12 DIVORCE FINANCIAL PLANNING MISTAKES

  1. Believing that a 50-50 division of property is the same as an equitable division of property.
  2. Keeping the house when you can’t afford to pay the mortgage, taxes, utilities, and maintenance.
  3. Deciding financial issues one at a time, instead of understanding how they all work together and affect each other.
  4. Failing to guarantee alimony and/or child support payments with life insurance taken out on your soon to be ex-spouse.
  5. Failure to make sure that the spouse who receives alimony and/or child support payments is the OWNER of the life insurance.
  6. Believing that your settlement must confirm to what a judge would order if your case went to court.
  7. Seeking financial advice from someone whose expertise is the law.
  8. Failure to include the present value of a pension among marital assets.
  9. Using unrealistic assumptions about inflation and investment returns.
  10. Failure to understand how spousal Social security payments work.
  11. Failure to consider creative financial solutions.
  12. Failure to ask “Will I be OK NOW and 20-30 years in the future?