You and your spouse may have opened up various joint financial accounts when you were married. You could have a shared checking account where you both receive your paychecks, for example, or a shared investment account where you deposit your extra funds to grow wealth over time.
It is important to close these accounts during the divorce, and there are two main reasons. First, some people will try to hide assets during a divorce. They could do this by transferring money to a business or to a family member, for example. Keeping these shared accounts open increases the odds that this will occur.
Secondly, divorce will likely take months, so you will get more paychecks while the process plays out. You and your spouse will likely have separated at this time, so you want those paychecks to go directly to you, and you do not want your spouse to have access to them.
Make sure you do it properly
One important thing to keep in mind, though, is that you need to take all the right steps to close the account. You often can’t do it online or on the phone. Instead, the two of you have to go to the physical bank location together and close the account.
The reason things are done this way is to ensure that both of you are on the same page. If you closed the account without your spouse and took all of the money out of it, for instance, then your spouse may accuse you of trying to hide assets – even if that’s not what you intended.
As such, it’s critical that you know exactly what options you have and what steps to take during a divorce.