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Peter Locke

Divorcing Women and their Unheard Financial Goals

Financial problems are one of the most cited causes of divorce and crafting a Divorce Financial Plan can be your best opportunity for a new start. The compounding stresses of money management and home economics can act as an accelerant for the underlying causes of marital strife and ultimately divorce. It should also come as no surprise that divorce often results in a change in financial direction for both parties, who through the process of divorce find they have several financial goals and needs that are not part of the current marital financial plan. So for one of the parties, it’s time for a change in the methods, tools, and priorities addressed in the financial plan.  On the heels of a divorce, here are some of the most commonly shared priorities that went unaddressed in prior relationships with investment professionals and financial advisors: 66% Hope to pay off debt accrued in or before the divorce 41% Want to save for a comfortable retirement 38% Would like to start or have a  larger emergency fund 34% Would like less risky investments 27% Would like a new home 20% Want more new streams of reliable income 19% Are hoping to build their wealth through investments 12% Want to gain confidence in their insurance  We feel that most of the divergence between the goals of these surveyed divorcees and their financial plans started long before the divorce proceedings. The disconnect between the financial goals of a single party and those established in a marital financial plan likely existed well before the topic of divorce arose and stems from a lack of communication and shared vision.   A staggering majority of recently divorced women comment that their post-divorce financial plan looks nothing like their marital financial plan. Furthermore, an alarming number of women developing a financial plan reveal that they have not yet discussed these priorities with a financial professional which begs the question of how a financial plan that fails to uncover the goals and needs of the woman became enshrined in the first place. As a result, many don’t have a clear path on how to achieve their stated financial goals.  These unheard financial goals compound the already frustrating and stressful situation a divorce brings.  A Certified Divorce Financial Analyst® or CDFA® can play a significant role when uncovering the value of shared assets, divining a tax-based strategy for the future value of different investment types, and assisting in dividing marital assets during the divorce process. Additionally, a CFP® professional can assist you in understanding your options, documenting your financial goals, and putting you in the best position possible to help you achieve your financial goals post-divorce. Generally speaking, women live longer, have different expectations for their money, and prioritize investment returns and strategies. As such, their financial plans should be developed differently. Having a financial advisor by their side during divorce is crucial for combining their long-term financial planning expectations with their current asset make-up. If from the outset, a divorcee lays out a road map for their financial life, the advisor and attorney can better negotiate the terms of the settlement for their shared client. However, in a 2018 survey by the publication Worthy survey, 56% of women getting a divorce, discussed the marital house and debt as a priority, but only 48% discussed taxes, 34% discussed alimony, and 39% discussed the ongoing cost of child care. All of these have a more impactful weight on the long-term success of retirement and the border financial plan.  This makes working with a CDFA® and CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER™ even more crucial when facing a divorce. A financial professional can help you overcome emotional turmoil to bring you the financial vision and stability you deserve after divorce. The Complete Playbook

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mindfulness
Articles
Kevin Taylor

