jean chatzky, "today's" financial editor and author of "the money blues" david bach, author of "debt free for life" and sharon epperson is cnbc's personal finance correspondent. good morning to all of you. >> good morning. >> a lot of great questions to get to so let's get right to it. first one is an e-mail question comes from christine in pennsylvania and she writes, my now 72-year-old mother took a reverse mortgage loan out of her home, which was paid off, for frivolous reasons, without cutting family or learning more about the consequences. she now realizes that she will be losing her home after she either can't live there anymore or passes away leaving her children without an inheritance. is there any way out of this situation? okay, jean, tough one. a lot of seniors are taking reverse mortgages. is it a good thing? >> it can be a good thing. and here's the deal, christine. when your mother took out this reverse mortgage, she went to a counselor. she knew what she was doing because you are mandated to go to counseling before you go through this process. so, getting out of it is

jean chatzky is "today's" financial editor. good to see you. >> nice to see you. >> what's the best way? i've got a couple of phones sitting in -- i've got -- stuff that you don't hand off to either your kids or a relative. >> right. >> what do you do with it? >> well, you have three basic choices. you can sell it. you can donate it. give it away. get a tax deduction. or you can recycle it. and of course we're talking about this now because of the whole hubbub with the new ipad. and people who even have an ipad that's one or two generations old can make some serious money from that, as well as people like you and me. i mean i have a whole drawer of old phones. >> first of all, how do you figure out how much this stuff is worth? >> you want to hit the internet. if you're looking -- the first place to look is the sites that allow you to sell them. places like yousell and gazelle. we've got a whole list of places that will allow you to do this. they're going to want to know about your particular device. what kind of shape is it in

jean chatzky once again. and once again here's lester. >>> i want to turn to the trayvon martin case. there are new questions about the background of george zimmerman. michael isikoff is in sanford, florida, with more. michael, good morning. >> reporter: good morning, lester. as florida prosecutors weigh whether to charge george zimmerman for the shooting of trayvon martin, the backgrounds of both principals are getting fresh scrutiny. it led to his arrest and -- it led to his arrest and a court order that he be required to take classes in anger managemen management. when george zimmerman was questioned by police after the trayvon martin shooting, it wasn't the first time he had been in custody. in july 2005 george zimmerman was arrested in orlando for resisting a florida law enforcement officer and obstructing justice. this police rorpt obtained by nbc news says zimmerman used violence and battery against the lead officer. the lead prosecutor says he could be charged with a felony i receive felons charged wi

up next, jean chatzky's money rules to live by. first, this is "today" on nbc.. ben learned about a homeless boy who had an infected tooth, and the boy died. that made ben really sad. he wrote a law so every kid can see a dentist. we have special dental van that goes from school to school. he even helps make sure we learn how to brush our teeth. he's my friend, ben. i hope he's your friend, too. i'm ben cardin, and i approved this message. this is an angus steak and egg sandwich. it's a tremendous morning. angus, man! angus! dunkin's new angus steak and egg sandwich makes any morning special. try one today. >> announcer: today's money is brought to you by bank of america. >> this morning on today's money, financial rules to live by. despite years of saving 50% of people will run out of money during retirement. what can you do to make sure it doesn't happen to you? jean chatzky is the author of "money rules, the simple path to lifelong security." welcome. >> tank you. >> these are simple rules you explain in perfect ways. let's get to them. if you can't see it an

jean chatzky is the author of "money 911." farnoosh torabi is host of financially fit and lenani cox joins us as well. christine from texas is on the line. >> caller: hello. thank y'all for taking my question. >> and your question is? >> caller: i'm getting laid off in the next month or two. my husband's salary is enough to cover our expenses, plus i will be getting unemployment benefits or will be eligible. so we feel that we have enough money after paying bills to add a car note. my husband thinks we should buy a car before i get laid off because we will get a better interest rate. and because we have an older car, a 2005 honda pilot with 116,000 miles. i think we shouldn't because there really isn't anything wrong with my car. we did just have some minor repairs, but -- >> all right, christine. let's let jean jump in. >> first of all, i'm sorry you're being laid off. i'm with you. if you have a car that's running fine, even though it has a lot of miles on it, i would not add any additional debt to the burden that you and yo

