Retirement planning · Retirement coaching
The most important question in retirement isn’t “Do I have enough?” It’s “Enough for what?”
Ten questions. Five minutes. You leave knowing where you stand and what to do next.
Nearly 30 years
of retirement planning experience
Certified coaches
for the life side of the plan
Westerville, Ohio
serving Columbus and beyond
Featured on
Media coverage of Rc Arseneau and Arseneau Financial LLC. Appearing in these outlets is not an endorsement, recommendation, or approval of our services.
Start with what matters to you
What’s keeping you up at night?
Every plan we build starts the same way: with your priorities, not our pitch. Pick the question that sounds like yours.
How do I turn what I saved into income? →
Living off what you saved is a different skill than saving it. That is the whole point of the plan.
What if I don't love retirement? →
The question almost nobody says out loud. We wrote a short book about it.
What happens if one of us needs care? →
Long-term care is the conversation most plans avoid. We have it early, on purpose.
Can I actually afford to spend? →
Permission to spend is part of the plan, never an afterthought.
Who am I when the title goes away? →
Tony asks it out loud in Episode 1: when that page turns, who am I? Identity after work is real, and it is workable.
Will my spouse be okay, no matter what? →
A real plan protects the picture for both of you: income, care, and decisions.
The two different games
Saving for retirement and living in it are two different games.
For forty years the rules were simple: earn, save, repeat. You got good at that game. Then one day the paycheck stops, and everything flips. The skills that built the money are not the skills that turn it into a monthly income, protect it from a bad market at the wrong time, or tell you what a Tuesday is for.
Most firms keep coaching the first game. We built The Retirement Life for the second one: the money and the life, planned together.
The saving years asked
How much can we put away?
Retirement asks
What is it all for, and can we spend it without fear?
Who walks with you
Planners who coach. Coaches who plan.
Rc Arseneau has spent nearly thirty years helping families get ready for retirement, and he is a CFP® professional. He and Deana are also certified coaches, and they are entering this season themselves, as grandparents asking the same questions you are.
Five founding voices cover the whole picture: planning, protection, purpose, and health. You are not handed a binder and a goodbye. You get people who stay in the conversation.
The goal isn’t simply to have enough money to retire. The goal is to build a life that’s worth retiring into.
The path
Dream It . Build It . Live It & Love It
Our tagline is not decoration; it is the order things happen in. You stay in control of the pace.
Dream It
Take the Retirement Picture Check
Ten questions about your money, your timeline, and the life you are picturing. No phone number required. You leave with your stage on the journey and one clear next step. This is where everyone starts.
Build It
Learn, then plan, at your pace
Start with a book, go deeper with the Unwrapping Retirement journey, or put your name on the Signature Retirement waitlist when you want the complete experience. Wherever you join, the first real conversation is about your priorities. We built a card deck to find them, and it changes everything.
Live It & Love It
Live your plan, and keep discovering
Your plan is a living thing. As your life changes, the plan grows with you. Your discovery never ends. Neither does your plan.
The living discovery
You don’t need to know what you want before you start.
The most common mistake in retirement planning is believing you must have it all figured out first. You don’t. Your retirement plan already exists inside you. We don’t build it for you, we uncover it with you, chipping away at everything that isn’t the retirement you were meant to live. The financial plan gives you the foundation: the confidence, the protection, the income. The discovering happens alongside it, and the plan adjusts as you go.
Three stages. One course.
Wherever you are on the journey, there is a right next move. We organize everything we make around three stages of the retirement life.
Early to mid career
You are still building. The wins here are quiet ones: saving with intention, protecting your family, and letting time do the heavy lifting.
3 to 10 years out
Retirement is close enough to feel real. These years decide how your savings become income, what happens with health coverage, and when work becomes optional.
Living in retirement
You are living off what you saved. Now the work is protecting your options, spending with permission, and building days that feel like yours.
Why the cactus
The Saguaro doesn’t grow its arms until it’s 50 to 100 years old.
The most recognizable, most magnificent version of itself arrives in what most people would call old age. That is not decline. That is arrival. It is exactly what we believe about retirement, and it is why a cactus is our mark.
The Retirement Life podcast
Conversations for the life side of retirement.
Rc and Tony talk purpose, health, relationships, and money, in plain language, with real stories.
Episode 11
The Short GameThe Four Cornerstones of a Retirement Transition
The team digs into the heart of Unwrapping Retirement: the four cornerstones (support, structure, self-talk, and self-care) that steady any big life transition. They explain why the course asks questions instead of handing out answers, and share the aha moments they've watched, including couples married 30-plus years having conversations they'd never had before.
Listen & read the takeaways →
Episode 10
The Short GameMeet the Team: Why We Created Unwrapping Retirement
The whole Retirement Life team (Rc, Deana, Madison, and Tony) sits down to share how the Unwrapping Retirement course came to be. Rc watched clients with solid money plans still struggle after retiring, and Deana realized she might be one of them. They walk through how the course works and what they each hope people find in it: fresh joy, better health habits, and real community.
Listen & read the takeaways →
Episode 9
On The GreenBecoming the CEO of Your Health with Kelley King (Part 2)
Kelley King returns to share where his treatment has taken him (through chemo, surgery, and radiation) and what cancer taught him about knowing his why. Nurse Madison Justus adds practical ways to get more from doctor visits, from writing questions down to using the patient portal. It's an honest conversation about speaking up for your health, asking for help, and taking one small step at a time.
Listen & read the takeaways →
Plain answers
Questions we get every week.
Our home base is Westerville, Ohio, and many of our families are around the Columbus area. You can also meet with us by video or by phone: the conversations, the planning, and the coaching all travel well by video, and your plan stays online, where you can see it between meetings.
Yes, for our planning clients. Estate planning documents are an add-on for Signature Retirement and Signature Retirement Continuum clients. We work through what you need, our partner firms' estate planners and attorneys prepare and review the documents, and we make sure they match the plan we built together. We do not practice law ourselves; we quarterback the work and stay accountable for the result.
Yes. Signature Retirement Continuum is available to Signature Retirement clients who want the plan kept in continuous motion: the portfolio managed, guardrails monitored, buckets managed, and the plan adjusted as life moves. It is a choice, not a condition: Signature Retirement is a standalone planning experience with no account minimum and no obligation to move a single dollar to us.
Yes, and this is unusual. Many advisers can recommend protection but cannot place it, which leaves you to implement one of your biggest decisions alone. We recommend, place, and then manage the coverage for the life of the contract. Our services are fee-based, which includes compensation from insurance placement, always disclosed before you engage us.
Tax strategy is built into the planning: which account funds which year, how withdrawals are sequenced, what a conversion would cost. For Signature Retirement Continuum clients, return preparation and filing are included and run through our partner tax firm, Vincere Tax, so the strategy and the filing agree with each other instead of happening in separate rooms. We do not prepare returns ourselves.
No, and this matters. The plan is not the reward for figuring your life out. The plan is the foundation that lets you start discovering it: the confidence, the protection, and the income that give you room to explore. As you discover more of what you want, the plan adjusts to serve it.
Peace and permission
The outcome isn’t just security. It’s permission.
Permission to breathe. To sleep well. To explore, to spend, to revisit, to learn. These are years worth preparing for, and your next chapter is still being written. We would be honored to help you write it well.