Disclaimer: Duly registered and duly licensed financial professionals offer securities through Equitable Advisors, LLC (NY, NY 212-314-4600), member FINRA, SIPC (Equitable Financial Advisors in MI & TN); offer investment advisory products and services through Equitable Advisors, LLC, an SEC-registered investment advisor; and offer annuity and insurance products through Equitable Network, LLC (Equitable Network Insurance Agency of California, LLC; Equitable Network Insurance Agency of Utah, LLC; Equitable Network of Puerto Rico, Inc.).Equitable Advisors and Equitable Network are affiliates and do not offer tax or legal advice or services.

Professionals holding the CDFA® credential must follow strict ethical rules and practice standards. This designation is not a license to practice law, as they are not permitted to give legal advice.

Well Lived Wealth is not owned or operated by Equitable Advisors or Equitable Network. PPG- 9009031.1(7/26)(Exp.7/30)

Episode 146

In this episode of the Texas Family Law Insiders Podcast, Holly Draper sits down with Molly Ward, a certified financial planner and certified divorce financial analyst (CDFA) and founder of Well Lived Wealth in Houston, to talk about why financial engagement — not just financial literacy — determines how well someone comes through a divorce. Molly shares her own divorce story and explains how the CDFA credential complements a family lawyer’s work by translating the legal process into a concrete financial roadmap: Can I keep the house? Will I be okay? What does my life actually look like now?

The conversation centers on Strangers by Belle Burden, whose account of “financial disengagement” in marriage — becoming what Molly calls a “financial ostrich” or “financial hostage” — mirrors what Molly and Holly both see in practice. They discuss the slow slide from financial co-pilot to passenger, why it disproportionately affects women, and practical takeaways for family lawyers: red flags to watch for at intake, when to loop in a CDFA, and how the book has fueled renewed interest in prenups (the “Burden Bump”).

In This Episode, You’ll Discover:

-What a CDFA is and how it differs from a CFP

-The “financial ostrich” and “financial hostage” patterns Molly sees in her practice

-Why each spouse should have their own CDFA

-How Belle Burden’s book Strangers illustrates the slow slide into disengagement

-Molly’s take on prenups and postnups, and the “trigger clause

-When and how family lawyers should loop in a CDFA

Mentioned in this episode:

• Texas Family Law
• CDFA
• CFP
• Financial Disengagement
• Strangers
• Belle Burden
• Prenuptial
• Stay at Home Mom
• Agency

Transcript

Disclaimer: Duly registered and duly licensed financial professionals offer securities through Equitable Advisors LLC, member FINRA, SIPC. Offer investment advisory products and services through Equitable Advisors LLC, an SEC-registered investment advisor, and offer annuity and insurance products through Equitable Network LLC.

Equitable Advisors and Equitable Network are affiliates and do not offer tax or legal advice or services. Professionals holding the CDFA credential must follow strict ethical rules and practice standards. This designation is not a license to practice law, as they are not permitted to give legal advice.

Well Lived Wealth is not owned or operated by Equitable Advisors or Equitable Network.

Molly Ward: Because most people that, or most clients think that they do have a financial planner or financial advisor, but it’s usually just an investment guy, not, not somebody looking at the whole picture and what will my life look like after the divorce?

Announcer: You’re listening to the Texas Family Law Insiders Podcast, your source for the latest news and trends in family law in the state of Texas. Now, here’s your host, Attorney Holly Draper

Holly Draper: Welcome everyone to the Texas Family Law Insiders podcast. Today, I’m excited to welcome Molly Reese Ward, a certified financial planner and certified divorce financial analyst, the founder of Well Lived Wealth in Houston, Texas. With more than 25 years of experience, Molly is known for her calm, holistic approach to guiding women through life’s biggest financial transactions.

Thank you so much for joining me today.

Molly Ward: Thank you. I’m excited to be here.

Holly Draper: So why don’t you start by just telling us a little bit about yourself?

Molly Ward: Yeah, sure. I am a mom of three in Houston, Texas. I grew up here, was born here, raised here. My grandparents lived about four blocks away, and all my cousins were here, so definitely a Houston native and very much part of the community.

I love to volunteer and I love to hike mountains. I just finished my 10th 14,000-foot mountain, uh, a couple of weeks ago. I love to be active and just involved in my kids’ life. My youngest just graduated from high school, so I’m about to be an empty nester.

Holly Draper: My oldest just graduated from high school, so-

Molly Ward: Oh, cheers

Holly Draper: it’s a little behind you.

Molly Ward: Yeah.

Holly Draper: Yes. So I know that you focus a lot on helping women specifically, and also women maybe going through divorce or some other life transition. Talk a little bit about why you have chosen to focus in that area.

