planning was built to help retirees like yourself orchestrate and live their ideal life without stressing about the market or managing spreadsheets. As a fiduciary financial advisor in Dayton, Ohio, my only focus is your success and confidence. But managing your investment accounts is only part of the equation. With the help of your CPA and Attorney, I'll coordinate your taxes, investments, and estate plan into an easy-to-understand, high-performance plan. From tax-efficient retirement withdrawals to risk-tuned portfolios, I'll take on the heavy lifting of managing your wealth, so that every move stays in step with your vision. JOSEPH A ECK, CFP®
Owner & Financial Planner

Since 2015, I have helped families in Dayton and Southwest Ohio harmonize their financial resources with their retirement dreams. Before founding Stage Ready Financial Planning, I served as a Financial Planner at a large firm, where I realized that retirees deserved a more personal partnership—one that orchestrates a plan to stay "in step" with their lives. With a background in music education and over a decade of experience in financial planning, I believe a confident retirement begins with understanding. I don’t just manage portfolios; I "handle the math" and teach the strategies behind it so you can make informed, great decisions about your future. My mission is to combine my love for teaching with a passion for financial freedom, ensuring your investments are tuned to support your lifestyle. In addition to my years of experience, I've earned degrees from Wright State University, and the University of Houston, along with an Executive Certificate in Financial Planning from Xavier University. As a CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER® professional and a member of the XY Planning Network and NAPFA,
I am committed to the highest fiduciary standards. My wife Kristen and I live in Oakwood with our dachshund pups, Lily and Henry. When I’m not "at the podium" helping clients, you can find me enjoying music, fitness, the ocean, grilling with friends, and spending time with my family.

10/26/2026

An organized retirement plan works the same way a well-managed vacation rental does. Every piece has a job. Nothing is there without a reason.

We just got back from a stay in the Lake Lure area outside Asheville, NC. We were blown away because the team who manages that property had thought of everything. Every switch in the house was labeled. Heaters on the patio for comfortable evening dining and hot tubbing. Fire pit on a switch. Pool cover on a switch. High end coffee at the push of a button. Groceries and Lake close with a stunning mountain view. You didn't have to figure anything out when you arrived. You just got to enjoy being there.

That's the standard I hold a retirement plan to.

Most people start with solid pieces already in place. A 401(k), a savings account, an old IRA from a job they left years ago. But nobody's ever connected them into a single picture. Nobody's assigned each account a clear purpose or drawn the line between what they have and what it's supposed to do for them.

In other words, nobody's labeled the switches.

Getting organized is the first thing we work through together. What's the job of each account? Where is sustainable retirement income actually coming from? What's your cash cushion? What's each dollar in your plan supposed to do?

10/19/2026

Not every plan delivers what you pictured. Sometimes that's the most useful thing that can happen.

We just got back from a few days split between the mountains of NC and the Gulf Coast. The mountain stay was everything we'd hoped for. The beach? Mostly rain and murky water.

We still had a good few days off together. But the second half of the trip didn't deliver the experience we'd imagined.

And because we've dreamed of spending part of the year in retirement near the beach , it was a useful experience.

One of the things I encourage people to do (especially in the years leading up to retirement) is to test the assumptions behind the lifestyle they're planning for. Not just the financial ones. The real life ones.

"We've always wanted to retire near the water." Great. Have you spent a week there in the off-season? Have you been there when it rains for four days straight? Do you know what that area actually feels like to live in when it gets hot, not just to visit?

I'm a huge believer that retirement planning (and all financial planning for that matter) should be iterative. You make your best assumptions, you test them, and you update your plan based on what you find out.

Sometimes the idea you pictured doesn't hold up. Sometimes it turns out to be exactly right. Both outcomes give you something to work with.

10/12/2026

When you take money out of your Roth IRA, your investment custodian reports the gross withdrawal to the IRS. But they don't report how much of it is taxable. Surprise, that's your job.

Your custodian sends you Form 1099-R showing the total distribution. But because they don't track your contribution history across all accounts and all years, they usually can't tell the IRS how much of your withdrawal is actually subject to tax (if any).

