Thus Spake Suze Orman

[Nightcap]

There is a sickness that befalls pundits: they start believing their own PR.

Suze Orman knows exactly when you must retire.

Suze Orman Says This Is the Age You Should Retire | Money

 

[RockyMtn]

There is a sickness that befalls pundits: they start believing their own PR.

Suze Orman knows exactly when you must retire.

Suze Orman Says This Is the Age You Should Retire | Money

More useless drivel from this woman.

 

[Gotadimple]

That's two useless sets of detritus:
Suzy Orman
Money Magazine.

 

[Teacher Terry]

This is ridiculous advice for many. Many people won't live to 70 or will be too disabled to enjoy retirement.

 

[W2R]

This is ridiculous advice for many. Many people won't live to 70 or will be too disabled to enjoy retirement.

+1

Plus, overdoing by trying to work until 70 could result in an early death for some.

 

[GravitySucks]

DW used to like her show for the bitchyness she came up with in the Can I Afford It segments.
Wish I could have such a simple world view as Suzy and Dave Ramsey. One size fits everyone! Unfortunately, I ended up more like Walt Whitman - I Am Large, I Contain Multitudes
Agree with GotaDimple, I never found one actionable useful item in Money Magazine.

 

[powerplay]

Suze is nuts!! I'm glad I don't listen to her. Who wants to wait till they are 70 unless they have no other choices!

 

[flyingaway]

If you don't save money or love your job, you can work to 70s. I want to get out as soon as possible.

 

[redshift]

Just read that drivel as well and was going to post it. She has a large following, and some will follow her off a cliff. Sad.

 

[GrayHare]

Members here are not Suze's target audience but maybe their siblings without a dime are.

 

[Brdofpray]

OOPS! Too late Suze! I guess we will just muddle through, somehow.

 

[RobbieB]

70 is too soon. Just work until you die on the job.

Gets rid of all those pesky "when to retire", "how much money do I need", "what will I do", "where will I go" questions.

Simple and clean. Work and die on the job. Easy.

 

[GalaxyBoy]

Shhhhh... we need these people to keep working and paying into the Social Security Trust Fund!

 

[LRDave]

Shhhhh... we need these people to keep working and paying into the Social Security Trust Fund!

+1 Suze is right!

 

[pb4uski]

That's two useless sets of detritus:
Suzy Orman
Money Magazine.

.... Agree with GotaDimple, I never found one actionable useful item in Money Magazine.

I totally disagree. While Money is not perfect, there is a lot of sound advice in there.... they were encouraging saving for retirement and no load, low-cost index investing long before it became fashionable.

 

[dunkelblau]

I totally disagree. While Money is not perfect, there is a lot of sound advice in there.... they were encouraging saving for retirement and no load, low-cost index investing long before it became fashionable.

It was also my first exposure to the concept of FIRE (their story about the Terhorsts from 1988)--
https://www.forbes.com/sites/nextavenue/2014/09/09/30-years-ago-they-retired-at-35-an-update

 

[jerryo]

To be fair, I think that what Suze is saying is that to be reasonably secure in retirement, MOST people (particularly people in their 50s and 60s) will need to wait longer, if possible. So, rather than taking SS at 62 and spending down your (meager savings) by the time your 80, MOST people would be better off working longer and delaying SS.

Certainly it would be better still to start saving and lbym in your 20's and 30's and FIRE in your 50s or early 60s! But that's not her audience.

More are like my sister, who took SS the day she turned 62, cashed in her retirement for a new house, spent through a couple of hundred thousand in savings, and is basically broke and dependent on her and her spouses SS at 73!

 

[Curmudgeon]

Though the preface is laughable, I don't disagree with any of the 3 steps she has laid out. Particularly #2; I think people should plan to retire as soon as they are able, but be prepared to work longer than they were expecting.

 

[Walt34]

More useless drivel from this woman.

Ah, perhaps not.

