Year-End Planning: Annual Gifting Rules

Retirement Answer Man

Roger Whitney, CFP®, CIMA®, RMA, CPWA®

Education, Investmentmanagement, Saving, Self-improvement, Careerplanning, Retirement, Business, Lifeplanning, Investing, Retirementplanning, Financialplanning, Retirementpodcast

4.6 • 1.2K Ratings

🗓️ 10 December 2025

⏱️ 41 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

In this episode, Roger Whitney, a retirement planner with 30 years of experience, breaks down annual gifting limits and year-end planning. He shares practical strategies for giving that make a real impact and create meaningful experiences for loved ones. Roger also answers listener questions, providing clear guidance to help you navigate your retirement with confidence.

OUTLINE OF THIS EPISODE OF THE RETIREMENT ANSWER MAN

(00:00) This podcast is dedicated to helping you rock retirement.
(00:57) Today Roger talks about annual gifting limits.

RETIREMENT TOOLKIT

(01:45) In today’s Retirement Toolkit, Roger explores year-end planning by breaking down the 2025 annual gift exclusion.
(04:05) Roger discusses giving money during your lifetime and shares the reasons why it can be beneficial.
(12:05) Roger shares his observations on giving money, noting that gifts can feel most meaningful when attached to a specific purpose rather than given with expectations.
(14:21) Strategies for impactful gifting are explored, including transferring appreciated assets, paying medical expenses, and covering tuition directly, showing ways to help others while maximizing meaning and efficiency.

LISTENER QUESTIONS

(19:00) Mary shares feedback on qualified charitable distributions (QCDs).
(21:27) Lee describes his “shoulder bonus” strategy to spend excess retirement funds while staying within a safe withdrawal rate.
(30:10) John asks when to switch from a general financial advisor to a retirement planner
(34:19) Rick asks about gifting appreciated stocks to adult children.
(35:17) Steve asks about building a resilient retirement plan at age 80.

SMART SPRINT

(38:13) In the next seven days: Do you want to give? Can you? How much and to whom? Can it have a purpose? Even small gifts can make a big impact.

CLOSING THOUGHTS

(40:00) Giving money can bring profound joy, often the greatest gift is the one you give yourself by helping others.

REFERENCES

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.8	Welcome to the show dedicated to helping you not just survive retirement,
0:04.4	but to have the confidence to lean in and rock it.
0:08.1	Great that great life.
0:09.6	My name is Roger Whitney.
0:10.9	I'm a practicing retirement planner with 30 years experience walking life with clients
0:16.1	into and through retirement.
0:19.1	Holy cow, 30 years.
0:20.4	That makes me feel old. I'm 58 years old.
0:23.2	All the young planners on my team tell me. I am founder of Agile Retirement Management, a
0:29.8	retirement planning firm, and we're actually soon to be co-founder of Retire Agile, the joint
0:35.5	firm with Tanya Nichols and I.
0:37.6	We merged our firms earlier this year.
0:39.9	Just came back from Duluth, Minnesota to visit her.
0:44.0	So I do this for a living.
0:45.6	And so a lot of what we talk about here is practical things that you can do to create a plan
0:50.7	so you can have confidence, so you can have a great life, which is the whole point of the
0:53.9	exercise. Today on the show, we're going to talk about annual gifting limits in our year-end
0:59.2	planning theme of the month. In addition, we're going to answer a number of your questions.
1:03.4	Before we get started, though, this podcast is just the beginning. Be sure to sign up for our
1:10.2	weekly email, The Noodle, which we send every
1:13.2	Saturday morning where we dig deeper with coaching insights, curated resources, and it's a
1:20.3	direct line. You get reply. That comes right to my inbox. So you can ask a question. You can give
	...

Please login to see the full transcript.

Previous episode | Next episode

Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from Roger Whitney, CFP®, CIMA®, RMA, CPWA®, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.

Generated transcripts are the property of Roger Whitney, CFP®, CIMA®, RMA, CPWA® and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.