 |
|
|
|
 |
| Mothers Who Dream | ||||
|
Home
About the Author ****** Myth #2: "I don't have enough money to invest." Solution:
Brown bag it for lunch. Make coffee at home. Myth #3:
"I may make mistakes. If I take risks, I may lose
everything." Solution:
Place money management high on the "to do" list. If you can do a crossword
puzzle, you can read a financial column. Myth #5: It's selfish to put myself first. I should take care of everyone else." Solution: Try
an attitude shift. Taking care of yourself financially really is taking
care of your family's future. Myth #6: "Taking charge of my money may mean I antagonize my spouse." Solution:
"Power struggles exist," says financial author Olivia Mellan. No need to
alienate. "Commit to shared decision making no matter who makes the
money." Myth #7: "Someone else will take care of me." Solution: Shake this old attitude and move toward security that reaps self-esteem. Married women must stay involved in decisions that affect financial security after the husband's death. Taylor's husband left a beneficiary box blank, meaning proceeds were taxed and subject to probate. Financial planner Julie Hercules says, "You'd be surprised how many life insurance policies still designate a first wife as beneficiary, even the the man has remarried." |
WOMEN: TAKE CHARGE OF YOUR FINANCES When then 45-year-old Nan Taylor of St. Louis came home from a tennis date to find her husband lying in the driveway, her entire world turned upside down. The man she calls “the picture of health,” had suffered a fatal heart attack. Like many women, Taylor had let her husband take care of the finances. She remembers them seeing a financial planner a couple of years earlier. “Everything they talked about was over my head,” Taylor confides. “But I pretended to understand. I didn’t know what to ask, and it’s hard to look stupid in front of other people.” Taylor fell into two money myth traps common to women (see sidebar). She believed someone else would take care of her. Then, overwhelmed with the sudden loss of her husband, she faced the daunting task of learning enough just to make the right decisions. “And my grief colored everything,” she says. According to research by Olivia Mellan, co-author of the book MONEY SHY TO MONEY SURE: A WOMAN’S ROAD MAP TO FINANCIAL WELL-BEING (Walker & Company, 2001), 93% of women will be alone at some time during their lives. “When you’re in shock is not the time to have to learn about money,” Mellan says. “Women need to set aside time to do something about money now. And investing in your future isn’t rocket science.”
NO SUCH THING AS A DUMB QUESTION “Money is the last taboo,” says Mellan, with at least half of her psychotherapy practice centering on money issues. “Women don’t talk about it like they do everything else, and that needs to change.” Thirty year-old freelance reporter Joyce Slayton of San Francisco, remembers her father first telling her about mutual funds. “He convinced me it was wise to make it an automatic investment,” says Slayton, who began with $300.00 and now invests $500.00 a month. “It’s reassuring to see the money piling up and know, okay, I won’t be eating dog food when I’m old,” she says. “First, figure out what your goals are,” says financial planner Julie Boschert Hercules of Renaissance Financial Corporation in St. Louis. “Do you want to send your children to college? Be able to retire in ten years? A good advisor helps you make investment decisions to achieve those goals. Find someone you can trust with the intimate details of your financial life, but never ever give them full control.”
When Cleveland, Ohio author Mary Mulroony lost her husband
9 years ago, she advocated responsibility to a financial planner who was
also a friend. “He didn’t do anything illegal,” says Mulroony, who only
recently began learning and making decisions herself. “But in retrospect,
I see that my money could have been invested with less tax liability.”
Mulroony also doesn’t recommend working with a friend. “It’s more
difficult to disagree,” she says. Mellan says this attitude of incompetence in math makes many women practice money avoidance. Slayton agrees, saying, “Most of my girlfriends haven’t really thought about their retirement, even though many are single and nearing or into their forties.” Keep a spending journal, says Mellan. “Write down every single thing you buy,” she says. “Then how you felt before and after. We live in a society where going to the mall is recreation, and coming home empty-handed is a failure. We’ve got to change our way of thinking.” A journal opens eyes to frittered-away change that adds up to big sums for good investment use, and also reveals a person’s relationship with money and the attitudes surrounding it--often dating back to childhood. To get in touch with your feelings, Mellan suggests creating a two-way dialogue. Imagine a conversation with your money. Ask questions such as, Am I happy with Money? And is Money pleased with how I’m using it? Then speculate how the dialogue might be judged by parents, the voice of inner wisdom, God, or a higher being. This revealing exercise gives insight into emotional attitudes toward money that help individuals reach a balance and acquire tools to take charge of your money life. “My whole attitude about money has changed,” says 35-year-old Julie Wilder, of San Diego, California. After her divorce a year ago, Wilder carried $7,000.00 in credit card debt and was stuck waitressing. “I made good money,” she says. “But it was a dead-end job with no way out.” Knowing she wanted security for herself and her daughter, Wilder made a plan. First, she decided on a career change, which meant an early cut in pay, but more income later. Then, she swallowed her pride, moved back in with her parents, and rented out the home she’d been awarded in the divorce settlement. “It was embarrassing,” she says. “I’d been out on my own since twenty-one, but I knew it was the only way to get by on less income and still pay the mortgage.” Her father’s advice led her to see a financial planner, although Wilder admits she thought it was a dumb idea. “How could someone without any extra money invest in the future?” she asks. If investing in the future becomes important enough, there is extra money: avoid a Starbucks coffee every morning (2.00 x 30 = $60.00) or eliminate the once-a-week pizza dinner ($40.00 x 4 = $120.00). “The first step is the hardest,” Hercules says, telling of clients who started small. “Even twenty-five dollars a month in a mutual fund builds over time.” She adds, “Be patient. It takes time, but once you see the money growing, it’s easier to find more dollars to invest.” Wilder’s financial adviser helped her apply good choices to her 401K. Wilder she took the rental income from her home and applied the overage to the mortgage’s principle. She got rid of credit cards to curtail spending, paid off those debts and pursued a flight attendant job with career longevity she knows will eventually pay off. “I now have a debit card,” she says. “The money comes right out of my account, so I don’t buy what I can’t afford.”
At the end of the year, Wilder paid off
the escrow shortage on her mortgage, which lowered the payment. She and
her daughter have recently moved back into their home. “My lifestyle is so
much better,” she says. “It only took me a year to take control of my
finances. I’m no longer working my fingers to the bone and never making
progress. Instead, I have a career I love and am investing in mine and my
daughter’s future.” Try these books for more advice:
All
material on the
www.motherswhodream.com website is copyrighted
|
|||
