My husband has a great job in a stable industry, but he's 63. Two years ago, we thought by this year he'd be officially retired -- doing a little consulting, but taking the winter off so we could spend the cold months somewhere warm. I have a home-based business that has always offered flexibility. Together, we were looking forward to a more leisurely life.

The economic slowdown has made us rethink our plans. My husband continues to work at his old job -- usually 50 or 60 hours a week -- and I'm not slowing down either because we and those who depend on us need what we earn.

We're not alone in this. A survey conducted for AARP found that nearly 20 percent of the people in our age group have postponed retirement. In most ways we're lucky. Overall, 66 percent of people older than 55 are having trouble paying for essential items such as food, gas and medicine. Fortunately, we don't have those troubles.

But we do worry about our grown children who have found this tough economy a drag on independence. Our two oldest children are economically solid citizens. They got their careers off the ground before the economy soured. But our younger ones face bigger challenges.

The unthinkable has happened. The sight of my portfolio of investments has reduced me to tears. Who wouldn't be crying when looking at 40% of their value gone this year? Even worse than the sheer magnitude of my losses... what those losses mean to me and to others.

I'm lucky. I don't need my retirement funds for at least 20 years or more. There is no doubt in my mind that I will have recovered all the lost value well before that. I worry about those who don't have years to wait, though. They're the big losers in all of this. Think about all the Baby Boomers who scrimped and saved to get to retirement, only to see their hard earned dollars massively reduced in a period of a few weeks.

Some Boomer friends of mine who were invested more conservatively have seen their portfolio drop "only" 15%. Imagine the impact of that over 20 years of retirement. These retirees need to draw on their accounts now, and can't wait to recover value. The portfolios of all retirees are going to be depleted much quicker than they thought.

Who would have thought that the people with all their money in certificates of deposit earning 3% or 4% would now look like geniuses? They were missing out on stock market gains, but now are feeling pretty good about the fact that their principal investment was protected.

This is depressing. And each day I tell myself that the bottom has to be near; that my investments can't go down much further than they already have. And each day Wall Street surprises me with a hefty drop in my value. There's not much to be done about my ailing retirement fund, other than to work hard and keep saving for the retirement that will hopefully still be funded when I get there.

Tracy L. Coenen, CPA, MBA, CFE performs fraud examinations and financial investigations for her company Sequence Inc. Forensic Accounting, and is the author of Essentials of Corporate Fraud.

Ken and Daria Dolan, America's First Family of Personal Finance, answer your money questions every Friday.

Click here to ask Ken and Daria your question.

The financial crisis is taking on a new victim: retirement. Planning and saving is hard enough, let alone trying to do it in the midst of a market meltdown! These are unprecedented times, folks, and your nest egg could get hit hard if you aren't careful.

We have heard from many of you wondering where to put your retirement money without the risk of losing it all. Here's our answer designed to keep you on the right savings path and protect your money in our shaky economy.

Dear Ken and Daria,

I am 20 years away from retirement and have been re-considering my portfolio allocation. What is the right mix in this economy?

-Gary

Not sure how to allocate your retirement funds? Visit Dolans.com for our complete library of 401k calculators and worksheets to determine what's best for you.

I once asked Walter Jon Williams, the science fiction writer, for advice about becoming a professional fiction writer. His first suggestion? Marry a civil service employee. Every writer needs a stable foundation. Luckily, I have that covered.

My supposed retirement funds are spread across multiple 401Ks, IRAs, and pension funds. Following the commonly held wisdom that the market will, in the long run, outpace more staid investments, I've stayed in, watching my mutual funds dwindle and my retirement drift further into the future. Frankly, I don't mind all that much, since I like to work and plan to do so for many years to come.

I do, however, mind on my wife's behalf. She's been a social worker for her entire career, never earning much, but providing us with the insurance umbrella that has allowed me to take on chancy career options. If health care weren't so expensive, she could well anticipate retiring in a couple of years. As it stands now, however, she'll have to work until she's eligible for Medicare; even then, since she's a year older, we'll have to deal with a year when I'm not covered.

In the short run, the impact of the meltdown won't hamstring us. However, if the market continues to bleed, much of our flexibility will disappear, including the option of early retirement. If it bleeds enough, tax revenue shortfalls on the local, state and national level could threaten funding for social welfare programs such as the one for which my wife works.

