Some Tax And Financial Tips For The Divorced From Julian Block

Divorced individuals should educate themselves for financial planning.

In these increasingly rough economic times, it’s more vital than ever that you assume greater responsibility for your financial future. You ought not to rely exclusively on paid advisers. At the very least, you should be knowledgeable enough to raise good questions and evaluate answers when you deal with divorce attorneys and other professionals. The informed client gets the best advice.

A quick, low-cost way to become savvy is to sign up for adult education courses on taxes, investing and other aspects of personal finance. Choose from an array of classes tailored to your interest that are available at places like high schools and community colleges. Courses cost a fraction of what it would otherwise cost to meet on a one-to-one basis with instructors, who usually are attorneys, CPAs, financial planners and enrolled agents—i.e., persons licensed to practice before the IRS who are neither attorneys nor CPAs, but who are former IRS employees or have passed rigorous tax examinations administered by the IRS. Instructors use their hands-on experience to provide helpful, unbiased advice on topics that run the gamut from timing the receipt of income and the payment of deductions to your best advantage, to opening, operating and closing business ventures, to getting married or divorced, to when and how much money to take out of tax-deferred retirement accounts like IRAs, 401(k)s and 403(b)s, to whether to make lifetime gifts of money and other kinds of property to family members or to leave the assets to them.

Read More: Forbes