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Classic Suze School: Financial Solutions if You’ve Lost Your Job · Suze Orman's Women & Money (And Everyone Smart Enough To Listen)

• 0:08
  Robert: October 22, 2026. Welcome to the Women and Money podcast
• 0:13
  Robert: as well as everyone smart enough to listen. Hi there, Robert,
• 0:17
  Robert: the producer here. For today's classic Suze School, we're gonna
• 0:21
  Robert: hear highlights of an episode about what happens if you
• 0:24
  Robert: lose your job.
• 0:26
  Robert: It's a painful situation. I know I've been there, but
• 0:29
  Robert: if you follow what Suze says, you can survive and
• 0:33
  Robert: rise through it.
• 0:35
  Robert: And now, Suze.
• 0:41
  Suze: I would highly suggest, since today is Suze School, for
• 0:46
  Suze: you to take out your Suze notebooks. If you don't
• 0:49
  Suze: have one, I most certainly would take out paper and
• 0:53
  Suze: pen and write down the things that I'm going to
• 0:56
  Suze: talk to you about today.
• 0:59
  Suze: Let's first go to a Suze story.
• 1:05
  Suze: I want you to put yourself in this situation.
• 1:09
  Suze: You have worked for a company for the past 10, 15, 20,
• 1:17
  Suze: 25 years, maybe even longer.
• 1:20
  Suze: And you feel secure.
• 1:23
  Suze: You're solid in that company. You've given them everything that
• 1:27
  Suze: you have, and they've been good to you. They've provided
• 1:30
  Suze: you with a paycheck, a retirement account, all kinds of
• 1:34
  Suze: things that have allowed you to do what? Maybe buy
• 1:38
  Suze: a home, maybe buy a car.
• 1:41
  Suze: Be able to put money away in a 529 plan
• 1:44
  Suze: for your children to send them to college, or whatever
• 1:48
  Suze: it may be.
• 1:50
  Suze: And, of course, if you bought a home, most likely
• 1:54
  Suze: you still have a mortgage on that home, or you
• 1:58
  Suze: financed that car, cause very few people today, honestly, can
• 2:04
  Suze: buy anything outright.
• 2:06
  Suze: Even though you've been really trying hard to take my
• 2:11
  Suze: advice and get yourself an 8 to 12 month emergency fund,
• 2:16
  Suze: put money away, make sure if anything goes wrong, you
• 2:19
  Suze: have at least 8 to 12 months to get you by.
• 2:24
  Suze: Because if you do lose your job, it could easily
• 2:27
  Suze: take you 8 months to a year to get another one.
• 2:31
  Suze: But even though you've been trying to do so,
• 2:36
  Suze: You just have maybe managed to save a month or
• 2:39
  Suze: two of must-pay expenses.
• 2:43
  Suze: You have some credit card debt, but really not a
• 2:47
  Suze: whole lot.
• 2:50
  Suze: And here you are, happy, because you are just getting by. Yes, yes,
• 2:55
  Suze: it's true that the cost of food and everything, your
• 2:59
  Suze: insurance policies, all of that have gone up, so it's
• 3:03
  Suze: costing you more and more, making it even harder for
• 3:06
  Suze: you to put money in an emergency savings account, but
• 3:09
  Suze: you're still getting by. You're not behind on anything.
• 3:14
  Suze: Maybe you have a spouse, but it's true that your
• 3:18
  Suze: spouse is now working.
• 3:20
  Suze: And it takes both of your salaries to just get by.
• 3:27
  Suze: All right, everything's going along, and all of a sudden
• 3:30
  Suze: you get an email that says you're fired.
• 3:33
  Suze: You're like, what?
• 3:35
  Suze: Not me? Really? Fired?
• 3:41
  Suze: How am I gonna pay my mortgage payment? How am
• 3:43
  Suze: I gonna pay my car payment? How am I gonna
• 3:45
  Suze: feed my family? What are we gonna do? Oh my God, Suze,
• 3:48
  Suze: cause you've been writing me. Help me, help me, help me.
• 3:53
  Suze: And I'm like, oh, here we go again.
• 3:57
  Suze: And I say that because a few years ago I
• 4:00
  Suze: remember doing a podcast when the federal government had shut
• 4:03
  Suze: down and how are these people going to get by
• 4:07
  Suze: without a paycheck, but then it was a little bit
• 4:10
  Suze: different because they were still working for the government. We
• 4:13
  Suze: knew they would be going back sooner than later, so
• 4:16
  Suze: it wasn't quite the catastrophe as it is now when
• 4:20
  Suze: you are not going to go back and have that
• 4:23
  Suze: job anymore.
