Same-sex couples
Thanks to the Supreme Court decision legalizing same-sex marriage nationwide on June 26, 2015, same-sex couples now face simpler financial planning that makes it easier to jointly own assets, inherit assets, and file taxes. Their notion of a dependent is no longer unique.
Nonetheless, establishing trusts and making an estate plan provide extra protection through clear legal documentation, especially in states that are still fighting against the law.
And same-sex couples that consist of two high-earning professionals may need extra help investing their money wisely.
What else is still different about financial planning for same-sex couples?
Because they are not guided by the traditional relationship mores, they have to make big decisions about how intertwined they want to be with one another from a financial perspective.
Even life partners can have a hard time comingling their finances because some people are very protective about their money. One partner might want to plan as if their money is one, and the other might want to approach assets as being individually owned.
One of the most common pieces of advice is that aren’t married is to consider marriage for the sake of love, and nothing else. When finances become a part of the marriage decision-making factor, it almost never works. In fact, if love wasn’t a part of marriage, the advice would generally be to stay unmarried for the sake of finances. Managing individual investment portfolios simplifies tax implications, investment decisions, income distributions, et cetera.
In next blogpost, we will discuss Multigenerational families.