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About this episode

What would happen to your family or loved ones if life threw an unexpected curveball tomorrow? Would they feel protected, supported, and prepared, or left to navigate a stressful maze of financial questions and paperwork on their own?

In a world where change is the only constant, financial preparedness is an act of love that too often gets pushed aside for another day. But when the unimaginable happens, being unprepared isn’t just stressful—it can have lasting effects on your sense of security, your relationships, and your peace of mind.

In this episode, you’ll discover how to take control and approach financial planning as a tool for caring for yourself and those you love. With honest stories from personal experience, practical checklists, and expert strategies for navigating life’s transitions like widowhood, blended families, and sudden loss, you’ll learn why clarity is the best gift you can give to your family. This episode offers actionable steps for organizing vital documents, starting tough conversations, and building the kind of foundation that keeps everyone cared for—no matter what the future holds.

Donna Jean Kendrick is a CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER™ practitioner and founder of Sephton Financial. After losing her first husband suddenly in 2013, Donna navigated widowhood with three young children, inspiring her to support families in transition through financial planning. She is the host of the Wisdom and Wealth Podcast and author of A Guide to Widowhood, and A Guide for Blended Families.

Episode Highlights

05:40 Navigating blended family dynamics and the process of adjustment.

13:25 How being financially organized eased the pain of loss.

14:38 The gift of clarity: Preparing financial documents for loved ones.

18:16 Facing the emotional side of financial planning in relationships.

21:57 Practical tips for document organization.

26:22 How to overcome overwhelm and take stock of your finances.

29:06 Building a financial foundation: Net worth, liabilities, and spending plans.

33:50 Finding your system: Partner roles and routines in managing finances.

36:00 Best practices for couples discussing and organizing their finances.

39:21 Joint vs. separate accounts: Customizing financial approaches for couples.

40:35 Planning for retirement and avoiding resentment.

46:07 Financial conversations for new couples and the value of prenuptial agreements.

Your Check List of Actions to Take

• List all your financial accounts and debts for a clear overview.
• Verify that account titles and beneficiary designations are accurate and updated.
• Safeguard important documents—wills, power of attorney, etc.—in a fire-safe box.
• Use a personal document locator to organize passwords and account information.
• Set aside time for open, honest conversations about money mindset and habits.
• Pull your credit report from annualcreditreport.com to check for missed accounts or errors.
• Make sure both partners have updated wills and powers of attorney.
• Establish a regular financial check-in, at least annually, to stay coordinated.

Mentioned

A Guide for Blended Families (*Amazon Affiliate link) (book)

A Guide to Widowhood Workbook (*Amazon Affiliate link) (book)

Don’t Leave Your Loved Ones Without Answers (webinar link)

Annual Credit Report

Evolve in Love (program)

Connect with Donna Jean Kendrick

Websites: donnajeankendrick.com

Facebook: facebook.com/DonnaJeanKendrick

YouTube: youtube.com/@donnajeankendrick

Instagram: instagram.com/donnajeankendrick

TikTok: tiktok.com/@donnajeankendrick

Podcast: open.spotify.com/show/27h7hxaS2YRb2JJz6R4K9I

Connect with Dr. Jessica Higgins

Facebook: facebook.com/EmpoweredRelationship 

Instagram: instagram.com/drjessicahiggins 

Podcast: drjessicahiggins.com/podcasts/

Pinterest: pinterest.com/EmpowerRelation 

LinkedIn: linkedin.com/in/drjessicahiggins 

Twitter: @DrJessHiggins 

Website: drjessicahiggins.com  

Email: [email protected]

If you have a topic you would like it to be discussed, please contact us by clicking on the “Ask Dr. Jessica Higgins” button here. 

Thank you so much for your interest in improving your relationship. 

Also, I would so appreciate your honest rating and review. Please leave a review by clicking here. 

Thank you!  

*With Amazon Affiliate Links, I may earn a few cents from Amazon, if you purchase the book from this link.

Episode Transcript

Donna Jean, thank you for joining us.

Thank you so much for having me, Dr. Jessica. Appreciate it.

Yeah, I'm looking forward to our conversation. It seems like you do so much in the world as it relates to financial health and wellbeing. For people who are just getting to know you, what would you like to share?

Yeah. So a little bit about me is, I am a financial planner. But more than that, I'm someone who's lived a very bumpy life that's come out pretty well. So back in 2013, my first husband passed away, and I had three young kids. Flipped my career upside down on its head, went back to school, and then started doing financial planning and purpose, and then mission to help people and families in transition. So widowhood, divorce, and blended families. Two years ago, was able to get remarried again, and now we're a blended family with six kids from 14-24. The dynamics of that have been crazy, but with it has helped me serve my clients better and helped me serve my community better. So, wrote a few books, host a podcast myself, and I'm just trying to help wherever I can.

