Top Regrets of Boomers Who Retired Broke

The baby boomers are getting old, ladies and gentlemen. Right now, the baby boomer generation is between the ages of 59 and 77. And that means that the majority of boomers are either thinking about retirement or already retired. And these aging boomers are finding themselves in one of two situations. The first situation is financially prepared and ready to retire comfortably. The second situation is not financially prepared, living on a small fixed income and perhaps forced to continue working to supplement their income. And for many of the people in that second situation who are entering their retirement age broken uncertain, they are starting to look back on their previous years with many financial regrets. Reaching retirement age unprepared financially is a very scary situation to be in. In this video, I wanna share the top seven regrets of these boomers who entered their retirement age broke. And I hope that inspires Gen X, Millennials, Gen Z and Gen Alpha to not make these same mistakes. And start taking steps in your own life to make sure that you do not reach retirement age broke. And the first regret is making social security your retirement plan. So this video was inspired by another video created by Business Insider called Money Lessons from Older Americans Who Learned the Hard Way. In the video is about boomers who share their story on how they reached retirement age broke. And a common theme of these stories is that their retirement plan was simply to receive social security checks. However, they all quickly learned that social security alone is not enough to retire comfortably. Even if you own a home and don't have many bills, a social security check alone is most likely not gonna allow you to retire comfortably. I mean, according to the Social Security Administration, in November 2024, the average monthly check for a retired worker was $1,925, which remember is before taxes, as you still have to pay taxes on social security. The government will be taking money from you until you are dead. But in order to retire comfortably, you can't just rely on a social security check, but you have to create your own plan that involves having things like a 401k account, a Roth IRA, an emergency fund, and other investments, which on top of a social security check will give you the financial cushion to retire comfortably. Entonces, por favor, do not let social security be your retirement plan. It is a huge mistake. The second regret is letting debt pile up. Now, for many of these boomers who made social security their retirement plan, another common theme that we see was throughout their lives, they accumulated a lot of debt. They lived their life saying, I am too busy to deal with this now. I'll pay this off later. And once they reached retirement age, they found themselves with a mountain of debt, but in a small fixed income, which forced them to delay full retirement and continue working in order to pay it off. Oftentimes when it comes to solving financial problems, we have this crazy idea that somehow in the future, without putting in any effort, our financial problems will somehow work themselves out, or that solving financial problems will be easier down the road. However, both of these are not true. You are the one that has to solve your financial problems, and the more you delay taking action, the harder it becomes. And so in order to retire comfortably, you cannot let debt pile up. You must take action today to solve your own financial problems and get out of this game of playing catch up. And that means paying off your current debt, not taking on new debt, and building an emergency fund to cover future surprise expenses so you're not forced to take on more debt. Don't let debt pile up, because the longer you hold onto it, the harder it is to get rid of it. Three, not taking care of your health. A while back, I saw a great video by the YouTuber Dan Go, where he spoke about various lessons he has learned in his 40 years of life. And the first lesson he said was a very powerful and true lesson, where he said, once you turn 40, you will see a massive divide of those who took care of their bodies and those who did not. I'm 31 years old now, and what I'm starting to realize with my body is that if I wanna maintain it, I have to work for it. And so I'm seeing this play out right now with many people I know. Some people are starting to let themselves go, whereas other people are working on their bodies, and both of these choices are starting to show. However, when you're in your 20s, what your body looks like has a lot to do with genetics. And when it comes to boomer regrets, another common regret amongst these boomers who retired broke is not taking care of their health as they started to get older in life. And once they reached older age, they ran into health problems and paid high medical bills, which ate away the small amount of money they did have. Diet and exercise alone won't prevent every health problem, but they will prevent some and give you more energy so you can live a much richer life. And so in order to retire comfortably, you must prioritize your health. And that means exercising, eating right, and doing regular preventative checkups at your doctor. I think that once you turn 30, it starts to become more apparent that if you wanna be in good health, you have to work for it and develop small habits every day that ultimately add up to something much bigger. And if you can create these healthy habits in your 20s, 30s, and 40s, they will follow you through to your retirement age. The next regret is not putting money in a 401k in a Roth account. Now, as I said earlier, in order to retire comfortably, you can't just rely on a social security check, but you also need to have accounts like a 401k and a Roth IRA, which are accounts that broke boomers didn't take the time to contribute to. In 100% of broke boomers regret not taking the time to contribute to these