• 4:24
  Suze: And in many of the places, it's the only jobs
• 4:28
  Suze: that are available as to where you live that pay
• 4:32
  Suze: any decent wage whatsoever.
• 4:35
  Suze: All of these things, really, the tariffs, everything that is
• 4:39
  Suze: going on, you can see many major corporations are starting
• 4:43
  Suze: to have layoffs as well.
• 4:46
  Suze: If you think that the price of eggs and everything
• 4:50
  Suze: might not affect the fact that your bakery or the
• 4:54
  Suze: restaurant you work for, or whatever, may have to close down,
• 4:57
  Suze: cause they just can't afford the price of goods anymore,
• 5:01
  Suze: Well, you might be facing a reality there.
• 5:05
  Suze: So, all of these possibilities absolutely affect you. It's not
• 5:12
  Suze: just if you lose your job or whatever. What happens
• 5:15
  Suze: if you're in an accident, or you get sick, and
• 5:17
  Suze: you can't work.
• 5:20
  Suze: So, this podcast is for every single one of you listening,
• 5:25
  Suze: and all I can do is beg you to take
• 5:29
  Suze: it seriously, that anything can happen to you at any time.
• 5:34
  Suze: So you have got to take the steps today to
• 5:38
  Suze: protect your tomorrows in case it happens. All right, everybody,
• 5:42
  Suze: Suze School is now in session.
• 5:46
  Suze: Let's just imagine that this has happened to you.
• 5:50
  Suze: All right, what you really need to do is the
• 5:54
  Suze: very first thing is, you have to cut all your
• 5:58
  Suze: expenses down to nil.
• 6:01
  Suze: I know you've enjoyed going out to eat, you've enjoyed
• 6:05
  Suze: going on cruises, you've enjoyed taking a vacation here and there,
• 6:09
  Suze: you enjoy going shopping, buying clothes, buying all this, going
• 6:13
  Suze: to the movies, going everywhere. Those are not must pay expenses.
• 6:19
  Suze: Those at this point in time, when you're in this situation,
• 6:24
  Suze: they all have to go. They're gone.
• 6:28
  Suze: And I know you're going to say, but Suze, I
• 6:30
  Suze: really need to go to the gym. I need this
• 6:32
  Suze: massage once a week. I need these things. No, you don't.
• 6:36
  Suze: You want those things, and I understand how they play
• 6:39
  Suze: in your mental health and everything. What's gonna really affect
• 6:43
  Suze: your mental health is when you can't afford to pay
• 6:46
  Suze: your rent, or your mortgage, or anything like that. After
• 6:50
  Suze: you have cut all your expenses that are not must
• 6:55
  Suze: pay expenses, I need you to take an inventory of
• 6:59
  Suze: all your money.
• 7:01
  Suze: How much do you have in an investment account? How
• 7:05
  Suze: much do you have in a cash account? How much
• 7:09
  Suze: do you have, seriously, in retirement accounts, and you're to
• 7:14
  Suze: divide them between Roth retirement accounts and traditional retirement accounts.
• 7:19
  Suze: How much do you have in a 529 plan? How
• 7:24
  Suze: much do you have in an HSA savings account?
• 7:28
  Suze: I need you to take an inventory of everything that
• 7:33
  Suze: you have.
• 7:35
  Suze: Where is your money?
• 7:39
  Suze: Now, I need you to take an inventory of your
• 7:42
  Suze: must pay expenses, and the income that you will be
• 7:47
  Suze: having coming in, possibly from your spouse, possibly from rentals
• 7:52
  Suze: that you have, whatever it may be. What is your shortfall?
• 7:59
  Suze: How much income do you have coming in versus how
• 8:02
  Suze: much are your expenses that you must pay.
• 8:07
  Suze: And therefore, the difference between those two things is the
• 8:11
  Suze: amount of money that we need to find for you.
• 8:16
  Suze: The next decision comes from, where can you take it from,
• 8:22
  Suze: and in what order.
• 8:25
  Suze: So, you have to look at everything you have, and
• 8:28
  Suze: you have to remember what I'm about to tell you.
• 8:32
  Suze: Any money that you have in an IRA.
• 8:37
  Suze: Roth or traditional, any money that you have in an
• 8:41
  Suze: employer sponsored plan, a TSP for the federal government, a 401k,
• 8:47
  Suze: a 403B, Roth or traditional, is protected against bankruptcy.
• 8:56
  Suze: So one of the biggest mistakes that you can make.
• 9:02
  Suze: Especially if you don't have a lot of backup places
• 9:06
  Suze: to get money, is to use the money in a
• 9:11
  Suze: retirement account to just get by, and if you don't
• 9:15
  Suze: have a lot of money in that retirement account, possibly
• 9:18
  Suze: use it all up.