Molly Ward: Yeah. It’s a moment in time that’s a very difficult season, the divorce, or it could be the death of a spouse or a job loss or a medical thing with your family.

There’s all these seasons that I see that hardworking moms and brilliant businesswomen face. But really the big why is, is what happened on Thanksgiving Day 2015, and what happened on that day was I was at my parents’ house with my three kids. At the time, they were 15, 13 and 7, and the table was set. The turkey was made, just smelled delicious.

Everybody was waiting to eat, and I got a text message from my husband of 20 years, and it said, “I’m out looking for an apartment. I want a divorce.” So that moment I was stunned, shocked, but I had to be brave. My kids were there. I didn’t want to alarm them. I didn’t want to alarm my parents or the other guests, and so slapped a smile on my face during that Thanksgiving dinner.

And then inevitably the divorce happened, and when I went through that process, I had already been a certified financial planner for 20 years, but what was very eye-opening was the process and how important my financial planning background was in that process. That was simple for me. The money side of it was simple, but the trauma and the way that life is at that moment in time is so fragile.

And I thought to myself, “What would a woman, uh, or a man, going through this difficult season do without the extensive financial planning background that I had?” And I’d already been a plan- CFP for 20 years. This usually, the divorce, is usually the largest financial transaction of somebody’s life. And so that’s when, that moment when I thought to myself, “I don’t see how other people do this without this extensive background that I have,” that’s when I decided to get my CDFA and really devote Well Lived Wealth to helping women have the confidence and clarity in their finances.

That became our mission here. I guess I should say thank you to my dear wasband, that’s what I like to call him, my dear wasband, for that, that Turkey Day surprise.

Holly Draper: So most of our listeners are attorneys that do family law, but for any of them that don’t know, can you explain what a CDFA is, how one comes to obtain that, and what makes someone with a CDFA different than someone that’s just a certified financial planner?

Molly Ward: Yeah, good question. A certified financial planner is a very important designation in this field. It’s highly recommended to engage somebody that does have that CFP, and then when you overlap it with the CDFA, the certified divorce financial analyst, that’s tremendously helpful for people going through a divorce or thinking about a divorce.

The divorce process, as you know, is a, it is a process, but it’s a moment in time And again, it’s the largest financial transaction in most people’s lives, and what’s happening is that they’re taking this one financial life and they’re making it into two. So that’s two separate financial investment strategies, income strategies, risk management, insurance strategies.

Everything has changed now. And so the CDFA, you know, that’s gonna have ripples forever. And so a CDFA can come in before the divorce and let the person know all those questions that they have. Can I keep the house? What about my income? You know, am I gonna be okay? And what’s really cool too is a CDFA can work for that client, with that client for the rest of their lifetime.

So it’s really neat to see somebody transform after the divorce. You know, we’re working with them years later

Holly Draper: I know a lot of people who come into a divorce, they may or may not have a financial advisor that they’ve been working with with their spouse.

Molly Ward: Mm-hmm.

Holly Draper: But why is it important for that, and we’re usually talking about women here, that don’t understand-

Molly Ward: Mm-hmm

Holly Draper: the financial picture, haven’t really been involved, why do you think it’s important for them to get somebody just for them, like a certified divorce financial analyst, as they’re going through the divorce process, instead of relying on the person that has been working also with their spouse?

Molly Ward: Well, that’s a good question.

You know, it, it seems like everybody and their brother calls themselves a financial planner or a financial advisor, and so that’s kind of the first thing I think about is, is this person that they’re already working with really looking at planning? Because most people that, or most clients think that they do have a financial planner or financial advisor, but it’s usually just an investment guy, not, not somebody looking at the whole picture, and what w- will my life look like after the divorce?

So that’s a, a point of clarity there that I would want that person to know. So that’s a real big reason why is ’cause most people don’t do planning. They don’t do real, “Can I keep the house?” type of questions. “Am I gonna be okay? What do I need? Do I need to get a job?” They’re, they’re talking about hot investments, not really, “What does this all mean to me and my livelihood?”

So I think that’s why it’s really important to engage a CFP, CDFA for, for these people that are going through a divorce, to see what their life looks like.

Holly Draper: Well, is someone who has represented, for lack of a better word, both spouses-

Molly Ward: Mm-hmm

Holly Draper: … as a financial planner going to have conflicts come up if they try and advise one spouse or the other about whether or not they can keep the house, and which of these assets should they be focusing on, and what does it mean if they get this retirement versus this investment account, et cetera?

