Risk Profile: How to Assess Your Investment Risk Tolerance for Retirement

Boldin's new Risk Profile questionnaire identifies your investment risk tolerance, Conservative through Aggressive, with a sample asset allocation and return assumption to help you make informed retirement planning decisions.

Your investment risk profile identifies where you fall on the spectrum from Conservative to Aggressive as an investor, based on your actual situation and not just a hypothetical reaction to loss.

Boldin's Risk Profile is a 7-question survey covering your withdrawal timeline, income sources, behavioral history during market downturns, and emotional response to volatility. The result is a personalized risk tolerance assessment with a sample asset allocation and nominal return assumption you can use as a reference point when reviewing your retirement plan.

If your plan's return assumptions don't reflect how you actually invest, or how much risk your situation can realistically support, your projections may be painting an inaccurate picture.

The Risk Profile gives you a concrete, personalized benchmark to compare against your current plan assumptions. It's also a useful starting point for a conversation with a Boldin Advisor about whether your strategy aligns with where you are in life.

Go to your Profile (top right) → Account settings → Risk Profile tab:

The survey is 7 questions with multiple-choice answers. A progress indicator at the top shows where you are throughout. Answer based on how you actually think and behave, not how you think you should.

When you've answered all 7, select See my profile to view your results.

Your results page shows your risk profile name, a sample asset allocation, a nominal return assumption, and a timestamp showing when your profile was last saved.

The Five Profiles

Conservative — 30% stocks / 70% bonds — 5.92% nominal return assumption
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Mod. Conservative — 40% stocks / 60% bonds — 6.64% nominal return assumption
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Moderate — 60% stocks / 40% bonds — 8.08% nominal return assumption
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Mod. Aggressive — 70% stocks / 30% bonds — 8.80% nominal return assumption
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Aggressive — 90% stocks / 10% bonds — 10.25% nominal return assumption

The stock/bond split shown is a sample allocation reflecting what a portfolio matched to your profile might look like, not a directive to change your holdings. The nominal return assumption is the expected annual return before adjusting for inflation. These are the same default return assumptions available when setting portfolio model rates in your plan.

Your Risk Profile is informational and does not automatically update your plan's return assumptions or asset allocation. You decide what to do with the results. A few ways to put it to use:

Compare it to your plan assumptions. Check whether the return rates you're using in your accounts align with your profile's nominal return assumption. If they don't match, you can update them manually.

Bring it to a Boldin Advisor. Your profile gives a Boldin Advisor a concrete starting point for discussing whether your current plan assumptions reflect how you actually invest.

Revisit it as life changes. A new income source, a change in timeline, or a shift in how you feel about risk are all good reasons to retake the survey. Select Retake questionnaire on your results page at any time. There's no limit to how many times you can retake it. Your most recent result saves automatically.