• 9:20
  Suze: Still then not being able to pay your expenses, and
• 9:24
  Suze: then end up having to claim bankruptcy, and now you
• 9:28
  Suze: have nothing.
• 9:30
  Suze: So, you need to look at the amount of money
• 9:32
  Suze: that you have in your retirement accounts, versus the amount
• 9:37
  Suze: of money that you need every single month to just
• 9:41
  Suze: get by.
• 9:42
  Suze: And how long will that money in the retirement account
• 9:47
  Suze: last you?
• 9:48
  Suze: If it's going to last you under 8 months, you
• 9:53
  Suze: are not to take the money from there, do you
• 9:56
  Suze: hear me? If it's going to last you two years,
• 10:01
  Suze: five years, whatever, you have a lot of money in there, OK,
• 10:06
  Suze: that may be a source of where you get the
• 10:08
  Suze: money from, but you have to think about it carefully,
• 10:13
  Suze: all right.
• 10:14
  Suze: If you have money in a retirement account,
• 10:20
  Suze: And that retirement account happens to be a traditional one,
• 10:24
  Suze: all pre-tax, cause you did not listen to Ms. Orman,
• 10:28
  Suze: you did not go the Roth retirement account route, you
• 10:31
  Suze: wanted your tax write-off at the time.
• 10:35
  Suze: All right, this is what you need to know.
• 10:39
  Suze: If you are 59 and a half years of age or older.
• 10:44
  Suze: Any money you take out of a traditional retirement account pre-tax,
• 10:50
  Suze: you will owe ordinary income tax on that money. You
• 10:54
  Suze: will not owe, however, a 10% penalty.
• 10:59
  Suze: In most cases, if you're under 59 and a half, and you withdraw
• 11:06
  Suze: money from a retirement account that's pre-taxed, of course, you
• 11:10
  Suze: will owe ordinary income tax, but you may also owe
• 11:15
  Suze: a 10% penalty.
• 11:19
  Suze: Unless your retirement account
• 11:23
  Suze: is an employer retirement account. It is a TSP, a 401k,
• 11:30
  Suze: or a 403B. Listen closely.
• 11:34
  Suze: And, you are under the age of 59 and a half,
• 11:39
  Suze: but you are 55 years of age or older in
• 11:46
  Suze: the year that you lost your job or you left service.
• 11:51
  Suze: Now what that means is, as you're listening to me,
• 11:54
  Suze: you may be 54 right now.
• 11:56
  Suze: But you will turn 55 before or on December 31st
• 12:03
  Suze: of this year, if that is true.
• 12:07
  Suze: Any money that you withdraw from your employer sponsored account,
• 12:13
  Suze: You will have to pay ordinary income tax on it,
• 12:17
  Suze: but you will not have to pay the 10% penalty.
• 12:22
  Suze: It only applies the 55 or older rule to money
• 12:27
  Suze: that you have in an employer sponsored plan. So, if
• 12:32
  Suze: you take money that is in your TSP 401k or 403B,
• 12:39
  Suze: and you do an IRA rollover with it.
• 12:43
  Suze: And you are going to be 55 years of age
• 12:46
  Suze: or older, you're not yet 59 and a half, but
• 12:49
  Suze: between those ages, and you do an IRA rollover with it,
• 12:54
  Suze: in most cases, you cannot touch that money, without the 10% penalty.
• 13:02
  Suze: Now, there are things that you can do if you
• 13:05
  Suze: did that, called separate and equal periodic payments, but trust me,
• 13:09
  Suze: you do not want to do that. All right, everybody,
• 13:13
  Suze: it is complicated, you could possibly get yourself in trouble,
• 13:17
  Suze: so it would be far easier for you. Just leave
• 13:20
  Suze: the amount of money that you know you wanna access
• 13:24
  Suze: from an employer sponsored plan in the employer sponsored plan.
• 13:30
  Suze: If you happen to have a lot of money in
• 13:34
  Suze: your employer sponsored plan, and you want to roll some
• 13:38
  Suze: of it to an IRA rollover, and you are going
• 13:42
  Suze: to be 55 or older this year, OK.
• 13:46
  Suze: But leave the amount of money that will at least
• 13:49
  Suze: last you for a year or longer in the employer
• 13:54
  Suze: sponsored plan. So that is a place that if you
• 13:58
  Suze: do withdraw, you're only going to pay income tax on it.
• 14:01
  Suze: But remember, you've lost your job, so your income taxes
• 14:05
  Suze: aren't going to be that high this year, because even
• 14:09
  Suze: if you are with spouse who's earning money, your income
• 14:13
  Suze: has gone down considerably.