Meditation, Mindfulness and Money: 4 ways to channel mindfulness into your money

If you’re looking for some broader answers to the ‘universal question’ I’m not your guy and this is not that article. But I will say that after years of thinking the transcendental was not for me, I’ve changed. If it was real, here and now, I would investigate it for legitimacy. If it was ethereal and spiritual it was for guru’s, theologians, monks and priests. But that has changed for me. I now see mindfulness as a tool that has a very real way of actualizing my intentions, and meditation is the gateway to getting in touch with that.  The deliberate focusing of your mind is no more than coaching it to react in a particular way. Drawing from techniques that are metaphysical (more controllable) and shaping the physical (less controllable). So, to cut through the chaos of daily life, and getting your mind thinking about money, or more broadly wealth is no more difficult than coaching it to think more deeply about your family, career, or your other passions.  Visualize your financial goals Players and coaches have for decades now taught visualization as a method for success. Mindfulness allows the player to be mentally prepared for a situation, before they are called on to act in that moment. To see their options and take advantage of opportunity by running through a situation and potential variables. This speeds up decision making ability and allows people to react faster and with a better sense of how a decision reflects the hope of a game plan. They do this to focus the mind on their desired outcome, before the situation arises. Visualization can similarly help you premeditate the outcome you’re seeking for you and your family’s financial future. It is rarely a lack of opportunity that hinders success, but a failure of recognizing that opportunity in the moment it exposes itself. Having coached your mind to see and react to risk and opportunity is something that you mind can be coached into understanding before the opportunity presents itself. Get real about your finances By taking time to reflect and gain comfortability with your financial situation you can become more intimate and realistic with your expectations. By carving out time to reflect on your situation, the calmness of the moment can help you define more achievable outcomes. This is not to say you shouldn’t expect an extravagant life, but to help you control the resources at your disposal and become capable of mastering the decision making process in front of you.  Through meditation you can calm down otherwise erratic parts of life and focus your mind with greater intention. You can isolate the parts about your financial life that bring you joy and contentment and ready your mind to make decisions that have often been the result of emotion or reaction. Deliberately bringing your mind into focus brings clarity to the more important aspects of your life. Mindfulness about your past Meditation can be used to deliberately shape the way you react to a situation. Using mindfulness it can also be used to relive and relearn from events in your past. Taking time to re-feel how a situation in your past affected your present is a way of coaching your mind to learn from those events. By using the emotions which drive so much of our decision making and combining that with the more deliberative parts of the brain, you can combine the events of your past into the reactions you hope are part of your present.  Imagine if you isolate a single event from your past that shaped your current relationship with money. Reflecting through meditation the events that have caused your current understanding of your financial situation and the history you associate with the subject. You can then reimagine the events and outcome from your past. Learn from that very visceral event, and reshape how you would have rather reacted. The goal is not to relive financial missteps that you cannot get back, but to coach your emotional reptilian brain to cede the lead to your primate and more deliberative brain. By reflecting on the emotional drivers in a meditative process you can recognize the leading indicators events and avoid them in your current situation. Discover your money beliefs though mindfulness By channeling meditation time towards your money habits you can have a more complete and intimate relationship with money. Meditation helps you uncover the person you want to be in life, to shape and imagine how that person thinks and reacts to help define what that person’s intentions about money are. We all hold certain money beliefs, usually as a reaction to our emotions with money and lifestyle. One you begin spending even small amounts of time focusing your mind on money and your relationship with it, you’ll find the beliefs you have about money change. Channeling a deliberate intention into your beliefs will develop more positive money reactions, and those reactions will evolve in habits. This process enshrines the positive money outcomes you desire, into tactical decisions you can control. For many this transformation can happen in the way they save which is one of the leading indicators to financial success. They can transform the way they think and transform the way cash flows through their household flow from “income – spend = save” to “income – save = spend.” This shift in the belief that saving is more pressing then spending is not the natural state for most people, until they gain that more intimate and purposeful mindset around the value of saving. Conclusion Becoming more purposeful with your actions and ultimately your money begins with mindfulness. This mindfulness can be the result of focused meditation on the subject. Reshaping to the way you feel about and react to investment situations, market performance, and risk. Finding time to be deliberative about money allows you to cultivate your reaction to your money and better develop the fiscal life you want.  

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Articles
Kevin Taylor

Using a 1031 Exchange as part of a divorce

During the course of real estate ownership, there are instances where the transfer of property title occurs involuntarily. One such situation is when a couple goes through a divorce, which often leads to the sale of the property to a third party or the transfer of the property from one spouse to the other. Additionally, if a spouse passes away between the sale of a relinquished property and the purchase of a replacement property, it also affects the dynamics of a 1031 exchange. Let’s explore the impact of these changes in legal ownership on 1031 exchanges in more detail. When a divorced couple intends to sell an investment or business use property to a third party, there are typically no major issues for a 1031 exchange. Despite having been joint tenants and filing taxes jointly, each spouse has the opportunity to pursue their own exchange or opt for a cash-out. Generally, the joint tenancy would have been legally severed as part of the divorce proceedings. Alternatively, the title can be severed prior to a divorce, where one joint tenant signs a deed that designates the grantor spouse as the recipient of the one-half tenancy-in-common interest. In some cases, as part of a divorce settlement agreement, one spouse may transfer their interest in the property to the other spouse. According to IRC Section 1041, when a spouse conveys property to the other spouse as part of a divorce, there is no taxable event for the party transferring the property. The basis of the transferee (the recipient) becomes the adjusted basis of the transferor. However, if the transferee wishes to sell the property in the future and carry out an exchange, they would need to exchange the entire value of the property to achieve full tax deferral. An essential requirement for any 1031 exchange is that the taxpayer must hold the property for investment or business use. Even though the party receiving the other spouse’s interest assumes the former spouse’s basis, it does not mean they automatically inherit the other spouse’s holding period. In these situations, it would be advisable to hold full ownership of the property for a significant period before selling. Ideally, holding the property for two years or longer would be ideal, but at the very least, it should be held for a period longer than one or two tax reporting periods to satisfy the holding requirement. On rare occasions, a taxpayer involved in a non-divorce situation may pass away between the sale of the relinquished property and the acquisition of the replacement property. While the heirs may desire a stepped-up basis in the property, unfortunately, that is not the outcome in this particular scenario. However, there is some consolation in the fact that, according to several IRS Letter Rulings, the heirs or the estate may proceed with the 1031 exchange transaction and achieve tax deferral, if not a stepped-up basis.

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