“I thought my husband knew more about finance than me”

So often I talk to women going through divorce who haven’t dealt with finance during the marriage and instead have left managing finances to their partner.

It’s quite common, at least with my clients. The wife looks after the house, children etc and the partner looks after the money.

But then if they end up going through divorce – she’s in the awful position as she knows very little about the finances and has total fear about it.

She may worry that her partner has not fully disclosed everything, but of course she has no way of knowing if this is true or not. And she may get an unpleasant shock when she does look at the finances.

This happened to my client, the one who made the opening comment. She found out the mortgage repayment was Interest only, and she hadn’t known. She thought the mortgage was being paid down. Since they had sufficient income to repay the mortgage each month, she had no idea what the money was spent on instead.

There’s nothing wrong with your partner dealing with joint finances. In fact, it’s quite sensible that one person does it, provided you don’t then get rid of all responsibility for it.

Do ensure you have a regular meeting between you to discuss your joint situation. It’s up to you to accept joint responsibility and ask the relevant questions. Don’t assume your partner knows enough.

Get in touch if you’re unsure about your financial situation and would like some help. Just email me at mary@wealthforwomen.biz and we can arrange a time to speak.