>> "today's" jean chatzky will be a keynote speaker at the expo. >> a lot of financial decisions to makeere's anything i could do to help people, i wanted to do that. >> nicole and francine say they are not proponents of divorce but are also not ashamed to call themselves divorce entrepreneurs with a message. >> i think it's time that people not look at divorce as a bad word. but as a transition in people's lives. they couldn't work to the. they couldn't live together. and this is a new chapter. >> now the two-day expo takes place this weekend with tickets costing anywhere from $125 to $200. but it is going to be a community there and i think that's so important when you're going through this process. >> and the organizers are not celebrating divorce, they're trying to make people going through it -- zblan easier transition. >> when you say that piece, it's amazing we didn't see it before. up next, the five style staples for spring. twinkle twinkle little pie you squashed my willpower like a fly. you looked so innocent and so sweet. convinced my lips that we should meet. you were a relen

jean chatzky is "today's" financial editor and the author of "money rules." david batch is the founder of finish rich dotcom and author of "debt free for life" and sharon epperson is cnbc's personal finance correspondent. let's get right to our questions. our first one via skype, lydia in tucson, arizona. good morning, what's your question? >> good morning. my question is, i have a $50,000 student loan that i pay on time and i paid ahead by four years. i was laid off and i know what to i need to do to work with lenders to forgive a portion of this loan so i can pay it off >> lydia, getting a portion of that loan forgiven is a bit of a hard call. unless you worked in public service, in some public service profession. in which case you could be eligible for some forgiveness after ten years. is that an option for you? >> unfortunately, no. >> well then there are a couple of other things that you want to look into. you want to get in touch with your lender and you want to talk about forbearance which essentially means they table your loan for about 12 months. int

up next, jean chatzky's money rules to live by.irtual wallet can help you be that person who's good with money. see what's free to spend. move money with a slide. save with a shake. feel good about your decisions. >> announcer: today's money is brought to you by bank of america. >> this morning on today's money, financial rules to live by. despite years of saving 50% of people will run out of money during retirement. what can you do to make sure it doesn't happen to you? jean chatzky is the author of "money rules, the simple path to lifelong security." welcome. >> tank you. >> these are simple rules you explain in perfect ways. let's get to them. if you can't see it and you can't touch it, you won't spend it. >> this is why 401(k) works. you have to get the money out of your line of sight. you can do it for other things. any goal you want to save for, get the money into a separate account. >> how about this one? just because someone will lend it to you doesn't mean you should borrow it. >> this is the lesson of the credit crisis. t

jean chatzky is the author of "money rules, the simple path to lifelong security." in perfect ways. let's get to them. if you can't see it and you can't touch it, you won't spend it. >> this is why 401(k) works. you have to get the money out of your line of sight. you can do it for other things. any goal you want to save for, get the money into a separate account. >> how about this one? just because someone will lend it to you doesn't mean you should borrow it. >> this is the lesson of the credit crisis. the whole housing bust and boom. banks now are willing to lend you a lot of money for a mortgage. maybe more than you can afford. don't take it. and don't take the high credit limits either. know your own budget and keep yourself in check. >> this next one has entered my life on a number of occasions, i will be honest. don't shop angry, don't shop sad, don't shop hungry. >> three rules. don't shop angry because you're more optimistic and you are likely to take foolish risks buying things. by the way, investing in things. when you feel sad you have a hole in your sad

we have financial editor jean chatzky here to help us sort it out.y by looking at a candidate like mitt romney. >> and the not wealthy. one thing we have seen over the past couple of years as the stock market has fallen out of favor with people is people looking for different things to put in their retirement accounts. one of the nice things about iras is you can put almost anything in there except for life insurance and collectibles like art and antiques. >> for example? >> horses, cattle, limited partnerships, things that -- stocks that aren't even traded. and real estate. a lot of people put in real estate. understand, if you want to go with an alternative asset ira you can't typically do it at a brokerage account. you need a provider set up to deal with the assets and it will cost more. the management fees typically start at several hundred a year, not a few dollars a year. >> do you have to have somebody to manage them? you're inferringing there has to be a person designated to manage your fund. >> you will want a company that specializes in man