A 61-year-old wife in California, who we will call Anne, cut back drastically on her work schedule a year ago to care for her dying husband.

After his death in April, she could not return to work, but called on Kimberly Foss, founder and president of Empyrion Wealth Management in Roseville, Calif., to help her make financial decisions for her retirement, which stretches far into the future.

Anne began drawing on the Social Security survivor benefits she was eligible for because of her husband’s death, and will not begin her Social Security benefits when she turns 62, which she could have done.

“She has about $1 million in assets to work with and we are taking some money from her taxable accounts first to supplement her budget, but she has had to make some sacrifices,” Foss says. “She is cutting back on what she gives the children and grandchildren. She cannot take the trips she wanted unless the market stays very strong.”

Foss also is advising her to sell the RV, hot rod car and motorcycle she and her husband owned to save the motor vehicle fees and insurance. “This is an emotional issue for her, but at some point she will need to get rid of these things,” Foss says.

More and more financial advisors are being faced with working through these kinds of problems, as their clients are forced out of work earlier than planned because of downsizing, poor health or other reasons. Each case is unique, the advisors warn, but some themes run through the planning.

If possible, they advise clients to defer taking Social Security until at least the full retirement age of 66 or 67, and longer if possible so that the benefits continue to grow. Take distributions from taxable accounts first since the taxes have already been paid and wait to take from tax-deferred accounts so the pre-tax assets can continue to grow. But be aware the ideal is not always possible, the advisors say.

Peter J. Nagle, a financial planner with Spruce Hill Capital LLC in Guilford, Conn., has a client, we’ll call Daniel, who was a successful corporate attorney who lost his job when the company was reorganized. The client and his wife, who had several million in investments, for awhile lived off of proceeds from selling his company stock and her income. They sold their large home and moved into a condominium.

Nagle advised them to take money from investments and delay Social Security until Daniel is 70, but he started taking benefits at age 65.

“There are emotional issues involved for those who are laid off involuntarily and it can make them want security in financial matters even more. Daniel wanted that base of income so he did not have to take from his investments, which he could have done,” Nagle says.

Others, like Elle Kaplan’s client, Jane, can follow a more accepted path. Jane, a publishing executive, was laid off at 62 with about $2 million in assets. She is spending about $125,000 a year in the near term and planning to spend less as she ages, says Kaplan, CEO and founding partner of Lexion Capital Management in New York City.

She will not take Social Security until she reaches 70 when the benefit is as large as it will get.

“But this approach is not formulaic; it is market dependent,” says Kaplan. “I saw people destroyed when they drew money from stocks in 2008 when they should have been drawing from fixed income to let the stocks recover. That decision will affect their retirement for the rest of their lives.”

“In Jane’s case, we are drawing from the taxable accounts and letting the power of compounding continue to work for the tax-deferred accounts,” she says.

Roth IRAs can also be used as a planning tool to pay taxes when the client wants, says Saul Simon, founder and president of Simon Financial Group in Edison, N.J. The firm is affiliated with Lincoln Financial Advisors.

Simon has a client who is a 64-year-old widow. She has about $1 million in assets, but no income other than unemployment benefits. She is living off some cash and liquid assets, but may soon have to tap unqualified accounts, Simon says.

“After that, if we take money from her qualified accounts we will roll it over into a Roth IRA so she will pay taxes on it now, when her tax bracket is very low,” says Simon. He has also made sure she has long-term-care insurance.

Taxes are also the prime consideration for a client of Brian Parker, managing director and co-founder of EP Wealth Advisors in Torrance, Calif. The client, John, was injured on the job and forced to retire before his goal of 65 years of age. Although John had nearly $2 million in his 401(k), much of it was invested in company stock.

Parker shifted John’s investments out of company stock and also took advantage of the net unrealized appreciation (NUA), which allows him to roll over the money to a taxable brokerage account and avoid taxes on the appreciation amount.

“We showed him that delaying his Social Security will improve his plan, which took some work, as he had the motto of ‘Take it while you can,'” says Parker.

Sometimes a client chooses retirement, but it is still not what was planned. A financial advisor at Morgan Stanley said he has a client who became so unhappy at work that he retired when he was 62 rather than 66, the age he intended to retire from his job. He has $1.8 million in assets and no debt.

“If he had debt, we would pay that off first, especially if he did not want any equity exposure in his investments, because his fixed-income investments would not be paying a big return. We advised him to delay Social Security until at least full retirement age and take from his taxable accounts in the meantime,” said the advisor, who didn't want to be named.

In order to delay taking Social Security until at least full retirement age, Larry Rosenthal, president of Rosenthal Wealth Management Group in northern Virginia, says he tiered investment withdrawals for a client who lost his job in the telecom industry in his early 60s.

Without a pension and with a wife who is not working, the client, who has $1.4 million in a 401(k) and other assets, had to decide which buckets of money to start drawing from.

“We started drawing from an annuity with lifetime benefits, then took from municipal bonds because they are tax free and yield the least, and then from nonqualified accounts,” Rosenthal says. “We will eventually move to qualified accounts. The plan is based on product design and tax efficiency.”

A tiered approach also is utilized by Joseph Anderson, president of Pure Financial Advisors in San Diego, in determining which assets to draw on for his clients. The starting goal is to have a 4 percent distribution rate from investments. If the distribution rate is higher than 4 percent, Anderson recommends taking Social Security early to avoid running out of investment money in later years.

If even that move does not reach the goal, the client will have to consider working part time and reducing living expenses.

“Ages 60 to 66 are the most critical years in planning your retirement,” says Anderson. Planning correctly “could be the difference between dying broke and leaving a legacy.”