That's what IRS Form 8606 is for.

Form 8606 is how you document your Roth IRA basis. It's how you prove to the IRS that the first dollars out were contributions, which come out tax-free and penalty-free per the ordering rules. Without it, the IRS has no record of what you've already paid taxes on, and they might treat the entire distribution as taxable income.

This matters most if you've made contributions over many years, done Roth conversions, or started taking distributions. The ordering rules are clear about what comes out first. But the IRS only knows what you tell them.

If you work with a tax preparer, make sure they know you have a Roth IRA. A missed Form 8606 is the kind of thing that costs people money they never should have paid.

Full breakdown of both five-year rules and the ordering rules in the newest blog post.

10/05/2026

Rolling a Roth 401(k) into a Roth IRA at retirement resets the five-year tax-free earnings clock. A lot of people heading into retirement don't see that coming.

Let's say you've had a Roth 401(k) at work for 10, 15, even 20 years. You retire and roll it into a Roth IRA. Clean move, but if that Roth IRA is a brand new account, the IRS treats it as a brand new account.

A new five-year clock starts on January 1 of the year the Roth IRA is opened.

That means your Roth 401(k) earnings, which may have been growing for decades, now sit inside an account that just reset in the eyes of the IRS. Pull out growth before that new five-year window closes and before you're 59½, and you might owe income taxes.

The fix? Open a Roth IRA as soon as possible, even with a small contribution. If you already have a Roth IRA with at least five years of history, that timeline stays in sync when you roll in your 401(k).

I'm a big believer in starting the clock as early as possible, especially for people in their 50s who are still a few years from retirement. Opening an account with even a minimal contribution costs almost nothing. But the five-year head start can mean flexibility down the road.

Full breakdown of both Roth IRA five-year rules in my latest blog.

09/28/2026

I almost told him to just cash the account out.

He inherited a small IRA from his mother. Not the kind of money that makes you think twice about the tax math. He wanted to simplify things, close the account, move the money to his bank. Totally reasonable.

My gut agreed with him. But I asked if we could hold off a few days so I could run the numbers first.

Glad we didn't.

He's in his late sixties and on Medicare. When that lump sum stacked on top of his regular income, it pushed him right against an IRMAA threshold. IRMAA is a Medicare surcharge that kicks in when your income crosses certain levels and it doesn't hit you immediately. It shows up two years later in a letter from Social Security telling you that you'll pay higher monthly premiums.

So we spread the withdrawals over two years instead. He gets the same money but the tax bracket stays put and Medicare premiums don't move.

The tax bill from taking it all at once wasn't the main problem. The Medicare cost was.

The accounts that feel too small to worry about are often the ones worth slowing down for.

09/21/2026

Scary headlines are one of the most useful planning tools I have.

Not because they predict the future. Because they test whether your plan is actually built for the life you're living.

I'm in fall planning meetings right now, and the stress is real. Families are watching markets bounce. They're hearing terrifying things about AI, global conflict, what comes next. And I'm getting some version of this question pretty regularly: "Do we need to move things to safety?"

Here's what I've been walking through with them:

First we confirm what's most important to them and look at their cash cushion. How much do they have on hand for those travel plans and house projects in the next 12-36 months?

Then we look at the bond and cash allocation inside their portfolio. How many years of income do they have in conservative assets that don't require selling stock if the market drops?

I've learned over the years that when someone realizes they don't need to touch their stocks for four or five years, the tension in their voice changes.

This is because they realize their plan was never random.

Stocks, bonds, and cash each have a job. Stocks are there to grow your money over time. Bonds and cash are there to fund your life when markets struggle, so you're not forced to sell at the wrong time.

When headlines get noisy, the most valuable thing you can do isn't change your strategy. It's make sure you understand the one you already have in place.

That's exactly what these meetings are for.

09/14/2026

We tried to save money on hotels on this trip.

We picked spots close to the parks at a reasonable price. They looked fine online.

But one had a clogged drain. One had a shower I'd describe as character-building. One had a lobby that smelled like it had a story we didn't want to know.