Molly Ward: Yeah. There would be a conflict there if they weren’t talking to both spouses at the same time. That would be difficult if the current financial advisor is talking to one and not the other, and so that’s why you would wanna engage somebody brand new.

Holly Draper: Right. So for family law attorneys, what are some things that we can look for in our clients that maybe suggest we should be encouraging them to reach out to somebody like you, or we should be connecting them with somebody like you?

Molly Ward: I think the family law attorneys reaching out, you know, I, I often wonder, like, why, why aren’t we working on this more together from, from the beginning or at least, you know, partway through when most all the financial information is available? I think the, the combination of what y’all know and what we know is so powerful to the client.

And, I mean, each case varies, right? Some people come to us before they’re think- before they come to the attorney and, because they want to know what their life looks like if they go through the divorce. And that’s a huge question, especially on people’s mind, especially women, and I’ll use this term, that have either been a financial ostrich or a financial hostage, ’cause they don’t know.

Holly Draper: I haven’t heard either of those expressions before. What do you mean by that?

Molly Ward: Well, I know we’re going to probably talk about this later, but the book, Strangers, the Belle Burden book, it speaks to what you do and what I do, and it speaks to this

Holly Draper: kind of…

Molly Ward: I mean, those are words that I came up with because that’s what we see.

They’re, they’re either a financial hostage where they just are, and it could be from their own tuning out, or it could be control from the other spouse. And then the ostrich is, is kind of the tuning out. You know, she’s chosen to tune out. Do you mind if I, if I just read a, a paragraph from, from the book about this?

Holly Draper: Sure, absolutely.

Molly Ward: Okay. ‘Cause this is what I’m talking about. So this is from Strangers by Belle Burden, and she, she talks about it in this way.

She says, “I paid our bills online and signed our tax returns, but slowly I lost touch with both the big picture and details of our financial life, depending on James to tell me what to do. I felt some shame in it, that, some shame about it, about not being involved, about not asking questions, but I was afraid I wouldn’t understand it, that it was too complicated for me, even though I was a former corporate lawyer. I settled into the vagueness, the luxury and privilege of not knowing, and part of me liked it, the handing over. James’s care for our money felt like his contribution to our family, the way he showed his love and commitment to me and the kids. There was something romantic about it, too. The smart and honorable man, the devoted husband and father, shouldering this part of our life. I had my own bucket of responsibility, the kids, their school, the meals, the homework, the bedtimes. So it made sense that he would take on our finances. We were dividing and conquering.”

So, you know, it’s not something that is one day, “Hey, I’m gonna tune out.” It is a slow slipping of that muscle or that autonomy or that clarity or agency, whatever you want to call it.

Holly Draper: So, this was a topic that you had brought to me for this podcast, is to, to discuss this book, Strangers, by Belle Burden.

And when you first brought that up, I didn’t have any idea what it was, what it was about, anything like that. So I started to look into it, and-

Molly Ward: Mm-hmm

Holly Draper: … it definitely aligns so closely with the stance that I have very publicly taken against the choice to become a stay-at-home mother. And I see people in Facebook moms groups three times a day, you know, “I haven’t worked in 20 years.

I have no money. My spouse makes all the money.” Yeah. “My spouse is cheating on me. I can’t go to work because daycare is too expensive. What do I do?” And, you know, I try and… And Texas is not a good place to be a stay-at-home mother.

Molly Ward: You’re right.

Holly Draper: Or a stay-at-home father, but the reality is that men generally don’t make that decision.

It is the women who are choosing to do that. And, you know, people will kind of come at me for my position of, this is a horrible decision for, you know, you don’t value mothers, you don’t, you know, my marriage is never gonna end that way, my, you know, this is what’s best for my family. And so why did this book speak to you so much, and why do you think this is important for women to understand?

Molly Ward: I’ll speak to that, but I’m, I’m curious about how you started down that path of being vocal about that.

Holly Draper: I think it came hand in hand with being a family lawyer and with seeing so many women’s lives completely devastated by divorce. Yes. And nobody, you know, any mother who has held that new baby has had- Mm

the exact same thought about how, “I cannot leave this baby at daycare. How am I-” Right … gonna go back to work?” And we’ve all been there, but, you know, some of us go one path, and some of us go the other at that life-changing point in our lives. And seeing these women who have given up a career, have, you know, the longer you’re out of that career, the l- less chance you have to get back into it, and the less earning capacity that you have.

And watching judges tell people that, you know, spousal maintenance is based upon your earning capacity, your ability to earn a living, and unless you have some disability or some reason that you are not capable of earning a living, we’re not gonna give you spousal maintenance, or we’re not gonna give it to you for long.

