There are some things in life you just can’t plan for: an unexpected illness, job loss, death of spouse, disability. And while experiencing one of these major events can drastically impact your life, having an effective financial plan can help ensure that it doesn’t ruin your financial well-being.
Have you wondered what you could gain by working with a financial professional? Many people consider working with an advisor when their finances have reached a certain point of complexity – they want someone else to step in to evaluate their situation and weigh in on what’s next.
The most solid strategy is to build an emergency fund – accessible, ready and able to support you and your family when you hit a rough patch. Let’s look at a few essentials on creating and protecting your rainy-day money, and how this fits into your overall wealth plan.
When thinking about money – do you feel stressed, tense, controlling, confused, like you have an abundance of it or a lack thereof? If you relate to any of these questions, you have an unhealthy relationship with your money.
Your financial advisor may not be the first person you call when considering splitting up, but they should be somewhere on the list. One of the concrete things you can do to help with the process and the healing to follow is to plan ahead.
For most students, experts say it remains financially worth it to go to college, despite rising tuition and opportunity costs in relation to increasing wages for workers holding only a high school diploma. The average rate of return (net gain or loss on college investment across a career) is 14%.
Your Health Savings Account (HSA) is a cornerstone of your benefits planning. The money is triple tax-advantaged – contributions, growth and withdrawals for qualified expenses are not taxed. This account is like nothing else, and you need to take full advantage of it.
