Tips To Organize Your Finances After Your Spouse Dies

Tips To Organize Your Finances After Your Spouse Dies

To organize your finances is probably the last thing on your mind after your spouse passed away. According to an article published in Psychology Today, the bereavement that follows a spousal death is a great source of stress. It can leave to problems like chronic stress and depression. It is actually enough to lead a widower to her immature death.

While you may not be in the best mental and emotional state to fix your finances, it may just be what you need to avoid drowning in your grief. If you have children, they need you to be strong for them. They will look to their mother for support, and you cannot afford to be incapacitated right now.

If you want to pull yourself together, you may want to organize your finances. This will help keep your mind off what you just lost and will help you look towards the future – which is something that can hopefully motivate you to move forward.

What to do when your spouse dies

To make things easier, here are the steps that you need to do from the moment your spouse passes away.

• Get a copy of the death certificate and marriage.

These are important documents that will help you with the activities that you need to attend to in the coming months.

• Notify the insurance company.

If applicable, you should notify the company where your husband got a life insurance. This will allow them to start processing the release of any claims that you or your children are entitled to receive. At the very least, this money can help you pay for the expenses associated with the burial or cremation of your spouse.

• Find out if your spouse left a will.

If your husband is young and his death unexpected, it is unlikely that he left you a will. But it pays to check first. What you can do is to get a “Grant of Registration” from the Probate Registry. If your spouse left you a will, you will get a “Grant of Probate” for the executor who was named in the Will. On the other hand, the “Grant of Letters of Administration” is for the administrator or next kin of the deceased. In this case, it will be you since you are the spouse. You can find more details from the Hong Kong Judiciary The important thing is to legalize the distribution of the estates and financial affairs left by your spouse.

• Find out if you qualify for benefits.

There are certain benefits that you can get when your spouse dies. For instance, you may be qualified to receive an insurance benefit sponsored by the company as part of your husband’s employment. If your husband was receiving a pension or financial support from the government, that might be passed on to you. Ask the department involved seeing if you can transfer the benefits under your name – or at least your children.

• Get in touch with financial institutions, like banks, credit card companies, etc.

If your spouse had bank accounts, credit cards, and other accounts under his name – get in touch with these companies or organizations. You want to let them know that your spouse is gone and that the accounts should be closed off. If there is a balance that needs to be paid, you may want to use the estate left by your spouse to cover these payments.

• Cancel subscriptions.

Finally, if your husband subscribed to anything – make sure you cancel these. You might be charged for these even if nobody in your house is using it anyway.

These are only some of the things that you need to work on to organize your finances after the death of your spouse. Work on each task one at a time. You will see that somehow, by closing these accounts and taking care of your husband’s financial affairs, you will find closure.

Tips to financially move on after the death of a loved one

While it is normal for you to grieve the loss of your husband, make sure that you do not dwell on it. According to the data from Harvard.edu, those who lost a spouse have a higher risk of getting a heart attack or a stroke. That is how dangerous emotional stress can be.

It may seem impossible to live without your husband, but you have no choice about the matter. This is especially true if you have children. They will need you now more than ever. One of the important things that you need to ensure is your financial stability. You are now a single mother. You need to take on the burden of financially providing for the family. Here are some tips that you can follow to make this easier to do.

• Decide what to do with what your spouse left behind.

If your spouse left you anything, you need to decide how to use that so you can secure the future of your kids. In case your husband left you a will, or if you got a claim from the life insurance, you might want to use that to get yourself a bigger insurance. Remember, there will be none left in case something happens to you. It is important that you make arrangements for your kids.

• Analyze your income.

You need to check your income if it is enough to support your family. Although you are smaller now, being the sole breadwinner will change things for the family.

• Create a new budget.

Once you have considered your current financial position and your source of income, it is time to create a budget plan that will incorporate all the changes in your life. The bottom line is that you have to make sure your income is enough for all your expenses. If that means you need to change your lifestyle – then do it. There is no sense in continuing with your lifestyle if you can no longer afford it.

The death of your spouse will bring a lot of changes in your life – that is a fact. But that change does not have to be too devastating as long as you organize your finances so it adapts to the loss of your loved one.