• 14:17
  Suze: So just something for you to think about.
• 14:21
  Suze: For those of you who only have a little bit
• 14:25
  Suze: of money within those retirement accounts, whether it's your IRA
• 14:29
  Suze: or not, before you use any cash, before you take
• 14:36
  Suze: money out of any retirement account, I would like to
• 14:41
  Suze: see you, I know you're gonna think I've lost it here.
• 14:44
  Suze: I'd like to see you put any expenses you can
• 14:47
  Suze: on your credit card.
• 14:50
  Suze: And only pay the minimum payment due when the bill
• 14:55
  Suze: comes in.
• 14:57
  Suze: Remember, credit cards can be discharged in bankruptcy if you
• 15:03
  Suze: need to claim bankruptcy.
• 15:07
  Suze: You do not want to take money from a retirement account,
• 15:11
  Suze: cause if you claim bankruptcy, and you've taken it, again,
• 15:14
  Suze: I'm repeating this, that money's gone and you have nothing.
• 15:18
  Suze: You wanna maintain any cash that you have, just in case. So,
• 15:25
  Suze: this is a case where Ms. Orman is saying, all right,
• 15:28
  Suze: let's just use your credit cards for now, and let's
• 15:32
  Suze: see how it goes.
• 15:35
  Suze: Another place that even before you touch retirement accounts, regardless
• 15:42
  Suze: of how much you have in retirement accounts, where you
• 15:45
  Suze: might want to get the money from, would be if
• 15:48
  Suze: you have an investment account. So, besides your retirement accounts,
• 15:54
  Suze: you opened up an account at a brokerage firm, and
• 15:57
  Suze: you've been buying stock or whatever it is, ETFs or
• 16:00
  Suze: whatever that may be.
• 16:03
  Suze: Especially because there isn't a 10% penalty there, there isn't
• 16:09
  Suze: ordinary income tax there, if you've owned your investments for
• 16:13
  Suze: over a year, that would probably be one of the
• 16:18
  Suze: first places I would go, if you're lucky enough to
• 16:21
  Suze: have an investment account, to get money.
• 16:25
  Suze: In choosing what you should do, I would be consulting
• 16:31
  Suze: an accountant or a CPA to look at your situation,
• 16:34
  Suze: look at your taxes, what you have going on, really,
• 16:38
  Suze: and make your choice from there.
• 16:43
  Suze: I know you're not gonna like this next one, if
• 16:45
  Suze: you don't have any of that, but you happen to
• 16:48
  Suze: put some money in a 529 plan for your kid.
• 16:53
  Suze: And your kid is still years away from college, or
• 16:57
  Suze: even if they're not.
• 16:59
  Suze: You could take money from the 529 plan, and obviously,
• 17:04
  Suze: you're gonna pay a 10% penalty on earnings from that account,
• 17:09
  Suze: and you're gonna pay tax on the earnings as well.
• 17:13
  Suze: But depending on what you have in there, and your
• 17:15
  Suze: current tax bracket, cause you don't have income possibly coming in.
• 17:19
  Suze: That might not be a bad idea, and in fact,
• 17:22
  Suze: that probably would be a better idea, really, than draining
• 17:27
  Suze: money from a retirement account.
• 17:31
  Suze: A lot of you have cash in an HSA account,
• 17:35
  Suze: a health savings account.
• 17:37
  Suze: That is the one place I would most likely tell
• 17:41
  Suze: you not to take money from. That is because if
• 17:45
  Suze: you're under the age of 65, not only will you
• 17:50
  Suze: pay ordinary income tax on it, since it's not going
• 17:52
  Suze: to be for a qualified medical expense, but you're going
• 17:56
  Suze: to pay a 20% penalty on it as well. If
• 18:01
  Suze: you're 65 or older.
• 18:03
  Suze: All right, you're not gonna pay the 20% penalty, but
• 18:07
  Suze: you will pay for non-qualified medical expenses, ordinary income tax.
• 18:13
  Suze: Those are some of your options.
• 18:17
  Suze: Now, for those of you who were lucky enough to
• 18:22
  Suze: listen to me...
• 18:24
  Suze: And you actually opened up a Roth TSP, a Roth 401k,
• 18:30
  Suze: or a Roth 403B, and now you have lost your job.
• 18:35
  Suze: Listen to me closely now. I just want you to
• 18:39
  Suze: see an example of what you can do to help yourself.
• 18:44
  Suze: Write this down, everybody. Let's just say you have $50,000
• 18:50
  Suze: in your Roth TSP.