Bear in mind that this group is a bunch of outliers, as numerous other threads make clear. So to look at her pontifications though the lens of what is common knowledge and practice among the members here would be, I think, misleading and inaccurate.

The group she is addressing is no one on this board, but we've all met the members of that other group. Those are the ones who think "I can make the payments" = "affordable". Savings? They have a few grand at best and that's a minority. They have never in their lives paid cash for a car or a home, new or used. They have a wallet full of credit cards and routinely carry a balance on most if not all of them from month to month.

Those are the folks who don't have a pension, don't have employer-subsidized HI in retirement, and will be living off SS as their sole source of income when they stop working. I think that constitutes most of the working-age population in the U.S., and yeah, if they're able to, they should work until they're 70 or later.

So for that group, Suze is almost certainly dead on.

 

[Pilot2013]

I have to agree with the last couple of posts. While for SOME, this advise, and the "one size fits all" approach from Dave Ramsey seems ridiculous, for MOST it may be sound advice.

 

[FREE866]

Like someone else noted, if you love or even like your job then I guess work till 70. Not that I "hated" my job, but I had my eye on the finish line at a pretty young age.

 

[Mdlerth]

Ms. Orman seems to equate retirement and commencing Social Security. Tsk, tsk. She should know better.

They are completely unrelated.

 

[RockyMtn]

Ah, perhaps not.

Bear in mind that this group is a bunch of outliers, as numerous other threads make clear. So to look at her pontifications though the lens of what is common knowledge and practice among the members here would be, I think, misleading and inaccurate.

The group she is addressing is no one on this board, but we've all met the members of that other group. Those are the ones who think "I can make the payments" = "affordable". Savings? They have a few grand at best and that's a minority. They have never in their lives paid cash for a car or a home, new or used. They have a wallet full of credit cards and routinely carry a balance on most if not all of them from month to month.

Those are the folks who don't have a pension, don't have employer-subsidized HI in retirement, and will be living off SS as their sole source of income when they stop working. I think that constitutes most of the working-age population in the U.S., and yeah, if they're able to, they should work until they're 70 or later.

So for that group, Suze is almost certainly dead on.

Well put...Let me change that to "more useless drivel for me from this woman".

 

[joeea]

There is a sickness that befalls pundits: they start believing their own PR.

Suze Orman knows exactly when you must retire.

Suze Orman Says This Is the Age You Should Retire | Money

Suze is 66. (I'm just sayin') And she seems to enjoy her work even though she's clearly got more money than she will need in several lifetimes. She has made a lot of money selling books, DVDs and seminars. I suspect she still does. Good for her.

Her shows are amusing, but often simplistic and geared to an audience that is not financially very knowledgeable. Some of her basic "rules" make sense for many, and lots of folks would do well to heed some of them. That doesn't mean she is correct in everything she says.

I'm sure she means well, but financial pundits who want to make money must by definition speak to a very wide audience and ignore individual cases. Plus, they don't get any press unless they make outlandish statements every now and then.

Suze: "Can you honestly tell me you're 100% sure you will not run out of money if you start spending down your retirement funds in your 60s and end up living into your 90s?"

Me: I can honestly say that I'm as sure as I need to be that I will not run out of money if I end up living to 100. One can never say anything with 100% surety - not when retiring at 60 and not when retiring at 70. Even if you worked for the rest of your life, you cannot say you are 100% sure that you will not run out of money. But nothing in life is 100%, so I won't make that requirement the rule.

Step 1: Delay Tapping Social Security Until 70 - agreed.
Step 2: Lay the Foundation Now to Work Longer Later - I'll pass.
Step 3: Truly Enjoy a Secure Retirement - that's my plan.

 

[flintnational]

I think Suzy is to conservative. I would recommend most folks wait until 80 to retire. Lets keep the golf courses, hiking trails, National parks, cruise ships and idyllic European villages for the early retirees.

FN