The golden years are going to feel a bit tarnished for almost one in five Americans.

In a personal finance survey published today, 18 percent of the respondents said they expect to be in debt for the rest of their lives. That is double the percentage who expected that in May 2013, the last time the survey was conducted.

Mortgage delinquencies dropped for the eleventh consecutive quarter, to 3.36 percent, in the third quarter of 2014, and credit card delinquency was at 1.34 percent, according to TransUnion. Credit card indebtedness has increased moderately since the 2013 CreditCards.com survey, Schulz said.

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In contrast, student loan debt rose from an aggregate of $390 billion at the end of 2005 to $966 billion at the end of 2012, according to data from the Federal Reserve Bank of New York. Average student loan debt topped $30,000 in six states, according to the Project on Student Debt.



"We've all seen the student loan debt numbers, and credit card debt is increasing, and even though the job market is improving it's certainly not humming along, and there is data about people's salaries not growing quite as quickly as people had hoped," said Matt Schulz, senior analyst at CreditCards.com. "You just wonder if it has all come together to create this unease."

Read More7 ways to stop student loans from ruining your life