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A Florida firm built to do fewer things, more carefully, and the founder who built it.
You shouldn’t have to translate your own pension just to get good advice.
Independent, fee-only, and built for Florida’s public employees.
Meet DerrickFRS Planning
Understand the decisions that shape your Florida Retirement System benefit.
Understanding DROP
Pension vs. Investment Plan · Guide. The FRS Income Gap Calculator · Tool.
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The pieces that sit alongside your FRS benefit, and the timing decisions that come with them.
Leaving DROP: the decisions with a deadline.
Your DROP exit is a one-time decision. Make it with a plan, not a guess.
Read the DROP guideWho We Serve
Built for the people who built Florida: teachers, first responders, officers, state and county staff, and the retirees who already served.
FRS membership has more nuance than most people realize.
A short conversation usually clarifies what applies to you.
Start a ConversationGuides, webinars, checklists, and tools in plain English. Education first, no sales pitch.
Estimate your FRS retirement income in three short steps.
Pension, DROP, the Health Insurance Subsidy, and Social Security. No Social Security number, no FRS login.
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Regular Class covers most state agency, county, and municipal roles. Normal retirement is age 62 with six years or 30 years at any age if you enrolled before July 1, 2011; age 65 with eight years or 33 years if on or after.
Vesting is six years or eight, on the same dividing line.
Your cost-of-living adjustment is 3% multiplied by the share of your service earned before July 1, 2011.
Twenty years with ten of them before July 2011 gives you 1.5%. A career entirely after July 2011 gives you zero: the same pension amount in year one and year twenty-five.
The 1.5% minimum COLA that took effect July 1, 2026 applies to eligible Special Risk retirees only. It does not apply to Regular Class.
This is not an argument for anything. It is a number most Regular Class members have never calculated for themselves, and it changes what the rest of the plan has to do.
Most state employees have access to the 457(b) through the Bureau of Deferred Compensation. It carries a feature worth knowing: distributions from a governmental 457(b) are not subject to the 10% additional tax on early distributions, at any age. Ordinary income tax still applies. See 457(b) and 403(b).
You had a choice at hire and you have one second election for your whole career. Entering DROP ends it permanently. See Investment Plan.
This page is educational and is not individualized advice. Benowitz Wealth Management is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or sponsored by the Florida Retirement System, the Florida Division of Retirement, or the State Board of Administration of Florida. Confirm the figures that apply to your own record at MyFRS.com or with the Division of Retirement.
Regular Class has its own dates and its own COLA math. Both are worth checking against your own record.
Independent, fee-only retirement planning for Florida’s public employees, built around your FRS benefit and everything you’ve built on the side.
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