For business owners, personal financial planning often comes second to the needs of the company.

If you can relate to this hierarchy of priorities, you may have often struggled to find time to look at your personal finances in depth, let alone make proactive plans for the future. Yet, overlooking your personal wealth plans, particularly if you are approaching retirement, could harm your financial stability later on.

One aspect of personal wealth that many business owners do not consider is their spouse’s money. There are several sets of circumstances here that mean you could benefit from bespoke financial planning:

• You earn significantly more than your spouse
• You employ your spouse
• You are both high earners in different fields.

Let’s take a look at why couples’ financial planning could be so effective for both you as a business owner, and for your spouse.

Couples’ financial planning leads to close consideration of your combined tax burden

You are probably already well aware of your personal tax burden as a business owner. If you are paying yourself a salary, making pension contributions, and saving outside of your pension for retirement, you may be keeping a close eye on how much tax you’re paying each year.

But if your spouse works, whether they are a high earner or not, thinking about how much combined tax you pay may be more useful than tackling your tax burdens separately.

The benefits of this strategy may include:

• Sharing key tax-efficient allowances and reducing your overall liability where possible
• Creating a combined plan for disposing of taxable assets in the coming years.

Putting together a wealth strategy (with the help of an expert) that leverages both you and your spouse’s tax breaks, incomes, pensions, and investments could strengthen your financial stability and help you gain more from your finances.

Aligning your retirement plans makes for a more efficient transition into the next chapter

If you are approaching the sale of your business, plan to pass the reins to a family member, or are thinking of winding up the business entirely, there could be huge advantages in involving your spouse in these plans.

If your spouse works for you, they may have their own retirement timeline in mind – they might plan to stay on under new leadership, or find new employment when you retire.

Or, you could intend to facilitate a simultaneous retirement, meaning that you both plan to stop working and enjoy retirement on the same timeline.

In either case, retiring as a business owner is a step that may require years of careful planning. If you do intend to sell up, you may receive a significant windfall, and if your spouse has their own pension pot and other retirement savings, you could both be drawing from significant sources of wealth at the same time.

For this reason, looking at your retirement plans as a pair may help tremendously. With the assistance of a financial planner, you and your spouse could:

• Figure out which “pots” of wealth to draw from first, and which you could leave to remain invested for as long as possible
• Take an honest look at your retirement timelines and discuss how to join them up if needed
• Measure your prospective retirement income, and ensure it is sustainable for your entire retirement
• Make exciting plans for retirement, including travelling the world or spending more time with your family.

Aligning your plans could make for a smooth transition into the next chapter of both your lives, and help to avoid costly financial decisions down the line.

You and your spouse could benefit from greater peace of mind

Whether you’re not yet retired or about to take this leap, managing your personal finances closely is essential for business owners. Involving your spouse in the financial planning journey may seem like another task to add to your long to-do list, but in fact, this could bring greater peace of mind in the long run.

While you are in your career years, taking both tax burdens into account could make for greater efficiency in this area. And once you retire, it’s important to look at whether your combined funds will be enough to create the life you want in the next two, three, or even four decades.

As such, couples’ financial planning could provide one thing money cannot buy: peace of mind. You’ll both know that your finances are being overseen by a professional who has your family’s best interests at heart.

Get in touch to work with a financial planner as a couple

If you are a business owner who wishes to approach financial planning with your spouse’s wealth in mind too, get in touch with us today.

Email us at clients@iqf.ie, or call 353 71 915 5560.

Please note

This article is for information only. It does not constitute investment advice.

It describes financial planning services that iQ Financial can offer to you. Financial planning services are not regulated by the Central Bank of Ireland.

iQ Financial is not a tax adviser and tax advisory services are not regulated by the Central Bank of Ireland.