I could have been an Olympic archer (and other lies I tell myself)

Many moons ago, I once found myself on a team-building event that involved, amongst other things, an archery range.

As a kid I'd owned a 'Cowboys and Indians' toy bow and set of plastic arrows with the rubber suckers on the end. But I'd never before picked up a proper bow and quiver of arrows.

It was a freezing cold day, with lots of standing around outside as we shuffled from activity to activity, and I wasn't really in the mood for these enforced "corporate fun" shenanigans. So I went through the motions somewhat of listening to the technique and safety advice given by the instructors before stepping up to the oche (or whatever it is they call that line in archery) to just get this done, get gone and get to the pub.

Well, Dear Reader, it turns out I'm quite the shot!

Time and again I hit the inner yellow rings with several 'bullseyes' to boot. Even the instructors were impressed.

My mood lifted considerably. Pub Schmub! I'm slaying the competition here!! We should do this sort of thing more often.

Maybe, I thought to myself, just maybe I've missed My Calling. Perhaps I am Great Britain's greatest ever archerist and I just never knew it! Who knows, with a bit of practice with a cheap archery set on sale from Sports Direct I could be a Gold medal winner at the next Olympics!

You may scoff. And with good reason, obviously. But I'm not alone.

A recent YouGov survey revealed 1 in 8 Britons think that, if they started training now, they could qualify for Team GB's archery team in the 2028 Olympics. Even more ambitiously (or laughably, depending on how you look at it) 1 in 20 think they would be in with a chance of qualifying for the 100m sprint.

Now there are lies, damned lies and statistics. But I think I can confidently state that at least 98% of those people would struggle to qualify for the final of a pro-am egg and spoon race, never mind the Olympics. Myself included.

Still, self-indulgent egotistical dreams of Olympic achievement come and go. I've never fired a single arrow since and I seriously doubt Team GB's medal cabinet is any the worse for it.

Retirement, however, is an event none of us can avoid 'qualifying' for, if we live long enough. But it seems there are even larger numbers of people who think they can make a success of their later life without fully appreciating the amount of planning, preparation and professional support they will need to achieve their own Personal Best.

Research conducted recently by Canada Life revealed that 79% of over-55s are making their own way through the financial maze of later life without professional advice or guidance. Perhaps not surprisingly, 29% of over-55s who have retired are not experiencing the retirement they dreamed of. Around 1 in 10 found they had under-estimated just how much money they needed to fund their retirement.

Perhaps qualifying for an Olympic team is easier than planning for a comfortable retirement.

What's interesting to me about this is what this says about the mindset of later life consumers and where, perhaps, some advisers in this market are missing a potential trick.

Despite the 'DIY' approach being adopted by the majority of this cohort of consumers, it's clear that many are regretting the lack of any structured plan and coming to realise this is all a lot harder than they thought. Money, or rather the lack of it (as the Canada Life research noted) is a big driver in terms of the motivation and overall level of 'retirement satisfaction' being felt by a huge swathe of the over-55s.

And this chimes somewhat with feedback I've had from some advisers recently who are reporting record levels of enquiries and business in the later life lending space. Despite rather modest new business figures being reported by the Equity Release Council in Q2 (up on Q1 but not by much) there are advisers in this market who have never been busier and dealing with multiple enquiries for significant six-figure lending requirements.

It feels like perhaps consumers have got their heads back in the game faster than some advisers. They realise they need to do something to boost their flagging retirement financial situation and the time to do that something is now....it's no use waiting for rates to return to the utopia of pre-Covid (never mind pre-Truss).

They want the help. They need the help. They are actively looking for the help. And the advisers who are in the same frame of mind are reaping the rewards.

There is rarely, if ever, a single reason why one adviser working in a particular market can be rushed off their feet while many of their peers (and the wider market in general) seem stuck in neutral gear. But certainly from my own observations and from talking to those who are experiencing record-breaking levels of new business, the conversations with consumers are out there to be had.

And it's more important than ever to be having those conversations before the next generation of retirees makes the mistake of assuming that, just because they once sorted out their own mortgage application, planning for long-term financial security in later life and hitting the bullseye of all their dreams and aspirations is easily achievable.