Hi everyone. Before I go into my post, a disclaimer. I am not an attorney or financial advisor. My post should not be construed as legal or financial advice. You should find a licensed professional to handle these matters.

Regardless of what anyone says, we want to make money. Our motivation and means of making money maybe different, but objective is the same. But many of us (including myself) don’t take steps to protect our assets. You don’t have to be a business owner to protect your assets, as an individual, you need to do that too. About 10 years ago, my wife and I were both traveling a lot for work and our daughter was about 4 years old. Our financial advisor told us to get a will. Now I was brought up in India and we were always told that the only reason a father has a will is if he does not think his children will behave fairly with each other. Also in India and most countries, assets automatically pass on to the surviving spouse. But it may not be necessarily true everywhere. Besides what if both parents died in an accident? In the US and other countries, if both parents are killed in an accident, the children become the responsibility of the government and it can do whatever it pleases with your assets to take care of your children, unless a will is in place. So my recommendation would be to find a good attorney who specializes in wills and get one made.  Don’t download one from the net.

The other thing is getting insurance. Make sure you have life insurance and designate the beneficiaries. Most people don’t have adequate life insurance. They have it through their employer, but you can get additional life insurance. Another thing our advisor told us was to get an umbrella liability policy against lawsuits. For example if I don’t clean the snow off my sidewalk and someone slips and falls, if they have an injury, they can sue you for damages. By having an umbrella policy in place will protect my personal assets like my house, my car etc. You can also put your assets into a trust so that they cannot come after them. So moral of the story is make sure you talk to a licensed professional about asset protection and do it soon.