10 Ways to Achieve Marital and Financial Bliss

By Lou Carlozo

Insert chirping-bird and flute sounds here: Valentine’s Day is upon us, a time when thechocolates fly, the mushy poems lie, and investors in love decide how much they’ll buy. From each other, that is.
As a force of irrational exuberance even former Fed Chairman Alan Greenspan cannot explain, love is indeed too often blind when it comes time to unite portfolios and pool finances. Think of it like an investor who pours money into a pet stock without taking time to check the numbers. And here’s one statistic that cannot be ignored when it comes to couples and their money: Half of marriages still end in divorce.
“Financial issues consistently are among the top reasons why marriages fail; complex emotions are tied to money,” says Stephen T. Diltz, senior financial advisor and senior vice president of Diltz Schroeder & Associates of Merrill Lynch, located in the Chicago area. “Whatever a couple’s biases, hopes and expectations are about money, they should commit to the responsibility of open and regular dialogue at the time they combine their finances.”

1. Newlyweds: It’s time to get fresh.
2. An advisor swan song: Breaking up is hard to do. 
3. Tricks of taking love to the bank.
4. Your better half may have a worse half.
5. Speak now or forever hold your pieces.
6. Re-marrieds with children: Don’t kid around.
7. One time to say yup to the prenup.
8. True love has its limits.
9. Spenders and savers need mediators.
10. Make goals the goal.

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