And most of you aren’t even gonna qualify to begin with. But even if you qualify, good luck getting it. And, you know, realizing that being capable of getting a job does not mean that you can get a job, because these people who have been out of the workforce for 10, 15, 20 years cannot get a well-paying job.

Right. Even though they’re physically and mentally capable of it, the reality is that they can’t, and the law in Texas does not reconcile that in a way that is favorable to stay-at-home moms. Also- Just being- I have a daughter. Yes. And, you know, over, she’s 18 now, but over the years of having her grow up, I mean, it has just been, it started of just preaching to her, “You do not make that decision.”

Yeah. “I don’t care who you marry, how, he can be the most wonderful person in the world, he can be, have brought millions of dollars into this relationship, I don’t care. You always have to be able to support yourself.” And there’s- Yes … so many reasons for that.

Molly Ward: Yeah. I, I think you and I see the same thing of the person that’s not earning the income, usually the wife, and, and what life looks like her after the divorce versus the husband, who usually still has a high income, and it’s two totally different, um…

We have women that come in here, too, that do have high incomes, and after the divorce, their scenario looks very different than the person that doesn’t. Uh, but yeah, I couldn’t say it better than you, Holly. I have the same value and thinking, and it’s so important to be with your kids, but we see this, we see this other side of it that can be a burden on the children later, and a dependency on them perhaps if…

I mean, that’s one of the things that they’ll say to us during the divorce, and especially after the divorce when we get into the actual planning of what their life looks like, they’ll say, “I don’t want to be a burden to my children.” And so we’ve gotta figure that out for the future, is how they’re not going to be…

You know, you’re always a mom, even if your kids are, you know, 40 or 50, so…

Holly Draper: Most stay-at-home moms, I tend to think, got into that position because life is wonderful, they have this amazing spouse, they have this new baby, they think they can afford it, or they’re gonna s- they think it’s too expensive to send the child to daycare, so this is what makes better financial sense in their minds.

Yeah. And they don’t ever think it’s going to land in divorce. But the thing, the surprising thing for me is when I see women who chose to stay home because they thought it was going to save their marriage. Oh. And I’m like, “What in the world were you thinking to… You just made your situation so much worse when and if that day comes,” and they’re just caught in that moment of, “I’m going to do whatever I can to try and not get divorced.”

Molly Ward: Yeah.

Holly Draper: And you can only do so much on your side. You cannot stop the other person from divorcing you.

Molly Ward: You know, we have seen some good outcomes for some of the stay-at-home moms, but they are usually, there, there’s a high enough net worth there. There’s still, it’s still very difficult, and it’s still financially very difficult to get their head around it.

But if they have been engaged in the finances, not just a participant, but an engaged person, then they, they do have a different outcome, ’cause they haven’t lost that engagement the whole time and slowly let that fall through their fingers, of their finances. They have stayed in tune with them. So that stay-at-home mom versus the stay-at-home mom that let that all slide and slip away are also two different people divorcing.

Holly Draper: And we often see, you know, women get stuck in bad marriages because they don’t have, they don’t know about the finances, they don’t have any control of the finances. They know they can’t make any money if they leave. So that’s kind of the other piece of it is, so many times, by the time these women actually are in a divorce, it’s because the other side is the one who finally pulled the trigger.

Molly Ward: Yeah. Yeah.

Holly Draper: And now they’re really up a creek without a paddle.

Molly Ward: Right.

Holly Draper: We never know what’s gonna happen, you know? You see that on a day-to-day basis. I see it on a day-to-day basis. Sure. So our antenna is up, uh, on the risk with, with what can happen. And it’s not just divorce, but people’s spouses dying unexpectedly-

Molly Ward: That’s right

Holly Draper: at a young age. Yeah. People have heart attacks. Yes. People are in car accidents. People have life-altering injuries, and I think the reason to be in-the-know on the finances, to stay in the workforce, you know, they apply equally for the risk of any of those things.

Molly Ward: Yeah. Yeah. I, I agree.

Announcer: This episode of the Texas Family Law Insiders Podcast is sponsored by the Draper Law Firm, providing family law appellate representation for non-parent custody cases, jurisdiction issues, property division, standing, conservatorship, possession and access, termination, parental rights, and grandparent access.

For more information, visit draperfirm.com or call 469-715-6801.

Holly Draper: So talk a little bit about the concept of agency and what that looks like for women in these situations.

Molly Ward: I’ll tell you a, a story about a woman that I met about 15 years ago, and she, um… This is a story of agency or, or lack of agency. They were in an airport.

She and her husband were in an airport on the East Coast. They were flying back to Houston, and he died. He passed away in the, in the airport lounge all of a sudden. And she had to come back home. They had three kids here, all school age. They had a very comfortable life. Their net worth was over $30 million.

