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Wall Street Journal scribe Jeff Opdyke sounds off on retirement planning, insurance premiums and why women are better money managers than men ...Jeff Opdyke might not technically be a boomer but, as a personal finance columnist for the Wall Street Journal, he plays one on paper. He has become intimately acquainted with boomer-ready issues like retirement planning, saving for a child's college tuition and changes in the Social Security landscape. The author of the books "Love and Money: A Life Guide to Financial Success" and "The Wall Street Journal Complete Personal Finance Guidebook," this is one kid you might want to listen to.

1. What do you think is the biggest financial challenge that baby boomers face?

This is actually a very easy question, though the answer is ultimately one of the hardest for boomers to face: saving for retirement versus saving for their kids' education. Boomers, as a group, tend to think they need to save every last penny for Junior's matriculation at Harvard or Stanford. So they stash money away in 529 Plans, UGMA/UTMA (The Uniform Gift to Minors Act/Uniform Transfers to Minors Act) accounts and elsewhere that's earmarked for college.

That's great. But most of these people are doing this while at the same time disregarding their retirement savings. If they'd scale back the college savings, they'd be able to save more in their 401(k) or the IRA that never quite gets fully funded each year.

Some boomer parents will rebuff this and say that paying for college is the gift they want to give their children. I counter with a more powerful gift: the freedom to know that Mom and Dad will not be showing up at their door struggling for money to pay the light bill. Too many parents, once they hit old age, either live way more frugally than their life would otherwise have allowed, or they end up having to call on their kids to pay for necessities their income can't cover. So what's the better gift, the college degree and years of worrying about Mom and Dad's finances, or paying for as much college as you can afford but knowing you will never be a financial burden to your children?

2. What do you see for the future of baby boomers approaching retirement age? Will boomers enjoy "the greatest transfer of wealth in history" or will their last years be marred by crashes in Social Security, healthcare or insurance?

Healthcare will be the biggest problem the boomers face, and by extension that means their retirement savings – what there exists of it – and the "great wealth transfer" they'll see will largely be earmarked for artificial knees and chemotherapy and other such joys.

As everyone knows, healthcare costs continue to ratchet higher, though at a somewhat more moderate pace. The real problem that boomers don't often think about is that these costs, according to all the surveys of folks actually in retirement, consume more dollars than actually expected. Meaning healthcare costs are a bigger component of spending in retirement than most people think.

Worse, many surveys show boomers expect to work longer to pay for retirement costs, since they recognize their nest eggs aren't large enough to pay for a life that might stretch on for another 30 years. Yet all those added healthcare costs mean there are added health problems, many of which are currently pushing older workers out of the workforce at an age much younger than they expected. Boomers could find that their working days will end earlier than anticipated, just at the moment their healthcare costs are rising because of the problem that put them on the sideline, and they don't have the financial wherewithal to afford the care they want and remain in their house and pay for the bills of life.

At that point, these boomers are going to say, "Man, I wish I had saved for retirement instead of spending all the money for my daughter's urban history degree! I wonder if she can spare a few bucks for the heating bill?"


3. Are you familiar with the term "bag lady syndrome," the idea that single women aged 40 and over are suddenly panicked at the idea of not being married and, having never learned the financial tricks that men supposedly learned, do not have any money saved?

I have not heard of this. But I'm not convinced it's an accurate portrayal. Yes, I imagine there are a number of women who fit this mold, but I think they are the ones who are, instead, widows who never managed the family money and were always a bit in the dark about finances because a husband handled everything. They are the boomer women who are struggling to get a grip on money later in life. My impression of the single boomer women I've talked to through the years is that they are becoming increasingly financially savvy, recognizing years ago that either Mr. Right may not ride in on that white stallion or that they have no interest in a Mr. Right, and they got their act together and began taking classes or reading books or hiring financial advisers.

As such, I think many of the single boomer women may actually be some of the best prepared boomers for retirement. They haven't had a man to muck up their finances. (And, as a man, I say that having read the statistics that show while men think they're best at managing money, the stark reality is that women generally do a better job. It's sort of like the idea that men never stop to ask directions – we just assume we'll find where we're going sooner or later – and women ask. As a result, women get there sooner, and in better shape).

4. Please name one of the least known ways to save money, in any area of life.

Insurance. Too many times, too many people find an insurance company to cover their home, their life, their car, and that's that. The shopping is over. I pay my premiums and go about the rest of my life.

Well, insurance is a living, breathing beast that changes all the time. Insurers move into and out of markets, they go through bouts of ultra-competitiveness and competitive lethargy. The upshot is that, once you have policies in place, the best thing you can do is shop them around every two or three years to see if you can find a better rate or better coverage for the same money.

My mother-in-law has had the same insurer for 20 years. Two decades! That's insane. She's the type who places value on customer loyalty. Great. There's something to be said for that. But not when customer loyalty costs you money. I sent her in to talk to an insurer and it turns out she could buy better coverage for her house and car and get a separate policy for a boat instead of having the boat covered as a rider on her home. She saved more than $700 in annual premiums doing so and she's with an insurer that is equally strong and reputable as the one she left.

5. What experience did you have, personally, that made you want to dispense advice about personal finance?

I was raised by my grandparents, who were living on a fixed income, so I saw money from the perspective of an aging couple that never had a tremendous amount and were always concerned about money. I was determined to make my financial life stronger so that I wouldn't have those kinds of worries when I reached their age. I taught myself everything I know about money, investing and personal finance.

Along the way, I realized something: Money really is not brain surgery. It's simply common sense. You don't have to be a specialist with a degree from MIT to manage your own money. You don't have to be a mutual fund portfolio manager to handle your own investments and pick winning stocks. My job has been to try to bring personal finance down to a lower common denominator, to encourage people to get out there and try this for yourself so that you, too, can see what I came to realize in my early 20s, that money is easy to manage. Don't be scared of it; it's doesn't bite.

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