"You have to invest for the long haul," said the 78-year-old retired teacher, who lives in Media.

But older Americans with investments, many of whom have lost large chunks of their wealth in the economic turmoil of the last month, may not have time to recoup their losses, financial experts say.

"It has to be terrifying to see how their savings are being impacted," said Catherine Collinson, president of the Transamerica Center for Retirement Studies.

"People just getting out of school and entering the workforce, this is certainly scary; however, they have their working careers to plan and save over a long period of time. For older people there's not that flexibility."

In a January survey by the Employee Benefit Research Institute, 29 percent of retirees said they expected to have enough money for a comfortable retirement, down from 41 percent last year. Thirty-nine percent said they felt likely to outlive their savings, up from 29 percent in 2007.

This week, Peter R. Orszag, the top congressional budget analyst, said pension funds had lost as much as $2 trillion in the last 15 months, which is likely to force many workers to hold off on major purchases or delay retiring.

With less money in savings, longer life expectancies, and fewer defined-benefit plans, it's a riskier time than ever for seniors, experts say. Many are being squeezed by higher costs, less income from investments, and declining home values.

Like many other retirees, Wiley and her husband worked hard for years to raise a family and save for their golden years, he in the military and as a community college professor and she as an elementary teacher in Garnet Valley schools.

It makes her nervous to see her portfolio slump, but she said she was not worried about outliving her investments. She and her husband moved from their Concord Township home to Granite Farm Estates, a retirement community, in 2003.

Investing their nest egg in a long-term-care community was the best move they ever made, said Wiley, whose husband, Bill, is 84. "You have to stop and think that you lived through it before and you managed," she said of being born during the Great Depression. "There are no assurances. Things just happen."

She said she had faith the market would rebound in her lifetime. "I have confidence in our country. You just can't go with the idea this is going to be a doomsday thing. You have to be positive," she said.

Having spent much of his career in the investment world, Bob Ross, 75, also is accustomed to the cyclical nature of the markets. Like Wiley, he said he had lived through bad times and recovered, most notably in the mid-1970s, when the stock market dived 40 percent in one year.

"In the long run these things adjust themselves," said Ross, who lives with his wife in Cherry Hill.

An admitted risk-taker, he has more of his retirement money in stocks than in bonds, which "shouldn't be the case" for someone his age, he said.

His wife's pension from teaching is fixed, but his fluctuates with the market, and if it continues to tumble, "in five or 10 years I'll run out of money," he said.

In addition to IRAs and annuities, the Rosses own several rental properties in Florida and North Carolina that they can't rent and have no hope of selling. "It's just one of those things," said the former accountant, Wall Street banker, and Drexel University professor.

"We feel in a way we're lucky. People that are hurting are some elderly people that basically exist on Social Security and have no other source of income and prices go up," Ross said.

He could be describing Delores Beckford, 74, of Devon, who like one-third of retirees relies mostly on Social Security for her income. The former secretary is so strapped for cash that she was at the Center for Positive Aging in Lower Merion, a senior center, using computers to look for cheaper housing and a part-time job.

Beckford said she recently had cashed in two CDs to help her daughter get back on her feet and was scrimping to get by. If she doesn't get a job soon, she may have to give up one of the bright spots in her life, singing in a choir in Maryland, because getting to the twice-weekly rehearsals costs $80 in gas.

This summer, she said, she got a boost from friends who shared what they grew in their gardens. "I worked all my life. It's not fair," Beckford said. "I don't have time to sit and worry. I'm trying to find a job."

More Americans older than 55 are working than at any time since 1970, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Some work because they want to, but many others need the paycheck.

In surveys by the Transamerica Center and AARP, more workers nearing retirement age say they are putting off retiring, curtailing contributions to their 401(k) accounts, and borrowing from those accounts to pay for living expenses, including credit-card and mortgage debt.

Raymond Cooper, 76, has cashed out two IRAs and sold stocks and three time shares to help pay for his wife's Alzheimer's care, which cost him $10,000 last year. If he doesn't get Medicaid approval for the nursing home where she lives, he may have to sell his two-bedroom house in a Williamstown retirement community.

"I'll tell you, this hurts. I'm surviving now, but if this continues much longer, I'm going to be in trouble," said the former manager of Naval Air Systems Command in Maryland.

The collapse of the housing market has hit many seniors like Cooper. Many have taken out much-needed home-equity cash through refinancing. Others, like Cooper, who bought his house in 2004 for $205,000, have seen home values drop.

The one-two punch of rising expenses and lower house values has Cooper wondering what the future holds. He and his wife, Arlene, 74, moved to the area to be closer to their son and planned on a comfortable retirement.

That all changed when his wife got sick two years ago and had to be hospitalized, then moved to a nursing home. Even if Medicaid picks up his wife's health-care costs, he may have to give up part of her retirement and Social Security money.

Gerald Rothkoff, a lawyer who specializes in elder and disability law, said he had seen more older clients wondering whether they should declare bankruptcy. "Because they are living on a fixed income, they've taken money out of the house, and the house has declined in price," he said.

He said he had recently met an older couple worried about losing their house. The husband is 82 and works at Macy's.