And so she gets back and there was a business that was being run, and the business, uh, perfect storm, it started doing horribly. Horribly. And it’s a coincidence of market conditions, real estate market conditions, stock market conditions, and then there’s a big loan outstanding. And so long story short, she went from over $30 million to a negative net worth, right? Very quickly after the death.

And she told me, you know, I will never forget it. It was probably 15 years ago. I was married and didn’t really have the same kind of view that I have now, and she’s crying on our couch telling me this story, and she said, “Don’t ever be dependent on a man.” And she didn’t say it in a way that was, you know, anti-men.

I’ll never forget it. She was in such a dark place because that loan, the lenders were coming to get the money, and she didn’t have it. So 10 years after that all, uh, transpired and she’s back on her feet again and doing well, I said, “What would you have done differently at that time?” And she said, “You know, I was involved with my husband.

We talked about investments. We talked about what we were doing with our money, but I would have made my own decisions on a lot of the investments.” So what she was saying was basically he was the pilot and she was the passenger. She was not a equal co-pilot. And so that’s where, you know, I think this agency thing is, is it slowly slips away, right?

Especially as women. They’re building their family. They’re building, they trust their husbands, as they should, but it’s, it’s during this building of life for very smart women that it, they stop reviewing the tax returns. They stop asking questions because it, it’s just easier, right? It doesn’t rock the boat, and they get r- I think that there, there are actually studies that back up that the more that a woman is quiet, you know, she does purposely become quiet because it’s, it’s just less friction and easier on the marriage.

But it’s- It’s just a slow slipping. Either they weren’t involved in the beginning, you know, and these questions were never talked about, or finances were never talked about before the marriage or in the beginning of the marriage, or they just slowly let it slip away with life, with kids getting busy and then just…

I mean, in the Belle Burden book, she was a corporate attorney. She wrote stock prospectuses. I mean, and she had the highest education level, Ivy League education, and she let it slip away. And that’s, and, and so what, about that, you know, that book and these women that come in here, they say the same exact things that she says, that they feel this shame about it, that they once knew it, but then it, it just, it left.

They’re disengaged. And it’s not like they don’t need to manage everything, you know? That’s not agency. I, I mean, it can be, but, but it’s, they’ve got to understand and have a real partnership of, like, financial transparency and… ‘Cause that, what you just brought up, you know, in a phone call, something can change, a diagnosis or, you know, one of those we-need-to-talk moments.

And, and when those happen, if you’re starting with agency already instead of ground zero, it’s, it’s going to make a difference in that trajectory.

Holly Draper: So tell us about the letter you wrote to The Wall Street Journal about this book, what prompted it, and what you wanted people to take away from it.

Molly Ward: Well, um, you know, this book just, it’s, it strikes such a chord, um, with

It mostly, it strikes a chord with married women because they, I guess they’re putting their, themselves in the shoes of Bellee Burton, who was seemingly happily married and never thought this would be coming, and one day it all, all fell apart. I started getting real curious about that question, about why, you know, why are women doing this?

Why aren’t they in a decision-making role in their marriage? Why have they gone from co-pilot back, back to being a passenger? And, and so I did a little bit of research and, and you know, thought about this question because they do all say the same thing, you know. They don’t say that they were, like, negligent or, or careless.

They’re just … And they own it. They say, “I did it to myself,” you know, “I wish I hadn’t let, let this go.” Um, it’s, and it’s not a financial literacy thing, and so that’s why I kept wondering why, why, why? Why do women do this? It’s not that they’re … They do have financial literacy. They just, uh, have withdrawn. And so there has to be a reason why we do this.

So that’s what, that’s what the article is about, is I want other women to question if they have done it, you know, how do I course correct, or how do I get back engaged? And asking these questions like, y- you know, why has this fallen from my, or slipped through my hands? So I did a little bit of research on some studies of, you know, gender norms and financial inclusion.

There’s one study by the World Bank that shows that women are routinely penalized socially and relationally for behavior perceived as controlling or redundant, even when that behavior improves outcomes. And it’s not an explicit, it’s not an explicit signal. You know, no one says, “Stop paying attention to the finances.”

It’s just this message that’s con- it’s like invisible rules or, or a tone. And so women learn quickly what keeps the peace, what keeps things pleasant. You know, this disengagement feels cooperative to a woman, and that’s what I wanted a reader to gain from this article, is to see if they identify that within themselves.

Holly Draper: One element that is discussed relates to prenups.

Molly Ward: Yeah.