Thank you for sharing just some of your background and what prompted your growth and learning, and obviously real tragic circumstance, and also just how to negotiate that in a way that gave you more purpose and ability to thrive. Congratulations on your family and marriage and all that's happening in that regard. I know blending a family, I still reference, I don't know, you might be able to help me in a statistic if it still holds, that it takes about seven years for blended families to really feel home, like real sense of home and family together. Even when it's done really conscientiously and intentionally, sometimes there's just a lot of variables and time, just having the nervous systems really get that sense of family. So is that your experience, or what do you think?

Yeah, the time to make it gel, that's kind of it, I guess. We were really lucky because my second husband and I knew one another for years before. He was actually the carpenter who helped me with a house that needed a lot of love when I was in the first few years of widowhood. I used to actually watch his kids so that he could do work on the house. It was almost like a little bit of a barter system. Like: Yeah, I'll come on Saturday and work, but you've got to watch my kids. So my kids had actually played with his kids, which was really good.

What a unique story!

Yeah. My best friend from high school, my college roommate—the person who's the executor on my will, that's who she is—her son and my stepdaughter, Delaney, are best friends. So it's just so interwoven. So for that, we were lucky because we were all coming from almost the same core of community, which was really helpful. It is. It takes a while to gel. I have three older, my husband has the three younger, and to have them recognize one another as siblings, because they are. But it's weird, and then you have cousin layers. It's one big happy jelly mess.

Well, the adjustment, like who one is and who others are. That changes, and it takes some time to really embody that probably.

Yeah. My step kids, their mom passed away two years ago, and that's been a huge adjustment for them. So not only were they already into a blended family, but then they lost their mom, and then it's a move of a house and a full-time shuffle. I remember standing in Thanksgiving last year with my husband, and he was like, are you blood related to anyone in this house? I'm like, besides the kids? He's like, yeah. We had 40 people at the house for Thanksgiving. I was like, no. And he's like, good, me neither. So it was all friends and my late husband's family and his late wife's family, and it was just everybody. I'm like: Okay, all right, we've got this, and here comes the blend. But it is, it's hard. I think a lot of it has to do with having open conversations and how they feel. I remember my kids tampering, like, how do I introduce you? My kids make fun. My name's Donna Jean, and they refer to me in third person as DJ, while I am standing in the kitchen. Like, ooh, what DJ say about that? I'm like, God, I'm right here. So that's what we defaulted. I'm like, just introduce me as DJ, it's fine. It's all good.

Yeah. The affection, and also comfort around, again, working into whatever name is associated or whatever they call you, that it feels resonant, that it feels true. I saw my grandmother, she passed since, but she was 99, and she was struggling with a lot of dementia. But she was like, you used to call me Gram. Instead of grandma, I would call her Gram. I just think it's interesting how we relate. But how beautiful that you have a community and the interwovenness of it all, and just, I imagine, what you all create together in that intention and how welcoming you all are. So it's really special to hear, thank you for sharing.

Thanks. They grew up in a wonderful little community right in the suburbs outside of Philadelphia, and so I moved there. So I have the older kids who all went off to college, and I was like: Well, we're not going to reload these kids out of this beautiful little community. This is everything to them. So for me, I was the odd one out. That was okay though, what a wonderful opportunity to get to know new people, to see what makes the kids tick, to understand how their school system worked for my kids. It was like, I would rather me be the fish out of water than those three kiddos. So that was helpful. It was very helpful. But that community was so welcoming and so kind, so nice.

That's lovely. Well, I appreciate that. I mean, just for the children and what they're negotiating, and just your willingness to uproot. It can feel like dislocating, there's a bit of change in the fish out of water.

Well, as you're talking, I'm just aware of all the changes that you're referring to, that perhaps people don't anticipate as they imagine their future. Because I think our inclination is to live life and be with people and be in the yumminess of all of that, or be pulled towards parenting or work. It's difficult, even though we all intellectually know things can happen, changes can happen, sudden changes can happen, but how to feel prepared. How do you help people approach this conversation, and where would you like to start?