When civil servants start to lose their jobs, we'll all be crying in our Metamucil.

Read how the financial crisis is affecting other WalletPop bloggers.

The steep downturn in the markets has hit senior citizens the hardest. Many of them have seen the value of their portfolios plummet, at a time when they need their money the most.

An elderly widow I will call Mary is one victim. Her husband died a few years ago, leaving Mary, in her early eighties, with a nest egg sufficient to meet her needs for the rest of her life

Shortly after his death, her trusted "investment professional" invested most of her portfolio in two financial stocks. In less than two years, the portfolio lost over $150,000.

The news is not all bad. The brokerage firm made over $50,000 in commissions by excessively trading the balance of her portfolio.

Mary has now entered a nursing home. Her retirement funds are nearly gone. She risks becoming a ward of the state.

It is easy to blame the markets. They did fall in value. But that is precisely how markets are supposed to work. The foundation of all returns is risk. Markets go up and down, usually in cycles.

Mary's problem was the perfect storm of an inappropriately risky asset allocation and an incompetent or greedy broker. She could not afford any meaningful market risk. Her portfolio should have had an allocation of no more than 20% invested in a broadly diversified stock market index fund with the balance of 80% in a low cost index fund benchmarked to the Lehman Bros. Aggregate Bond Index.

There is plenty of blame to go around. Most of it should be focused on poor asset allocation and broker misconduct, not on the markets.

Read how the financial crisis is affecting other WalletPop bloggers.

Dan Solin is a Registered Investment Advisor and the author of The Smartest Investment Book You'll Ever Read (Perigee Books 2006) and The Smartest 401(k) Book You'll Ever Read (Perigee Books 2008).

My mom is in the eighty plus group, lives alone, and manages her own finances. She has been retired for more than twenty-six years, living off of pensions, Social Security and savings. While she is concerned about rising costs, especially gas and energy, the economic meltdown does not really affect her financial status.

Like many of her friends and others in her age group, she learned a long time ago how to stretch dollars. She grew up in the depression and "frugal" could be her middle name. She saves foil wrap and baggies, pays off all of her credit cards in full each month, and combines trips with her car to save gas. Her occasional splurges are trips to the casino where she spends no more than $20 and usually gets a free meal.

Mom does not have a large stock portfolio. As she says, "What more do I need to save for?" Her house and car are paid in full and she retired with no debt. In spite of relatively modest income, she is able to put money away each month for unexpected expenses.

While she does not see dramatic changes in finances for herself, she worries about her children and grandchildren. College, rent and homeownership is so much more expensive than years ago. After all, her first home cost less than $3000 in the 1950's. The same home is now around $350,000. Yet, wages have not increased proportionally.

I emulate and admire my mom's approach to money. With simple needs, she has the extra money for trips to Europe or cruises in the Mediterranean. Spending less than you earn is a simple formula for success.

Barbara Bartlein is the People Pro. For her FREE e-mail newsletter, please visit The People Pro.

It's been scary reading the headlines. It's been scarier reading my family's investment reports from Fidelity. A nice little nest egg that my husband's parents diligently built up through the course of his lifetime has lost 20% of its value in 2008 alone. Thankfully, we own our apartment and are mortgage-free so we are, in some ways, better off than most these days. Just two years ago, we too had an adjustable mortgage but luckily paid that off before the seven-year deadline. I also paid off my college loans before I married, and we try to live within our means. I still wear my pregnancy jeans three years after my daughter's birth because they're in good shape.

But that doesn't mean we don't worry about the future. My husband and I both work in print journalism, which, if you read the stories, is a dying industry. I haven't had a cost of living raise in six years. We are also raising our daughter in Manhattan, one of the most expensive cities in the world. With more and more families staying in the Big Apple, competition for spots at good public schools is tough and will only get tougher when she reaches kindergarten age. And the idea of private school is frankly nightmare-inducing. We're talking some $30,000 a year.

