Bankruptcy becoming more and more common among elderly

Posted by: Brendan Boesch

Bankruptcy is becoming more and more common among the elderly. One of the main reasons for this occurrence is because of poor financial planning. Many adults do not plan properly for retirement and underestimate the costs associated with it. Often times adults will retire with outstanding loans or other forms of debt, and do not take into account the fact that it will be harder to pay off this debt without a steady income. Payments that were easy to make while employed become unrealistic during retirement.
Another reason that bankruptcy is becoming more and more common among the elderly is because many people try to support their children to grandchildren while in retirement. This causes many of them to spend more than they should, and live above their means. This is another result of poor financial planning.
The increasing need for medicine among the elderly continues to drain the funds that they worked so hard to save. With the cost of medicine increasing every year, a huge burden has been placed on many elderly adults. In addition, if one’s spouse happens to pass away, that will decrease about half of the income of the family.
All of these reasons make it apparent that people should anticipate unexpected costs during retirement. Proper financial planning is essential to ensure that one can grow old without having to worry about declaring bankruptcy.

http://www.courierpress.com/news/2008/aug/28/28web-Bankruptcy/?ebj=1/
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=93241953
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2004/07/21/earlyshow/contributors/raymartin/main630966.shtml