When you’re in the middle of divorce, it’s easy to focus your attention on your immediate needs and what life will look like once your marriage dissolution is finalized.
While you certainly need to pay attention to the legal issues that have an immediate impact, you also can’t overlook how your marriage dissolution will affect your long-term financial well-being. This includes properly addressing retirement assets.
If you mishandle retirement assets in your divorce, then you could be in for a difficult time later. You may not have the time to replenish your retirement accounts. Although equitable division of marital assets should position you well here, there are some tips that you’ll want to keep in mind as you navigate your divorce.
How to protect your retirement during divorce
We know it can be easy to get entangled in several legal issues that come up during divorce, but as you navigate the process, you don’t want to lose sight of the following tips:
- Gain a full understanding of the assets in play: You can only secure those marital assets that you’re aware of and that you loop into the property division process. Therefore, you need to ensure that you know what retirement assets your spouse holds. You’ll also want to assess your own retirement savings to see if you can legitimately argue that some of them are individually owned, which would remove them from the property division process altogether.
- Secure a proper valuation: Some retirement accounts, like a 401(k) or an IRA, are easy to valuate. You simply see how much money is in the account and go from there. But if your spouse is expecting to earn pension benefits, it may be harder to figure out what it’s worth. Here, you can contact the plan administrator to try to get a better idea of where your spouse’s benefits fall, but you might also want to speak to a forensic accountant who may be able to help you navigate this aspect of your divorce.
- Consider using other assets as leverage: There are going to be certain assets that your spouse wants out of the divorce. If you can identify them, then you might be able to use them as bartering chips to secure more retirement assets. Just make sure you’re not leaving yourself on too precarious of financial footing in the short-term.
- Be articulate: There are a lot of emotions wrapped up in the divorce process. While some of these emotions can become problematic, making it harder to navigate the challenging legal issues ahead of you, others can be used to elicit empathy. So, if you can articulate your concerns about the future and why you feel like you need a certain portion of retirement assets, then you might be able to convince your spouse to agree with you.
Don’t let retirement assets get away from you in your divorce
There’s a lot to address in your divorce. You don’t want to be left without the resources you need to be successful in the next chapter of your life. That’s why now is the time to start building your divorce legal strategy. By being diligent now, you’ll hopefully secure the bright next chapter that you deserve.