Holly Draper: So talk to me a little about your position on prenups and what maybe family lawyers could take away from the lessons here, because a lot of us do draft prenups for people.

Molly Ward: Yeah, and there’s… I don’t know if you’ve seen this, uh, any articles on this, but there’s been something called the Burton Bump of increased interest in pre and postnups from this book So, when a client calls us and tells us that they’re getting married, you know, we’re very excited for them, we congratulate them.

Or, the parents might call us and tell them that one of their adult children’s getting married. We’re very excited, congratulate, but then we start thinking of all the risk. As you know, a marriage is a business partnership, and what that other partner is doing or not doing can sink the business or add to the business.

If that couple’s coming in to us, or the individual that’s getting married, we’re gonna start asking questions, you know, around money. And if it’s a couple, sometimes we’ll start asking money questions and they’ll say, “Well, we’ve never discussed this,” and they’re about to get married and tie their life together.

So that can be anything from, like, you know, what they think about sending their kids to college. What’s their philosophy on that? You know, they’ve never talked about these things. Well, that’s a huge financial commitment, as you know, and it can run the gamut of a few thousand dollars a year to almost $100,000 a year.

And so some couples aren’t having these conversations. The other thing that we start asking about is what, what money was like when they were growing up, and this is a big part of, I think- Where prenups and more healthy financial discussions can stem from is that what we grew up with and our money scripts, and these money scripts are in our heads by the time we’re five years old.

And so you probably have a way of looking at money that’s different than, than me, and different… You know, just because there’s been so many messages and life experiences, but there’s a real fun… you know, a very ingrained by the time we’re five of what our money scripts are. And, you know, that can be anything from spending to saving or risk to not, you know, not being risky, and n- none of them are…

You know, they’re not bad or good. They’re just, that’s the way we view things, and if you can know that about your spouse or soon-to-be spouse, it’s gonna help when things get tricky down the road, and probably help through some of these money conversations and the prenup, and there’s a lot of resistance to it.

But I think what you brought up earlier is th- these conversations about, “Hey, are you gonna… After we have kids, are, is one of us gonna stay home?” You know, you don’t talk about that. And so that, there’s been a… That’s what has been another article that’s been lately because of this book is the trigger clause if that, if one of the spouses decides to stay home.

So, you know, with us, we, we’re not executing the document. We’re suggesting it and, and saying, “Hey, you really should do this,” and, and getting into a little bit of the psychology of money so that the couple, when they’re in these days when the things are good, you know, the salad days, um, it’s just gonna be so much better down the road if, if they’ve had these discussions.

Holly Draper: I know most people have a… Or a lot of people anyway A kind of visceral reaction to the notion of a prenup, and they think, you know, “He loves me,” or, “She loves me. If he really loved me, he wouldn’t make me get a prenup,” you know?

Molly Ward: Yeah.

Holly Draper: Reframe the discussion to get around that attitude.

Molly Ward: Well, I was gonna ask you the same thing.

You know, what we’re doing is we’re planting the seed. If it’s a second marriage, they’re very open to it, and, and so it’s usually there’s not much resistance there. We’ve had adult children come talk to us about their parent that’s getting married and, you know, say it goes both ways with the parents and the children encouraging it for these second marriages.

Sometimes it’s a little bit easier if you’re talking around children. Maybe there were already children in the first marriage, and how that money feels different when, when there’s children involved, and there’s some… you know, and then we, we also just, “Hey, there’s some pretty easy solutions to this,” like life insurance could be an easy solution to making the new spouse whole, um, you know, so that she does receive money.

And then the original money goes to the kids. So, people kind of start to warm up to it when you can frame it in a way that says, “Hey, this is what legally is gonna happen at your death,” which could also be at divorce as well. We are not giving legal advice. This is what the state of Texas is usually saying at death or divorce.

It would be wise to do a prenup, but whether they pick up the phone and do that, I mean, we give them attorney names and su- g- suggestions of who to call. But yeah, it’s a real struggle. They do have a visceral reaction. Sometimes we’ll call it a collaborative marriage agreement instead of a prenup. The same thing, but it sounds better.

I don’t know. How do you get around that, or how do you navigate that?

Holly Draper: Yeah, I think it’s definitely the second or third or fourth marriage, it is a much easier sell to convince someone ’cause, A, they now know that I didn’t think I was gonna get divorced and I did.

Molly Ward: Mm-hmm.

Holly Draper: And they’ve probably accumulated some wealth by that point, or they’ve built- Yeah

their business or whatever, and they want to protect that. It is much harder when you have the young couple who is so sure that, that nothing bad is ever going to happen to them, and usually they’re not the ones coming and asking.