accounts throughout their lives. And so in order to retire comfortably, you must contribute as much money as you can while still living good in the present to these retirement accounts, and ideally in this order. First, contribute the maximum match to your employer 401k plan, then focus on maxing out your Roth IRA, and then move back to your 401k plan and focus on maxing that out. And if you do that consistently over a long period of time, you should reach retirement age with a lot of money on top of having a social security check each month. You can't retire on social security alone, but you must open and contribute to these different retirement accounts. However, contributing to these accounts isn't enough, which leads me to the fifth regret, not investing your retirement fund. This is a mistake that many people make when it comes to their retirement plans, and it can be an extremely costly mistake. When setting aside money for retirement, you don't just contribute to these accounts, but you also have to make sure that money is invested in the market. And failing to invest your money can be a very costly mistake. For example, this is one of my biggest personal finance mistakes. When I was 18 years old, I had worked a summer job and saved a few thousand dollars. My mom told me to open up a Roth IRA and put money in it, and I listened to her and put $2,000 into a Roth IRA. However, what she didn't tell me was to invest that money and it just sat for seven years, accumulating almost no interest until I learned about investing at 25 and then invested it. And that small mistake cost me $86,000. And this is why letting that money sit cost me seven years of interest, which means that $2,000 investment had 40 years to grow instead of 47. And in those seven years through compound interest, it missed out on $86,000. And that was just a $2,000 investment. And I'm not gonna blame my mom because she didn't know, but in order to retire comfortably, you can't just contribute to these retirement accounts, but you also have to make sure that money is investing in the market so it is growing over time, ideally just in a simple low-cost index fund. That way your money grows over time into something much bigger, which leads me to the sixth regret, not starting to invest earlier. Among broke boomers, and that's just a fun phrase to say, broke boomers, which might be triggering to the boomers watching this because boomers for some reason don't like to be called boomers, but that's just who you are and you should embrace who you are. But another common regret of these boomers that retired broke was saying, I wish I started to invest earlier. However, you can't judge them for that because they probably didn't have anybody in their lives to teach them about investing, and the internet wasn't around yet to teach them. The finance channel of El Agustin had not been created yet. I was still in my mama's belly in the 70s, and I was born in the 90s. But when it comes to investing, the truth is what matters is not how much you invest, but it's when you choose to invest. The earlier you invest your money, the more it has time to grow and the returns can be exponentially different. And let me show you how exponential it can be. Imagine a single investment of $10,000. If you invested it at age 20 with inflation calculated, it would grow to $319,000. But if you invested it 10 years later at age 30, it would only grow to $147,000. And if you invested it 10 more years later at age 40, it would only grow to $68,000. 10 more years at age 50, $31,000. In 10 more years at age 60, it would only grow to $14,000. And so let me repeat what I just said. When it comes to investing, what really matters is not how much you invest, but when you choose to invest. And as we just saw in that example, the 20-year-old grew their money 23 times more than the six-year-old because the 20-year-old had 45 years for the money to grow, whereas the 60-year-old only had five years to grow. And so in order to retire comfortably, you must start investing as early as possible, aka right now, because your golden years to contribute to your retirement account is in your 20s and 30s. And so don't delay investing. In the final regret, and let's say it together, of one, two, three, broke, boomers, is not having any hobbies outside of work. Now, despite retiring broke, many of these boomers mentioned in this Business Insider video did end up retiring on some level, whether that was full retirement on a fixed income or semi-retired working a part-time job to supplement their income, which meant that they had a lot more free time compared to in their working years. And one huge regret of these boomers, broke or not, once they reached retirement age and had all this free time, was not creating hobbies throughout their lives outside of work, because once they had more free time, they were bored and didn't know what to do with their time. Work is important, and hopefully you can find a job that brings you some joy in life. However, no matter how much you enjoy your job, you should never derive 100% of your enjoyment in life through your job. But you should also learn to find enjoyment in life outside of work and making money through various hobbies, social connections, and community events. If you are lucky enough to reach old age to the point that you can retire, it's important to have, one, built enough money to retire, but also, two, create various activities to find joy outside of working. Find enjoyment outside of work, and those are the seven regrets of broke retired boomers. And if you are a boomer watching this, broke or rich, I would appreciate in the comment section, if you shared one piece of advice to the younger generation that you wish you knew when you were younger. And if you are younger, then scroll down to this video and read the comment section to gain some insight so you don't retire broke. And with that, muchas gracias, que tengo un buen dia, nos vemos chico.