So what to do? My brother's friend, a financial adviser in New York State, says people like us, those in their late 30s with two modest incomes and little debt, should sit tight and ride things out. In fact, he says that now is the time to invest in mutual funds and bond funds that provide quarterly dividends. These dividends can be used to buy more shares at today's basement prices. When the market rebounds and share prices go up, we will have made money. He also recommends participating in our employers' 401K plans, opening or putting money into our IRAs and setting up an education fund for our daughter. "Buy low, sell high, those are the basics," he adds. "Pulling your money out now means you'll suffer losses. And too often, people wait too long to get back into the market and lose out on the gains when the market does come back."

Even though I don't have nearly as much to lose in my retirement account as my elders, the sad state of our economy has still had an effect on my life plans, but not all for the worse. I share many of the same concerns as they do regarding the strength of our economy and the overall health of our financial institutions but by virtue of my youth I see fewer immediate downsides and a silver lining inside the gloomy forecast.

Since we didn't get caught up in the fever of home ownership that swept America recently, my wife and I aren't in the position to lose our home because of the rising interest rates that many others were hit with. Even though we dodged the subprime bullet, one of my biggest concerns is that when we are ready to purchase a home in the near future we won't be able to get a mortgage with favorable terms thanks to constricting credit.

As far as retirement goes, I'm still socking away as much as I can in the hope that I make out well when the upswing happens, but I'm worried about being called upon some day to finance the retirement of my older coworkers as well as the remnants of the bailout package. Speaking of employment; I'm not losing sleep over my livelihood as a result of the current crisis because two of my three jobs are in higher education, an industry which I think will fare better than others.

While I am concerned that it may be harder to get a mortgage in the near future, the current housing slump means that we may be able to purchase a house sooner than we had anticipated. With sinking housing prices and several forms of government incentives, it's likely that we'll be able to purchase a home that fits both our needs and wants without overextending our reach.

All things considered, I'm concerned but not distressed by the current financial crisis. At 25 I have plenty of time to build my retirement savings and have multiple sources of income, none of which are attached to the banking industry. I have my worries about the financial well being of my older family members, the overall health of the economy, and the leadership of the country; but I am confident in myself and my generation's ability to cope with the current situation.

Much like you or I would send a card of support to a friend in troubled times the CEO of the company who holds my retirement account took a minute this week to send me and my fellow policyholders a few words of encouragement during these shaky times. Even though it seemed odd to get a note that essentially says, "This too shall pass," from a major corporation, it gave me a little peace of mind to know they haven't forgot whose money they have.

The gist of the email was to brag about its "sound decision making" and avoidance of subprime securities, and how these actions have allowed it to remain strong and safe during this turmoil. Normally a company flaunting its good choices in such a blatant manner would have turned me off, but this email made me want to drive over the headquarters and give every employee a hearty slap on the back! These actions were even more impressive by the fact that other institutions did not express the same concern for our money.

On top of the reassurances and self congratulatory words they also offered to help me make the right financial decisions. To do this, the company has offered its employees free personalized advice on how to best allocated their funds, depending on their life stage. Even though I am a ways off from retirement I think I just might take them up on this offer. In the end, I'm glad they took the time to let me know that I won't see them on the news next week, as the next company to be taken over!

We are doing a terrible job saving for retirement. The median 401(k) plan balance is a paltry $18, 986!

While there is raging debate over how much you need to save in order to retire with dignity, everyone would agree that most Americans are falling far short of achieving this goal.

So how much do you need to save?

Ideally, you need to figure out how much your expenses will be when you retire for the rest of your life (and, if you are married, the life of your spouse or partner). This is not easy to do, given the ravages of inflation and a tax code that is subject to change.

Most financial planners simply assume that you will need a percentage of your pre-retirement salary.

Don't miss the rest of our series on 15 Ways to Ruin Your Financial Future!

One comprehensive study by Baclays Global Investors determined that 75% of pre-retirement income is a benchmark for a successful retirement. The study also found that, given the typical 401(k) plan savings rate, most Americans could count on replacing only 41% of their pre-retirement income.

Divorce is usually painful, messy and expensive in the short run. Ask Phil Collins, who recently paid out $47 million for his third divorce. But the financial pain of divorce doesn't always end when the forms are signed, but can linger on into retirement.

The immediate costs put a large cash hit on the divorcing household. The average cost for a divorce, according to maritalstatus.com, is $20,000, and 3.6 million marriages ended in divorce in 2008. If, in the settlement, one of the couple gets the house, he/she may be forced to pay capital gains on the appreciation. Split up a 401K without a qualified domestic relations order (QDRO) and that money may become taxable as income.