I think a lot of it too is, I always like to say I am an optimist who worries. I stole that line from somebody else. Like, I love living life and I love living for the next best minute. My first husband passed away suddenly, and so I know the value of it. It can feel very different when you didn't think so. I know that sudden shift, and now what? But I also know what it felt like, because financially, we were prepared. We worked with a financial planner in our 20s. My late husband worked for Homeland Security, so it was almost like a military life. So at one point in time, right before the bubble burst in 2007 and 2008 in real estate, we sold our family home to move abroad. We were just two kids from northeast Philadelphia. We were in our 20s. We did not know what to do with money that we made on a profit on the house. So that's where we hired a financial advisor. Honestly, that person changed the trajectory of my life, and I didn't know it standing there at 26 or 27. Because he was like, well, how about life insurance? My husband was law enforcement, so he had to retire early. He's like, how are you going to bridge from 57 to 65? Like, what are we going to do? So we got a life insurance policy that also had a savings vehicle that we could have used for withdrawal, never thinking we would use the life insurance side. It was just like a savings vehicle.

So when my husband passed, not only did we have life insurance, that financial advisor helped educate me, as a mom, as a woman, on where all the accounts were in the house. He helped us set up our beneficiary designations. So I don't even remember even having to go with the will anywhere. Everything was either held jointly. I was either a beneficiary through life insurance or retirement. The houses were in both our names. The cars were in my name. So when he passed, everything just fluidly moved. Here I had life insurance to allow me the opportunity to go back to school, to keep my house, to educate my kids. So because of that, and by first sharing the story of this is what happened to me, I was over-prepared at 26 being like: This guy, oh my God, well, okay, we'll humor him. Let's go ahead and do it. Like, we're 25-26, what's going to happen? Well, 15 years goes really quick, and at 42, my husband passed. So those things helped me stay as a mom and stay in grief, without having to make some of these major decisions about finances and things like that.

So when I share that story, it's very easy to say. So now let's dig in. 

We have something called The Personal Document Locator. I always say, because it's a hard conversation to have even if you know somebody is sick, to bring that to the forefront and be like: All right, you're not going to be here, let's go. Rare people can have that conversation.

But it's opening the first page going like: Hey, what city were you born? Everyone would say I was born in Philadelphia. Just because I don't say the R in water—I just say the Rs, I don't say the Ts—it's waw-duh. But just because I don't say that doesn't mean I was born in Philadelphia. I was born in a suburb outside. You need that information for a lot of the verification when someone dies. Let's fill out the blank. And where are all those passwords? We really encourage people to use password aggregators, the online. Not the ones that just autofill, like can I keep that? Pay for a subscription and have those passwords encrypted and auto-generated. But with one major password, you can link into pretty much anything that I do digitally. I barely have any paper tracks, I call it at home, anymore. Because everything's in a PDF. Well, does my husband know the code to my phone, so he can get into all of those codes. There's also something out there called Access. It's almost like a power of attorney over digital assets. Do you have that with your estate documents?

But having these questions and having like eight pages to work through, so that we're just working through the packet. It's not personal, just help me fill in the blanks. It's easier, and I think that's really where I try to, as you can see, I followed it pretty easy. Like, here's my story, this is how being organized helped me, and this is what I'm trying to help people do. So that really, the decisions are made now. So if something should happen, you're truly not making those decisions in a time of grief. And to know what decisions you can make, what is immediate, what can wait a while, what can be long-term when you can dream again. It's hard. Blending families, even harder, I'm so sorry, but a joy. Because a lot of things come to the table when you marry me. We did a podcast, my husband and I together, and they were like, what word of advice do you have? Because I'm a financial advisor, he is a carpenter. He's like, marry a financial advisor. I was like, you're so sweet. He doesn't want to be bothered with it. He doesn't want to talk about it. We have to.

Yes, and your skillset that helps give direction to these difficult conversations.

Yeah, they're hard. A lot of it is just the transparency. Find a quiet spot. Sit for an hour. Know that's what you're going to do is sit for an hour. If it's too hard to have that conversation, sit with a me in your neighborhood or your community, or an accountant, or a family psychologist. Be like: Hey, we're in family therapy or we're in marriage therapy. Hey, this document we need to go through, and we need someone to follow the rules. Can you help us go through this? It might be the best $160 you paid, just to have someone lead that conversation.

Yeah, and help make some decisions.

Yeah. I think the big thing too is, for a lot of people, money. Because that's really what it comes down to, protection and money. Like, am I going to be able to survive? That was the big question I had to answer when my first husband passed. Am I going to be okay? When I do financial planning for myself and for my new husband, now it's are the kids are going to be okay if something happens to me or if something happens to you? I take both of us off the playing field and create a picture of what if something happens to you? Do you have to hire a nanny? Do we have to buy another car for the house? Of course, yes. He says yes to the nanny. Now we're changing it to au pair. So should we have an au pair come? But for me too, our house is a fixer upper. My husband's talented, he's a carpenter. So if something happened to him, I need to hire somebody who I'm sure is going to be much more expensive than my husband, the carpenter. I have to have that money put aside.

