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How Can a Certified Divorce Financial Analyst Help with Your Separation?

Separation and divorce are uncertain times.  Our routines and plans today and in the future need to be re-evaluated and re-planned.  Many of the questions that you have during these times are a combination of personal values and financial impacts.  You can answer these questions effectively by finding a Certified Divorce Financial Analyst (CDFA) to help you.

Below are 4 general areas that you will have questions and a CDFA can help.

Collecting Financial Information

• What do you own?
• What do you owe?
• How much do you earn?
• Is there any excluded property that won’t be divided?

Building a Spending Plan

• We all spend money. Post-divorce, you may need to make different choices about where and how you are spending.  Discussing a plan during the division process gives you a clearer picture of what is necessary and what is possible.
• When you have dependent children, it’s important to review and divide their expenses.  Both parties should understand the costs and who is responsible for what.

What Happens in the Future?

When you are making choices about how to divide assets and debts, it’s important to understand how your decisions today may affect your future.  Some common questions are:

• Am I going to be okay if I keep the house?
• My spouse has a pension; now that we’re separating, I don’t know what my retirement savings look like.
• Paying for our children’s education is important to me; can that still happen?

Follow-Up Items (if needed)

• Life insurance is often discussed during separation to secure spousal and child support obligations. I can follow up with you to ensure that the policies are in place with the correct beneficiaries.
• Changes to wills and powers of attorney post-divorce- you need to re-plan for your assets to be given to your heirs.  I can follow up with you to update your plan to reflect your new situation.

If you have questions about your separation and the implications of the decisions that you are making, at whatever stage you’re at, please contact Sara at 519-569-7526 or [email protected]

More information about the Certified Divorce Financial Analyst designation here

Information about Collaborative Family Law here.  I’m excited to be working with this group of professionals who are committed to preserving the dignity, integrity and long-term best interests of your family.