When my father died unexpectedly and without a will or a financial plan, it was hard on my family in many ways.
One of the more challenging obstacles was what to do with my dad’s business and investments. He was self-employed—and the only employee—so my mom had to figure out everything on her own. Having three kids to raise, she didn’t have the time to look into the little nuances of how the business was run. She had priorities; learning and understanding my father’s business wasn’t one of them. So after he passed, my mother attempted to keep the business afloat. But without the knowledge and experience of my father, she was taken advantage of, and the business ultimately failed.
My father did have some investments and equities and mutual funds that he intended for retirement, but these were also something foreign to my mother. Back then, such financial matters were more the domain of the “man of household”. My mom did learn quickly, especially about dividends and income and what was needed to have additional revenue sources to help the household budget, but unfortunately, naive about how to manage my father’s investments, she was taken advantage of. I remember a broker from Prudential actually turned her account for $5,000 in commissions. Back in the late ‘70s that was a lot of money. She was a trusting widow, not educated enough about detailed financial aspects. Stretched thin as she was with suddenly being a single parent, finding a job, and trying to keep the household going, it wasn’t easy to know what to do with my father’s investments and it made her a target.
It’s your job to make sure you educate yourself in the basics of investing, regardless of inclination or interest. Sometimes one partner is financially “in charge” or has a more intuitive grasp of finances than the other, but both adults in the family should understand their investments and retirement plan just in case. You need to know what’s expected in investing and what’s out of the ordinary. When you’re a couple, it’s really the responsibility of both people to think about financial planning. It’s important for both to know how to handle finances. For some people it’s uncomfortable and difficult, but having sound financial knowledge is very important. And should you need help, a financial planner can always guide you and make the process a little bit easier to understand.
Death, disability, or illness can strike anyone at any time. Those with a plan, who have made a will, who have all the necessary documentation in an easily-accessible place, and who share their financial plans with their spouses are doing just what they should in order to guard against chaos should the worst occur.