But more than anything, when I say it comes down to money is, how do we all treat money? How do we make money decisions? Where is our scarcity in money? So much of that comes back to when we were little. How did we see our parents deal with money? How did I deal with money in my first relationship? I brought that bag of tricks over to my second relationship, I certainly did. I'm sure my husband brought from his first divorce, a lot of scar tissue about money. So let's unpack that too, because as we're seeing and we're doing the logistics, like beneficiary, insurance policies, what does your work provider give, where do you hide the keys to the safe deposit box? Those are logistics. That's the motions side of it. The second conversation is the harder one.

What is the conversation that's harder?

How do you feel about money? Where do your money decisions come from? What's your money mindset? That's harder.

That doesn't always seem as visible. Sometimes we have to really explore to get at what's operating, that we might not even be conscious of.

Big time. We always had cash on hand when I was little. I was like: Wow, why did we always have cash on hand? Well, was my mom scared of the banks, coming straight from the Depression Era? Could that have been it? I actually sat with her in her 60s. I was like: Mom, why do you always have so much cash, like hidden in between the winter draperies. She was like: Oh, because your dad had a side job that we didn't report taxes on. He's gone now. So we always had cash. He painted houses for his friends and family, and they would just give him cash to say thank you. That's why we had cash. No good reason. She wasn't a great saver. She wasn't scared of banks. I had put all these layers to why my mom always had an envelope of cash. Who knew?

Well, just to back up one moment, it sounds like you're saying that when we can be more prepared, it is a way to give love. It's a way to offer love in circumstances that are unexpected. We hear this particularly when a parent, like you said, if someone knows they have an illness or something imminent or just aging, that they want to get their affairs in order so their children don't have to go through everything. And how many children report that I'm so grateful my parents did all of this, so the burden, or conversely feeling incredibly burdened by it all. While that may not have been the intention, perhaps the avoidance of it can have a result or can have an impact. Perhaps what you're bringing attention to is, we can really offer that care that extends these decisions beyond what we can see even.

It's true, and I love that you said that. 

So it opens an opportunity for some bigger talks and bigger conversations. Some of the hardest things I have too, and I'll digress a little bit, is when I work with my own clients, like I just said, that scar tissue, coming from widowhood. How did I make money decisions with my first husband, and now I'm coming to my second husband? Also, when you're out there dating, when do you talk about money? When do you bring that up? When is that suitable? I have a podcast called Widow Wisdom and Wealth, and I have someone simply in charge of, we call them bad actors, kicking bad actors off of following on social media for that. Because widowhood is vulnerable many times, for men and for women. So you have to be very careful about money conversations, as well as being open. Be careful who you're open to, if that's helpful.

It is helpful. It's extremely helpful. I can even feel inside myself, much more interest, when it's a way of loving and caring, versus being in the fear state or worry state or thinking about all the bad things that could happen. That if we're saying, we want to be in a place of protection, we want to be in a place where we are really caring for each other. Things do happen in the world and in life, and how do we care for us and one another and our family?

100%. By doing the activities ahead of time is really how we do that. So being organized, having a fire-safe box or a safe, putting everything in there. If there's any listeners out there who actually have a physical, old-fashioned, bigger safe, note to self: when you move houses, don't move it on its side and leave it that way. There's condensation that builds up, and it drips into all of your very specific documents. So make sure they're upright all the time. There we go, it happened to us. I accused the cat of making a mess on top of the safe. No, it was because it was on its side. So you have to take care. I always say too, even like you talked about your grandma or your Grams, like let's make sure that she has everything that she considers important that she might run back in the house for at a fire, really in a fire-safe box or in a bag that she can grab and go. It's really important. We know so many people that are like: Oh, if I could have just run back and gotten that. Some things are in the permanent safe, some things are hidden, and some things can be pretty accessible that they can grab and go with. But fire-safe boxes, fire-safe bags, really important.

Copies of your wills. 

