One of the things that can hurt your financial future is a poor credit rating.
No matter how good your credit was when you were married, if you don’t have sufficient money to pay your bills during or after divorce, your credit rating will take a nose dive. If both of your names are on accounts and the mortgage, chances are fairly good that he won’t want to hurt his own credit rating so he will make sure those accounts are paid on time. Please don’t assume this will happen because too often divorcing people “cut off their noses to spite their faces.”
Separation and divorce do not often go hand in hand with sufficient support payments. If and when you don’t have enough money to pay the bills that are in your name, you will see your credit rating spiral downward. There are some reputable online service such as Consolidated Credit [Affiliate] that might be of assistance to you.
When this happens, it can be absolutely devastating because you will have a difficult time getting a mortgage or credit cards – if you can get them at all. In addition, the interest you will be required to pay on credit cards or mortgages will be substantially higher than if you had good credit.
If you recognize this issue and take precautions, you can minimize the plummet of your credit rating.
Think about this analogy.
Compare your lack of preparation to coasting downhill on a 10 speed bike. When you suddenly realize that you need to do something to get back to where you were at the top of the hill, you must shift into a different gear. It should be one that you are strong enough to peddle up the hill. Usually that gear will be the one that requires you to peddle faster and faster with much less ground covered.
The moral is that you must not allow yourself to coast downhill because it will be extremely difficult to get back to where you were at the top of the hill where you had a good credit score.
Photo: Sarah_Ackerman
