How Four Early Retirees Shielded Their Savings From Market Downturns

Four individuals who stopped working close to market highs shared the steps that let them maintain their standard of living during a recent equity slump. Hitesh Pahuja reduced his equity share to 60-65% and kept three to four years of expenses in debt, while Amit Gupta limited withdrawals to about 1.5% of his portfolio and held seven to eight years of costs in safe assets. Ravi Handa separates two to three years of liquidity in ultra-short-duration funds and another five to six years in hybrid allocations, avoiding any need to sell equities.

Sagar Saroy moved most of his corpus into cash-generating assets before retiring, warning that selling during a 30% market fall erodes compounding. Experts cited stress-test models that highlight sequence-of-returns risk in the first five to ten years of retirement, recommending diversified buffers and modest withdrawal rates to survive market stress.