So many people come to my office after a loss, and page eight isn't notarized, or page nine isn't witnessed. Oh boy, almost the entire document is then invalid. But make sure you have, when we talk about estate documents for our couples out there, it's your new six pack. It is your will, one for each of you. It is your power of attorney, one for each of you. Power of attorney should be healthcare and finance. And it is your healthcare directive, almost like your living will. We're going to add in the power of attorney for digital assets. But have those in place. If you have 18-year-old kids going off the college, have a power of attorney over healthcare. Because they could go in the hospital, and you might not have rights to help them make decisions. As parents, we don't want that. Make sure that's on file. Make sure it's on file with the school. Those are the things that we have to take, again, to stop our worry.

I'm a mom of six, I worry about each and every one of them. But knowing I have a power of attorney over healthcare really helps me. Not even for the college kids now, for the 24-year-old that's out there. I was like, do you want this back? Like, you really are a big person now. He's like: No, keep that, that's good. Okay, here we go. So those are my big things. Make sure that you go back to former employers, and if there's old 401(k)s, 403(b)s, employee retirement plans, that might have been there from 20 years ago, make sure you take a look at who the beneficiary designation is. It could have been your old girlfriend Fifi, and your wife won't get a dime. It happens. It does. I see these things.

So that's that inventory, that's that double-check. Make sure your contact number is up-to-date. How many of us have left AT&T to go to Verizon or to T-Mobile or to Optimum, whatever's out there, and your cell phone number might have changed back from 1997, where I don't even think I had a cellphone back then for god's sakes. It was in the early 2000s. Make sure the numbers are up-to-date. Because when you call that old 401(k) provider and you're like: Hey, I retired, I want to get that money over here. They're going to be like: Okay, we'll send you a four-digit code. To what number? Everything will get deleted. If you're in widowhood, wow, that's even worse. That is even worse, it's hard.

No kidding! So for the people that might feel overwhelmed in daily living and all the demands and whatever life circumstances they're negotiating presently, and they have their hands full around those things, even financially and getting things more in order, how do you help people have conversations about the future and being prepared when perhaps present day is requiring so much? How do you recommend that?

Yeah, actually, I say put that on pause. 

Remember chutes and ladders when we were younger? You didn't get to start in the middle of the board. You had to start at the beginning and you had to wind through. So yeah, we all have future goals and needs, and I love people who write their obituary what they want to be when they're 90, and then in 10 years, and then in 5, and then in 3 and in 2, and in the next few months. I love those exercises. Do that and then be done. But about your finances, stop. Just get a hold of where you are right now.

Take a brain dump of where you know checking and savings are. Take a brain dump of anything that might be for retirement. Take a brain dump of anything you might own. We always call that the balance sheet, but what do I own and what do I owe? Put a line on the middle sheet of paper, and then put it away. That's the overwhelm. Put it away, and the next day, pick it up and be like, do I own anything else? Anything of value, write it down. Those things can be you own a house. Do you really own the house? Is the mortgage in your name and your spouse's? Is the mortgage just in your name? Is the paperwork just in their name? Take it one step deeper. So what you first want to do is just what do I owe and what do I own. That will give you what you call your net worth. That's a great place to start.

Then you move to the next step. What are my assets? Title them? Where are my liabilities? That's where most people will stop, that short-term liability, that credit card that you rolled over. Many times we do it for good reason. There was a point of time in widowhood where I had to get some credit card debt because I had to make ends meet before life insurance came. Credit cards got canceled because I didn't have them in my name. I was an authorized user. Always make sure you know what credit is in your name. Those are those things that really make a difference. Then when we can start writing them down and inventorying where each of the accounts are, even better.

Want a shortcut? Go on to AnnualCreditReport.com and pull your credit report. That's going to show you all of the accounts that are open, and it's going to show you anything that might've had late payments, anything that might be open in someone else's name. Because there is fraud out there, there is. For some of my clients that are in a pending divorce, sometimes soon to be ex-spouse, they know your details, they're out there opening credit. You want to keep a real tight hold on that. It's illegal, you're not allowed to do it. But it's hard to prove sometimes. So it's called AnnualCreditReport.com. You can get a free copy of your credit report from each of the three credit agencies. I always say don't get all three at once, they pretty much will say the same thing. Start there, order one, go through it, inventory it. If you have any problems, you have to reply in writing about the proof. Like, no, I paid that credit card or it was closed. You have to apply. It takes sometimes months or close to a year to fix that. Then four or five months later, take another report, make sure everything looks the same.

For some of my clients that are dating and about to move to the next level of maybe the blend or more commitment, and this financial conversation is the next one, many times we'll say: Okay, get that credit report, now trade. Wow, that's really vulnerable. Because sometimes you can't say the word, like I had to live on credit in widowhood or in that first three months of divorce, and I lived in my car. Who knew? But there can be stories around each of those accounts. Then allow that other person to ask some questions, that's fair. It's fair.

