BUFFALO, N.Y. (WKBW) \u2014 For many older Americans, retirement is no longer looking like they thought it would.<\/p>\n
With prices still high on everything from groceries to gas, many seniors say their savings simply are not stretching as far as they once did.<\/p>\n
“I used to be afraid of dying, but now I\u2019m afraid of how am I going to live until I die?” Howard Flint said.<\/p>\n
Flint says he thought he had planned carefully for retirement, but rising costs have forced him to rethink what life after work actually looks like.<\/p>\n
“When you think you\u2019ve planned ahead, and you think you made enough money, what\u2019s the right amount of money to retire on?” Flint said.<\/p>\n
A new study from the Allianz Center for the Future of Retirement found a record number of retirees now fear running out of money more than death.<\/p>\n
The study found 67% of respondents said money is now their top concern.<\/p>\n
Researchers pointed to inflation and rising healthcare costs as major factors driving those fears.<\/p>\n
Federal data also shows inflation has been hitting older Americans harder than many other groups for more than three years.<\/p>\n
WATCH: ‘I\u00a0used to be afraid of dying’: Rising costs forcing many retirees to rethink retirement<\/p>\n
‘I used to be afraid of dying’: Rising costs forcing many retirees to rethink retirement<\/p>\n
Experts say that is because retirees tend to spend more of their income on necessities like healthcare, where prices continue to climb.<\/p>\n
“People come to us concerned about the future, and inflation especially, because when you retire, you\u2019re on a fixed or semi-fixed income,” Elise Murphy said. Murphy is a partner with Level Financial Advisors. <\/p>\n
“And if those prices rise, unless your income sources are rising at the same rate or even higher, you\u2019re going to see your purchasing power erode,” Murphy said.<\/p>\n
Financial advisers say more Americans are now delaying retirement or taking on part-time work to help.<\/p>\n
A study conducted by Economist Enterprise found that Americans expect to work roughly four years longer than originally planned because of rising living costs and healthcare expenses.<\/p>\n
For Flint, that has already become reality.<\/p>\n
“Now, I do a little part-time job at a healthcare agency a couple days a week,” Flint said.<\/p>\n
He says everyday expenses have become harder to ignore.<\/p>\n
“My gas bill to heat the house, I paid almost double this year than last year,” Flint said. “My gas in my car, I had to fill up my truck and I was like wow, 80 bucks to fill up my truck is very high.”<\/p>\n
And with so many unknown costs still ahead, Flint says the biggest fear now is whether his money will last as long as he does.<\/p>\n
“What happens if I live 20 years from now?” Flint said. “That\u2019s the topic for the conversation.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"BUFFALO, N.Y. (WKBW) \u2014 For many older Americans, retirement is no longer looking like they thought it would.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":630054,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[39],"tags":[28,147,530],"class_list":["post-630053","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-personal-finance","tag-business","tag-personal-finance","tag-personalfinance"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/630053","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=630053"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/630053\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/630054"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=630053"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=630053"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=630053"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}