FRS Planning

FRS retirement planning: starting with the decisions you only make once.

Your financial life has a small number of very large decisions in it. Most of the FRS ones are irreversible. This is the map.

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Your pension is the pension. Nobody can get you a better one: the formula is in statute and it produces the number it produces.

What is decidable is everything around it. When you enter DROP and what that settles at the same time. Whether you spend your second election. Which payout option you elect, and when that actually happens. Whether you apply for the Health Insurance Subsidy in time. When you claim Social Security. What the years before 65 cost.

The Division of Retirement administers a pension. It does not do financial planning, which is a description of the job, not a criticism.

The irreversible list

Decision	Settled on	Reversible?
DROP entry and date	Form DP-11	No, from the end of your first DROP month
Payout option 1–4	Form FRS-11o, filed with your retirement application, or with the DP-11 if you enter DROP	No, once the benefit begins
DROP beneficiary	Same form; must match the retirement beneficiary	Limited
The second election	Once per career	No, and DROP entry ends it
DROP distribution	Form DP-PAYT, 60 days	Default is a taxable lump sum
HIS application	6 months from retirement	Limited: apply late and back pay stops at six months
Returning to an FRS employer inside 6 months	None	May void your retirement

The four pages under this

DROP: the 96-month window, three interest cohorts, what entry locks in, the deadlines at exit.

Pension Plan: formula, multipliers, vesting, COLA including the new Special Risk floor, four payout options.

Investment Plan: one-year vesting, portability, the second election.

Health Insurance Subsidy: the amounts and the six-month deadline.

How we work on it

A first conversation is thirty minutes, costs nothing, and does not create an advisory relationship.

If we work together, the engagement is Comprehensive Portfolio Management: investment management with financial planning and consulting included at no additional cost. One service, described in full in Form ADV Part 2A.

Important

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.

Most of these you decide once.

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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