Wow, I've never heard that recommended. I've heard the more physical health practice of getting tested for STDs and various things, when you're wanting to be sexually intimate, and this is a financial reveal and inventory of an assessment or a test, if you will.

Right, which usually comes after everything you're just talking about. It does. It absolutely does, and it is a vulnerable spot to be. Then once you get back to the foundations, what do I owe, what do I own? That's my net worth. What accounts do I have revolving? What makes this work? That's where we start to find our ability to save. So I'm not going to say it's what I owe. I hate the word budget, it's a spending plan. Where can we find opportunities to save?

Look, the overwhelm is real, because life is busy and we don't like dealing with this. My husband does not like talking finances. That's why he says marry a financial advisor. I sit down every quarter. It used to be every Sunday, every fourth Sunday. I say, this is our spreadsheet, take a look. He'd be like, great, and we just move on. It stops him from being productive for some reason, it makes him worry, just because whatever money mindset he has. So that doesn't work for him. So if that's the overwhelm someone gets to after doing a net worth and then figuring out where the spend plan is, then put it down. But what we know is, there's a few times a year we have to pull it together. Usually the end of year, and usually tax time. So maybe do it all during tax time. Just get it all out. Then start saying, all right, what do I want for this year? You have to make decisions in the beginning of the year on how you want to save many times, or what goals do I have for the next three months, the next year, the next three years, a little bit longer? You just ease yourself into it. When you start to get control of where I am right now, then you can dream.

Then, at what point are you recommending to do these documents in this preparation?

Tomorrow. Really, as soon as you can. Because I always believe that you live your next best minute. You can't change anything that happened in the past. You can't change anything else anybody else does. You can only change what you do. So what are you going to do next? Are you going to decide to live off of cash for a while instead of a credit card? Because the feeling of money changes things. It's actually kind of hard to live off cash many times, you need that credit. So then, are we going to move it to debit? Are we actually going to balance our checkbook each month? I remember my mom doing that each and every month. I'm a financial planner, and rarely do I balance my checkbook. I'm checking my Amex because that's where I live life. But let's try that. Just actually putting it on paper and seeing it and feeling it has a different behavior within you.

Okay. So for someone or a couple that's dealing with overwhelm, getting their foundation and the clarity there, then as soon as possible, being able to start taking action on the things you recommended for preparation for future?

Are we talking about a couple that's already together or getting together?

Well, let's do already together.

Okay, already together. I actually say if you're working on your taxes right now, a wonderful time to pull it together. Really and truly start with that inventory of, let's just make sure things are titled. If something happens to me, are you going to be okay? That's coming from such a source of love. So do you have any debt that we need to cover? We can have life insurance to help cover that. Or do we have to work together to get that down? There's so many different ways that couples can manage their money. Joint accounts, non-joint accounts. One for me, one for you. You write me a check for half the utilities, whatever works. There are no rules to this, what works for you.

Myself, with my current husband, I take care of everything. It's one giant lumpy joint account, and here it goes and we're done. Something happens to me, he needs to know where the bill payer is. He needs to know the two taxes that won't accept the bill payer that he has to write a check for. I have to write that down. Because if something happens to me, he needs to know that. Besides that, check in once a year. Have a good day, Jim. He doesn't have to look at it again. That's my role in the marriage. Same role is, if something bad happens in the house, I'm not going to unclog that toilet. I can, I don't want to. So that is the yin-yang here. That's how he feels about finances. Swear to God, that's how he feels about it.

But I actually say, just sit down. Sit down, do that. What if something happens to me? What's titled in my name, what's not? What insurance do we have? The next step will evolve when we have to talk about it. How much do we owe? Now we're talking about mortgage, now we're talking about credit cards, now we're talking about student loans. So you're naturally going to be backing into this. The cheat sheet, get the annual credit report, start inventorying that. If it's a couple that's been avoiding talking about it, or life is busy, it's either set a time aside. If you have kids, get a sitter for the kids. Don't do it in public. Some people say do it in public in case behaviors get bad, because you'll keep your behavior because you're sitting in public. But this is sensitive information. Have access to your computer, have access to your documents. It's a dining room table chat. That's what it is. If you need to bring someone in like myself, a financial advisor, someone you trust, then bring the third party in to help guide that conversation. Some people need like a teacher in the front of the room. If I didn't have a teacher telling me do lesson 5, 6, 7, and this is what you have to bring in for homework tomorrow, I would never have done it. Do your homework.