The ongoing expenses, especially when the couple has dependent children, can soak up every penny of savings for years to come, and when only one of the couple works outside the home, the situation is even more dire. Double mortgages, health insurance, travel back and forth for the kids, the need to hire professionals to do work around the house that one or the other had previously done, all are a drain the monthly budget. Paying such ongoing expenses often comes at the expense of saving for retirement, too. For people working at companies that offer a match for 401K savings, the cost of not fully funding their account each year is magnified.

Don't miss the rest of our series on 15 Ways to Ruin Your Financial Future!

Madison DuPaix had a goal of leaving the workforce by age 29. She has been saving since the tender age of 16, and has been planning her exit from corporate America for years. With two very small children, she's going to spend more quality time with them, but won't feel a financial pinch thanks to smart planning.

Did you ever think retiring at age 29 was even possible? I suppose most of us don't think it can happen for us. But Madison's site offers lots of information on how she and her husband were able to make this happen. She's not fully retiring. She'll be doing some professional blogging, but because of smart planning, she doesn't need to pull in six figures from it.

You can learn how Madison did this on her site, but here are a few of the highlights. Although Madison had a job with a six-figure compensation package, she figured that 2/3 of her earnings were going to pay for childcare and taxes. In her "retirement," she'll be slashing 60% off childcare costs. She was also putting a lot of her earnings into savings in preparation for her retirement. Madison estimates about 15% of her and her husband's salaries were going into retirement savings. She no longer has to worry about that chunk of money.

Ken and Daria Dolan, America's First Family of Personal Finance, answer your money questions every Friday.

Click here to ask Ken and Daria your question.

Here's a little trick when it comes to saving for retirement: every little bit helps. That's why we're thrilled when we hear about folks contributing any amount to their retirement plans because it all adds up over time to a very rich future! But we also want your investments to work hard for you, which means choosing the right savings vehicle.

When deciding between a traditional and Roth IRA account, there is one major rule of thumb to live by. Find out what it is in our video response below.

Dear Ken and Daria,

I've been told I should invest in a traditional IRA instead of a Roth IRA because of my low income. Which is the right choice for me?

-Jill

Confused about where to begin your retirement planning? Learn how to start saving for your future and get answers to all your questions about Roth IRA rules, rollovers and more at Dolans.com.

It's easy to feel panicked with titans of the financial world like Lehman Brothers, Merrill Lynch and AIG either failing, selling out, or getting taken over by the government this week. The financial world is truly in crisis, but that doesn't necessarily mean your money is now at risk.

Take a deep breath and read on as we take you through 12 personal finance topics and explain what the mayhem on Wall Street means for you:

For your stocks: No doubt about it, the market is going to be swinging wildly for the next few months. Predicting the direction of stocks is all but impossible, but it seems likely the major indexes will be down from here at year-end. That doesn't mean you should sell. But if you will need some of that money in the next year or two, use upswings as an opportunity to gradually exit your riskiest positions.

For your mutual funds: Many mutual funds have been heavily weighted in financials (especially value funds, which buy stocks that seem cheap), so you may be feeling the pain now. But you can bet your fund managers are working feverishly to recover. If you sell now, you miss out on a chance at a rebound. Still, in times like these, index funds prove their mettle. At least you don't have to worry about doing worse than the market.

A lonely hearts website for married people claims that more women are signing up than a year ago and the economy is to blame. The website, IllicitEncounters.com, states women were joining the site at 55 people per day in 2007, but has risen to 142 as of last week. Reportedly more women are turning to adultery because the credit crisis had made their husbands "no fun," causing them to work longer hours, worry about losing their jobs and shun social activities.

Unlike "golf widows" or "fishing widows," these "downturn widows" report that the husbands are not happy and are too preoccupied to put much effort into their marriages. Seeking attention and wanting to feel special, they are accessing this encounter website to have new, exciting relationships with no strings attached.

A quick review of the site shows listings from married men and women bored with their marriages looking for excitement. And, of course, that is exactly what affairs are all about. It is easy to have excitement when there are no responsibilities; like mortgages, bills, taxes, and childcare.