• 18:53
  Suze: And that $50,000 is made up of $30,000 that you
• 18:59
  Suze: put in.
• 19:01
  Suze: $20,000 of earnings when you withdraw money from a Roth TSP,
• 19:10
  Suze: it does not work like a Roth IRA. Any money
• 19:15
  Suze: you originally contribute to a Roth IRA, you can take
• 19:20
  Suze: out at any time without taxes or penalties regardless of
• 19:24
  Suze: your age. In a Roth TSP, they don't do it
• 19:28
  Suze: that way.
• 19:30
  Suze: They do a combination and prorate how much of your
• 19:34
  Suze: distribution is made up of your original contributions and of
• 19:40
  Suze: your earnings. So, let's just say, of this $50,000 that's
• 19:46
  Suze: in there, where you put in the original $30,000 and
• 19:52
  Suze: let's just say you want to take out $20,000 the
• 19:56
  Suze: way that it would work is this.
• 20:00
  Suze: You would divide 30,000 by 50,000, your original contributions, which
• 20:07
  Suze: is 60%.
• 20:09
  Suze: You would divide 20,000, which is your earnings, by 50,000,
• 20:15
  Suze: the total that you have in the account, and that
• 20:18
  Suze: would be 40%.
• 20:21
  Suze: So, you want to take out $20,000. 60% of that
• 20:28
  Suze: is considered your contributions. You're not gonna owe taxes, penalty
• 20:32
  Suze: on it, nothing, $12,000. However, 40% of that $20,000 is
• 20:39
  Suze: gonna be considered your earnings. That is $8,000.
• 20:44
  Suze: So if you take this from your Roth TSP and
• 20:49
  Suze: you are not 59 and a half years of age or older or
• 20:52
  Suze: possibly 55 or older in the year you left service,
• 20:56
  Suze: you are going to owe ordinary income taxes no matter
• 20:59
  Suze: what on the $8,000 and possibly a 10% penalty. However,
• 21:06
  Suze: let's just say you were smart and you decided to
• 21:10
  Suze: roll over all $50,000 into a Roth IRA.
• 21:16
  Suze: Two things. If your Roth IRA has been opened for
• 21:21
  Suze: five years or longer, or however long it's been open,
• 21:24
  Suze: the money that you're rolling in there takes on the
• 21:28
  Suze: time period of that Roth IRA. Let's say you don't
• 21:32
  Suze: have a Roth IRA and you are opening it for
• 21:35
  Suze: the first time. When you roll it over.
• 21:41
  Suze: All 50,000, 30,000 is going to be contributions, 20,000 is
• 21:47
  Suze: going to be earnings.
• 21:49
  Suze: You can take out without taxes or penalties, anything up
• 21:54
  Suze: to that $30,000. It's the $20,000 that has to stay
• 21:59
  Suze: in that account for at least five years and until
• 22:02
  Suze: you're 59 and a half to access it without 10% penalty and taxes.
• 22:07
  Suze: So in that case, if you wanted $20,000 you could
• 22:11
  Suze: withdraw it.
• 22:13
  Suze: Without any taxes or penalties versus the other situation, if
• 22:19
  Suze: you took it from your Roth TSP you are going
• 22:23
  Suze: to owe ordinary income taxes on that $8,000 plus possibly
• 22:30
  Suze: a 10% penalty. So to save yourself that tax money
• 22:36
  Suze: and penalty, if you just simply do a Roth IRA
• 22:40
  Suze: rollover with your Roth TSP 401k or 403B, you've lost
• 22:46
  Suze: your job now, you want to save every penny you can.
• 22:50
  Suze: This is something that you should look into doing.
• 22:53
  Suze: Obviously, check it with the CPA, just to make sure
• 22:57
  Suze: that I'm correct. So, there are things that you can do,
• 23:01
  Suze: what all of you should be doing now, however, if
• 23:04
  Suze: you don't already have a Roth IRA, if you qualify
• 23:08
  Suze: for it, you should open a Roth IRA, even if
• 23:11
  Suze: you just deposit $1 in it. Now the clock is ticking,
• 23:18
  Suze: because if you did have a Roth IRA that was
• 23:23
  Suze: open for five years and you did this and you
• 23:26
  Suze: happen to be over 59 and a half, oh, you could take all $50,000
• 23:31
  Suze: out without any taxes or penalties whatsoever. Think about it.
• 23:36
  Suze: All right, everybody, until KT joins us again, there's only
• 23:40
  Suze: one thing that I want you to remember when it
• 23:42
  Suze: comes to your money, and it is this, people first,
• 23:45
  Suze: then money, then things. Now you stay safe. Bye-bye.