Yeah, I love it. So it doesn't sound like you have a strong stance around couples blending their finances. I know a lot of psychological studies say there's some correlation around commitment and the harmony in the relationship when couples are pooling their funds. But I also know that it can work in many different ways. You're really saying just find what works. Is that right?

I am, I really am. I love yours, mine, ours, theirs. Because blended families, that really is it. The kids have assets, they have inheritance from their parents, or the parents that have passed. I have my assets, my husband has his, we have what we need jointly. I think there is really, to your point, a behavior part of having joint or proportional to what we both make that are going into the household expenses. If there's one spouse who stays home and the other one works, guess what? Whenever I get an “allowance”, then Jim will get an allowance too. Because he's just taking care of the needs of the family if I'm taking care of the needs of the business. I believe in that equity of it all. But I also believe in the ability to have freedom. So a little account on the side, one in my name, one in his, and that shared percentage of everyone's paycheck might go in or shared amount. Because sometimes you want to surprise your spouse, and if it's just on one Amex, ooh. Or maybe there's one of the partners that just loves to run up a credit card, just can't say no. But you've got to sit down and you've got to talk about it here and there. Is that the responsibility of the other spouse from their little personal account? Probably not. But these are the rules that you set. So is there a hard and fast rule? No.

Many of us who come into blended families come from divorce, and many times finances was an issue. Or maybe that's why you're not even married, who knows? So by having that joint account, there's nothing to hide. Both of you can log in at the same time. So do I like joint accounts? I do. Do I like having your personal account so you can love up on somebody else and have some freedoms for yourself? I do. Many of my clients actually have rules like, anything over $500 we have to ask, and anything under $500 we can run. Now my husband would go and do two separate charges, both under $500. But he'd be like, I didn't break any rules. It's funny. But I'm not going to say that there's nothing psychological about having things separate. It's a trust issue many times, a transparency issue.

Yes, that's what I'm hearing. You're really reiterating that open communication, whether or not it's joint accounts or a hybrid of some sort, that really this discussion and this willingness to work together from a place of clarity or being in contact. I mean, really when we talk about care, it's being in contact with, it's being in touch with, and it's helping it be successful, and that takes a level of attention. I also recognize when people are struggling with this, there can be people, and this probably hearkens back a little bit to what you were saying about money beliefs or hiding or withholding or feeling shame about what they've spent. Even as it goes as far as betrayal, like financial betrayals or secrets and those types of things. When we aren't in contact, these things can really get out of control at times. So really having this intentionality can really be supportive, and also brings more awareness to our behaviors that do a touchback to what we're believing and what we're thinking.

It's a big part of it. We're talking about how do we have these discussions right now, how do we get started? Let's fast-forward to those long-term goals, like retirement and things like that. Again, it all trickles down. How much do we save now for this long-term goal of retirement? Sometimes it's not even a goal to have to. Maybe you both can't keep working after 75 and longevity is in your future. So you're going to laugh, your grandma was 99. Is that what you said? That's a long time to support yourself, wow. So we do have to think about that, because it's saving today that's going to help us for that long life in retirement. Those are those goal-based conversations that should not happen when we're figuring out the day-to-day transactions, savings plan, net worth, where are we, where are the accounts? Save that one for another time. But you might be over-saving for the goals you have in retirement, so you could be living a better quality of life right now. Or you could be significantly under-saving, or one spouse is putting in more and the other spouse is putting in less, and you both think you're putting in everything together. Who knew?

Those are discussions that do have to happen, because it's decisions we make today that are going to help with those long-term retirement goals. I'm going to keep working. I love what I do. I came late to the game, because this is my second career in life. Because it's finances, I could keep doing it, even if maybe it's harder to get up and walking in the morning. I could probably still be a pretty effective financial planner at 75. I'll keep going. My husband was a carpenter, still is. His body's been beaten up, and he's gonna probably be out before 60. Well, wait, what quality of life is he living from 60 to 75, while I'm still going to the office every day? We have to talk about that. What does that look like, and what's our access to funds at that point in time? That's a big conversation.

Absolutely, I'm glad you mentioned that. I have clients that she worked, I think a whole 10 years longer than her husband. It sounds like he thinks they talked, she didn't think they talked as clearly, and she had some resentment about what she contributed and what he was able to experience in that early retirement. So these conversations are very important. So for the couples that are looking at partnering, you had asked about what if they're thinking about getting partnered, anything you want to say as far as the couples that maybe aren't fully together yet in the committed marriage or life partnership way?

