Fewer than one in ten South Africans can maintain their standard of living in retirement. That number includes people who did everything they were supposed to do — contributed to retirement annuities for decades, owned their homes, had financial advisors, accumulated meaningful wealth. 

The failure mode is almost never catastrophic negligence. It's a slow accumulation of small, individually reasonable decisions that compound in the wrong direction over twenty years. A preservation fund cashed out once. A living annuity drawdown rate set at 6.5% because the income felt right at retirement, without modelling what happens at 78. A beneficiary nomination form last reviewed in 2011. An estate plan assumed to be in order because it was once discussed. 

None of these decisions feel significant when you make them. All of them show up, eventually, in your retirement account balance.