Molly Ward: You’re right. In The Strangers book, in Bellee Burton, her mother told her and her brother that they were not allowed to get married without a prenup, and so that was told to her from when she was young, that she could…

That that’s just the way it was gonna be. So I think, you know, as parents, we can tell this to our young ch- to our young adult children, that, you know, if y- when you get married, you’ve, you gotta do this. Whether they listen to us or not, I don’t know, but- Who wants to pay for it, right?

Holly Draper: Yeah. So- Sort of going back to financial, I know your kind of core thesis of, from the book Strangers isn’t about infidelity, it’s about financial disengagement.

Talk a little bit about that

Molly Ward: It’s kind of like what we were talking about earlier, where the slow sliding of at one point in time, like let’s say the, the couple is married, in the beginning of the marriage, um, you know, before kids, they’re both very engaged with the money. You know, they know what’s coming in.

They meet monthly around what’s being spent, the budget. They’re reading about the investments once a month with each other. There’s a lot of good, healthy conversation about what we want for our future. And then life, life just, you know, grows, right? It gets bigger. Careers get more demanding. The kids come.

And so usually what’s happening is one of the spouses, usually the wife, is starting to take a backseat, and the, the meetings stop, not out of anyone saying, “Hey, let’s stop having these.” It’s more they’re busy, uh, barely even have time to, to say hi to each other at this point in life. And then n- nobody’s speaking up about, “Hey, we really need to talk about this.”

It’s just.. It’s disengagement. I mean, the tax returns have to be signed every year, but she’s not reviewing them. She’s not looking at them. And this doesn’t happen all the time. This is just in the financial disengagement when we see that. It’s a slow slip where she once held all these things closely and knew about them, but then life happens.

And of course, why not? You know, she trusts her husband. She trusts her spouse that they are going to make great decisions and investment decisions, and their money decisions and planning decisions, and why, why shouldn’t she? I mean, this is the person that she married. And so there’s all these layers of what’s going on, but it’s a very risky place to be.

I mean, it’s a reallocation of the labor. You know, she’s staying at home and doing a lot of work at home. I mean, I, I don’t want that to be portrayed here. There’s a lot to do at home. But he does have an affair, and there’s infidelity. When she hears this, when she learns about the infidelity, it’s shocking.

You know, she gets a call from the husband of the person who her husband’s been having an affair with, and she goes through this period of shock and can’t believe this has happened, and what are they gonna do? And then the divorce starts happening. Well, she describes how at that point in time, you know, she was very devastated at the beginning, but then she becomes even more devastated because she starts realizing the real financial consequences, or she doesn’t even realize the financial consequences yet.

She just doesn’t know, and that scares her even more. She becomes into a deeper– She talks about becoming even more deeply upset and, you know, just- Not in a good place when she starts realizing that she should’ve been more involved in the finances. So it’s a, it’s a real, a real thing.

Holly Draper: So let’s talk about kind of some practical tips for family lawyers that they can take away from this-

Molly Ward: Mm-hmm

Holly Draper: book. First of all, do you think this is a good book for family lawyers to read, and if so, why?

Molly Ward: I absolutely think it’s a good book for family law attorneys to read.

Family law attorneys or people like me, CDFAs, can go around and talk about how important it is to know your finances and how to be engaged and how important that is, and it’s kind of like a squeaky wheel, right?

But when they read this book, when clients read this book, or just anybody reads this book, it does more for what we’re trying to preach than any of our preaching. So that’s why I think it’s an impactful book for the family law attorneys to read and to pass along to anybody. You know, I have a 26- and 23-year-old daughters now, and my 20- 24, sorry, my 24-year-old has already read it.

And it’s great for these young women to read too.

Holly Draper: So that’s, that’s what I think. What can we do to build financial literacy inquiries into our intake process or our process of working with these clients?

Molly Ward: Are you talking about, like, the process of collecting information, or what do you mean?

Holly Draper: Yeah, or just, you know, red flags to look for or things-

Molly Ward: Oh, yeah

Holly Draper: we should be asking that can help us figure out where a client is in this spectrum of people and how maybe we can help them.

Molly Ward: Yeah. So, um, you know, I think that’s important to real- to, to know at the beginning. If they don’t know how to put their hands on statements, if they don’t know how to find the tax return, I mean, that’s gonna be a red flag right there.

If they didn’t act as the pilot or even the co-pilot in, in the decision-making on investment decisions and financial planning decisions, that’s gonna be important. As part of that intake, you know, how are you gonna get that information from them when they have no idea where it is?

Holly Draper: At what stage would you recommend lawyers loop a CDFA in with a client?

