"But the evolution for all women is happening, and I think advisors need to change their perspective," she adds. "Women are becoming more comfortable with finances, although it can take a lot of coaching. I call the women in their 50s and 60s 'tweeners' because they are in between learning investing and taking control."

Chris Abts, president of Cornerstone Retirement Group in Reno, Nev., has some clients who are typical for this group. One 65-year-old woman came to him recently. She had $370,000 in assets in 1997 and that had risen to $527,000 by October of 2007. But her assets went downhill in 2008 and she had to recoup 47% just to get back to breaking even.

"That is a typical situation, but she did not know how much money she could withdraw and not outlive her funds. We showed her how to eliminate some risk and still have more income than she was withdrawing at the time she came in," Abts explains. "We showed her strategies and provided her with the information she needed.

"To be able to do that, with the growing number of retirees, advisors need to decide if they are going to specialize in accumulation or preservation and disbursement," he adds.

Women and men have a different attitude toward investment, and women follow different influences that make it impossible to lump them all together in their investment attitudes or their level of preparedness.

"Men have a different kind of anxiety about assets," says Katherine Lintz, founder of Financial Management Partners in St. Louis and Denver. "Men are afraid of what will happen to their families if they die. Women are more afraid they will outlive their money. But women also are more willing to admit what they do not know, and they are anxious when they do not understand something. They want to understand and to have a voice in the decisions."

A woman's circumstances also affect her attitude toward money. "The widow is really afraid," notes Hannon. "The divorced woman, especially right after the divorce, is emotional and frail, so our practice does a lot of hand-holding. We do seminars, and often the women do not feel they belong there because they think they do not know enough, so we give them information and tools to deal with the situation. Our women clients who have always been single are in much better shape with less fear."

The differences in attitudes toward investing also can be used to the woman's advantage, advisors argue. Women can be too conservative and "not take the reasonable investment risks that they should," says David Loesser, a CFP licensee and founder of the Estate Planners Group in Washington Crossing, Pa. "Men usually take the lead, especially in older couples, so women have less experience, and they will stick to investments in CDs when they become the one in control. Women also receive, on average, half the pension benefits that men receive, making them more cautious. This makes education important for women."
But women are also more pragmatic once they have a good understanding of what they need and are willing to do what is necessary to manage their investments, notes David Giegerich, managing partner and co-owner of Paradigm Wealth Management LLC in Bridgewater, N.J. The firm specializes in clients in or near retirement.

"One of the things I would say to advisors is not to assume women do not understand investing," he says. "In fact, many women want to cut to the chase and understand their current income and future income. From an investment standpoint, they are often more concerned with absolute return, and not merely relative performance. Some men, on the other hand, can often be tempted by greater performance and will often try to chase better returns, often to the detriment of their portfolios.

"Advisors need to respect the priorities of their women clients," he adds. "Many women were not necessarily in control of their household's investments during the meltdown of '08, but now many have taken constructive steps to educate themselves in order to take an active role to get their portfolios in line."