Brian Tracy delivers a short, practical talk on preparing for retirement: he argues many Americans have undersaved and recommends calculating a retirement "number" (annual need × 20), controlling spending, and aggressively eliminating debt (mortgage, car, credit cards). He also notes modern retirees are healthier and likely to remain productive, urging listeners to set concrete goals and begin taking action immediately.
Hello. I want to talk to you today about retirement. And retirement, as you can see, is getting further and further away for more and more Americans for the primary reason that they really thought they would live forever and the money would continue to come in. And so most Americans today do not have enough money to retire at the old traditional age of 65. So what can we do? Well, one of the most important things we can do is face reality, is we spent far beyond our means. We've saved far too little for far too long. So we've got to get serious about our financial future. And what does that mean? It means that you've got to sit down and you've got to do an analysis of your finances and figure out how much you're worth today. And then ask yourself, how much will you need to retire? We call this the number. And the number is the amount that you would need to live on comfortably for 20 years. So you work out, how much do you need to live on comfortably per month if you had no debt? And that's one of your goals, get out of debt. And then how much would you need per year to live without having any income? And then you multiply that times 20, that becomes your number. And then what you do is you look at where you are today and you say, all right, what can I do starting today to begin achieving that number? The first thing we do is get our spending under control and reduce it wherever possible. Second of all is you've got to get out of debt. This has to be the number one focal point of your life. You got to get out of debt. If you have to sell your house to get out from under a mortgage and rent something less expensive, get out of debt, pay off the car if you can get out of debt, pay off the credit cards, get out of debt. Now, the good news is this, is that a person who is 65 today has the health of a person who was 75 or 80, 50 years ago is you're going to live longer and live better. You're going to be productive, you're going to be able to do a great job and get great results. And you're at the peak of your earning power as you approach retirement. They say there's 10,000 people a day will be retiring in the next 20 years. 10,000 people a day. Well, your job is to realize that you've got a lot of productive years in you. So take good care of yourself, get your finances under control, set a goal for how much you need to retire and then begin working toward that goal. Good luck to you.