Molly Ward: Well, it, it depends. You know, if they have over 50% of their financial information, I think that that’s a good time for them to come in or at least start talking to us or to a CDFA. There’s a lot that they can get out of that first meeting that we hold. To answer the question, the sooner that they can meet with us, the more I feel productive they’re gonna be with the family law attorney.

Because we’re gonna be answering those questions of, “Am I gonna be okay? Can I keep the house? What kind of job do I need to get?” You know, “What am I gonna do about my income? What, what about these assets? What, what’s good for me?” They come into our office, they’re usually shaking. They usually can’t, they’re not even looking at us in the eye yet at the beginning of that meeting.

But within that hour, and when they walk out, they’re holding themselves high, you know, holding themselves higher. They’re able to breathe. When we can answer that question, or, “Am I gonna be okay?” Or we’re able to say, “You know what? You are gonna be okay, but, but here’s what it looks like. This is what your reality looks like.

It doesn’t look like it does right now, and this is what it looks like, and this is what you need to do to plan to move forward.” There’s so much circling in their head that it’s gonna be hard for them to focus on moving forward with the family law attorney. And so I feel like the sooner they can come in with us, the better.

Holly Draper: Well, and for anyone who hasn’t had a client working with someone like you, one of the things that we have done that’s been super helpful is having that CDFA involved in mediation or available at least to chime in. Because, you know, as attorneys that aren’t tax attorneys, you know, we’re not supposed to give tax advice and, you know- Right

we may not know the true consequences of taking the house versus taking the retirement versus you need cash. But having that financial- Yeah … expert on, kinda on the team, so to speak, can really help a client make decisions in that moment and, and hopefully you’ve already been having these discussions along the way- Yeah

that, that- Yeah … you’re not keeping the house. I know that that’s your dream house and you love it, and you want that more than anything else in the whole wide world, to live there with your kids, but that is just not a reality that it, you know, you can’t. And having that expert financial person involved makes that a much easier sell than us as attorneys just being like, “Look, dude, you cannot afford the house, so let’s not kill in mediation.”

Molly Ward: Yeah. Yeah. It’s, I don’t see how… It’s, the divorce is such a, it’s such a legal process. I mean, it is a legal process, but there’s so many financial decisions and financial livelihood for the future that it’s so helpful when we can come together to help that client.

Holly Draper: So we’re just about out of time, but I always like to ask for one piece of advice at the end of each podcast.

Yeah. So I’ll tweak this one a little bit. What is one piece of advice you would give to family lawyers in how to approach and deal with clients who have been a stay-at-home parent?

Molly Ward: So is this at the point where they’re getting divorced?

Holly Draper: Usually, if they’re coming to us.

Molly Ward: So the piece of advice to give to the family law attorney that’s representing the person that has been staying at home is send them to a CDFA.

They need to know what the future looks like. They need to know about, you know, am I gonna be living in a cardboard box? Probably not. But what kind of box am I gonna be living in? I- is it gonna be in our house? What kind of adjust- You know, they’re okay. They’ll hear that information. They might not like it.

They might not like to hear what we’re, what we’re saying or what you’re saying of, “No, you need to sell the house,” but they do really want to know what they need to do, and, and so that the circling can stop, and they can move forward with their life. So I think that sending them to a CDFA to do some planning and projections of an assumption of, hey, just an assumption, 50%, I get 50%, and this is what life looks like.

This is how much money I can spend. That’s gonna be really helpful to that person that hasn’t, that, that doesn’t have that same income that the other spouse does.

Holly Draper: Is there typically some sort of minimum threshold for assets that people should have before we send them to someone like you?

Molly Ward: I think all the CDFAs have different types of minimums or different types of billing, so it’s gonna be, you know, CDFA by CDFA.

But generally, we’re working with clients with $2 million or more of investable assets. The first time they come in, we do a consultation for $300 for that one hour. Like I was saying earlier, they usually come in not feeling good at all. They usually walk out, just the anxiety level has gone down. They’re able to breathe.

And then we’ll work with them during the divorce at the $300 an hour level throughout the time that they need us.

Holly Draper: Where can our listeners go if they wanna learn more about you?

Molly Ward: Thank you. Our website is welllivedwealth.com,

Holly Draper: and we’re also on Facebook, Instagram, and LinkedIn. Perfect. Well, thank you so much for joining me today.

I definitely look forward to reading the entire book myself, not just the summary. For our listeners, if you enjoyed this episode, subscribe and leave us a review. Thank you.

Announcer: The Texas Family Law Insiders Podcast is sponsored by the Draper Law Firm. We help people navigate divorce and child custody cases and handle family law and appellate matters.

For more information, visit our website at www.draperfirm.com.