I always just say, sometimes having a general idea is okay. You don't have to, like, it was a phrase somebody used to use when I first became a financial planner, don't spill all your candy in the foyer. I'm sure I'm getting it wrong, but it was when people would be selling candy. Am I getting that right?

I don't remember the exact phrase you're thinking of, but I know the concept of you don't want to give it all away.

Yeah, so it's a general idea. It's okay a year and a half into a relationship, if you don't think marriage is imminent or that you're going to be moving in together, because those things are financial obligations. If you're just like, we are good, and I think we could take this to the next level, that might be at a six-month mark, who knows. But it's okay to say I've been working hard and I'm really happy with what I have saved for retirement, I'm not worried. Right there, done. Very different than: You know what, divorce was really hard on me, so I have three choices. I can work longer, I can spend less in retirement, or I can start saving more. I pick which one I want to do. Same thing. So you walk away knowing she's all right, and this one has a little work to do, so things are going tight. That's all you need, and that's okay. Allow yourself to do that. Also be very wary of somebody who asks too many questions about finances, about are you okay, or can I see your bank account, or we should go jointly on that house? Be very, very careful. Very, very careful.

Okay, I'm sure you can say a lot more about that. Well, one of the things that you help people have different associations with is the prenups or the prenuptial agreements. What would you like to say there as far as how that can be a supportive tool rather than just a negative thing that people have stigma around?

Yeah, a lot of people have stigma around it for many reasons. A lot of what we've seen in movies, and some of it is religious values. Some of it is just, I can't believe they're already thinking that the marriage is going to end before we even started, because they've been divorced or anything of the sort. Almost like sitting down and saying, this is my estate documents, these are my life insurance, this is what I have. It is clarifying on paper, what did we come to this relationship with, and what are we agreeing upon moving forward? Many times when we are older in relationships, we do have extended family to protect. Somebody might still have an alimony obligation to another spouse, child support, which again, you cannot waive a child's right to child support. You cannot claim it, but you can't waive the right. Someone else can come back in. It's not really a negotiation tool. So remember that as you move forward. Again, I'm not a lawyer, just from seeing what happens with my own clients. 

My husband and I have a prenup. What was mine when I came to the marriage? What was his when he came to the marriage? What are we growing together with this business, and what's his rights to the business should something happen? What's the rights if it was divorce? What's the rights to my kids if it's death? These are things that we make decisions on. Then, do we need extending documents to support that? Do I need a continuity plan, a succession plan? We're getting into it. These things layer the cake. But at least to have the instructions. That's all it is. But the prenups can be hard. I always say, make sure that you have a lawyer, one for him, one for her. These lawyers could be good friends too. Be like, this is an easy one. It might just cost you $150 if you guys all play nice in the sandbox, let's go. It's not war, it's not sides. It's clarity. It's open communication. It's putting it on a piece of paper and witnessing it. That's it.

It sounds like this can be evolving, if there's some way in which your intention as you set out in your relationship, and then circumstances change, and then you can renegotiate that. Is that right? But it's an expression.

It's postnup. You do postnups too, it's all there. Really, it's mine, yours, ours, theirs.

Wonderful. Well, Donna Jean, thank you so much for everything you're offering. Is there anything you wanted to say that we haven't gotten to?

I just think if anyone wants that Personal Document Locator, they can go to DonnaJeanKendrick.com, it's there. It's a free resource. There's also a webinar, a little less than an hour, to teach you how to use it. Pop up the computer, sit down at the dining room table, get a sitter for the kids, and start filling it out. That's that. Spend an hour. Have some snacks, have some wine. Just do it. Easy.

I love that. So you're inviting people to come to your website. You have a document locator. You have a webinar that will support people around how to use it. Are there other ways that people can work with you?

Definitely. So you can follow me on social media. We actually have an eight week course for widows to get their finances in order. I own my own practice for financial planning, that's Sephton Financial. That is my maiden name, named after my dad, Mr. Blue Collar, who said his name would never be on a wall or on a door. It did, Dad. So that's SephtonFinancial.com. I also wrote two books. One's called A Guide to Widowhood, and one's A Guide to Blended Family. Both of those books, if you go to DonnaJeanKendrick.com, the resources, that net worth, how to figure out your spending plan, conversations to have when interviewing a financial advisor, they're all available there. So go ahead and download those resources. You don't have to recreate the wheel, there's a guide on how to do it. So I recommend everyone go there.

Well, thank you for making all of that so accessible in the work that you're doing. I'll make sure to have all of the links on today's show notes. You also mentioned the podcast, I'll put that link on today's show notes as well.

Appreciate that. Thank you so much.

Thank you.