We saved a few hundred dollars.

And I'd take every dollar of that back right now.

This is something that shows up in retirement planning too. The cheapest option and the best option are rarely the same thing.

That doesn't mean spend more on everything. It means know what you're actually optimizing for.

When you're building a retirement income plan, you can absolutely cut costs in places that don't matter to you. But if you cut them in places that do, you don't save money. You just pay for an outcome you didn't want.

The goal is to spend your money on what gives you the life you're trying to live. Not to spend as little as possible and hope it all works out.

Cheaper isn't always wrong. Cheaper as the primary driver usually is.

09/07/2026

When you think about retirement planning, you probably think about the math. Safe withdrawal rates, tax efficiency, sequence of returns risk...

I think about those things every day, but the math is in service of something. And for most of the people I work with, that something includes other people.

My wife and I just spent five days traveling with her dad, watching him check off stadiums from a bucket list he's been working through for years. We covered five parks. He's now at 24 of 30. We've been with him for 15.

The flights, hotels, tickets, meals. None of that was cheap.

But that money bought something that doesn't show up in any spreadsheet: five full days with someone we love, doing something that lights him up.

That's what retirement income is supposed to make possible.

When I help people build a retirement plan, I want a clear picture of what they're planning for. The bills, the taxes, the investment income. And also the trips, the family, the things that have been on hold.

Your money is a tool. The goal is to orchestrate it well enough that you can actually use it for what matters.

08/31/2026

When someone inherits money, the first questions I get are usually around taxes.

Which makes sense. The rules are tricky and they matter. But I always want to make sure a second conversation happens too.

What would be meaningful when you think about the gift you've been given?

When someone you love passes away and leaves money behind, that inheritance is more than a dollar amount. It has intention behind it. It might represent decades of work, of saving, of choosing not to spend so that you could benefit from it.

I encourage my clients to ask themselves a few questions before making withdrawal decisions.

Is there something your loved one would have wanted you to do? A trip they always talked about. A grandkid's education. A charity they cared about.

Does any of this money fit naturally into your own plan? A home project you've been putting off. A year with lower income where a distribution makes tax sense. Something that already has a purpose.

Is there an opportunity to give now, while you can actually see the impact?

And I say all of this from the mindset that every dollar in your plan should have a job. An inherited IRA is no different. When you get in tune with what that money could actually accomplish, the tax decisions get a lot easier.

My recent blog has the full breakdown of inherited IRA rules, including the mechanics and common mistakes. But the purpose piece is the one I'd start with.

08/24/2026

The first thing to do after inheriting an IRA isn't what you might think.

It's take a breath.

You've just lost someone you care about. The money isn't going anywhere. The account will be there when you're ready to think clearly.

Then once you've given yourself some space, here's a basic checklist of next steps:

1. Gather the paperwork: Find recent account statements and a certified copy of the death certificate. You'll need both.

2. Contact your financial advisor and CPA: The tax rules on inherited accounts are specific to your situation. Getting the right team in place before you make decisions is a smart move.

3. Contact the custodian: They'll walk you through the paperwork for either a distribution or a transfer. If you're not planning on cashing the account out, ask for a direct transfer. If they issue you a check directly, you can't put the money back, and it counts as a fully taxable distribution.

4. Give some thought to what's meaningful: Before deciding on a withdrawal strategy, consider what the money could actually do for you. A charitable gift. A trip. Something your loved one would have wanted. The financial plan should follow the intention.

Inherited IRA mistakes are almost always the result of moving too fast while you're grieving. There's rarely a reason to rush. Take your time, get the right people involved, and make a decision you'll be proud of.

Address

1 Oakwood Avenue, Unit 694
Dayton, OH
45409

Opening Hours

Monday	9am - 5pm
Tuesday	9am - 5pm
Wednesday	9am - 5pm
Thursday	9am - 5pm
Friday	9am - 5pm

Website

https://www.stagereadyfp.com/, https://www.linkedin.com/in/josepheckcfp/, https://www.instagram.com/stagereadyfinancialp

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