Partnered

Sharing life and love with someone can be twice as exciting.

• You might be partnered, partnered with pets, officially de facto, officially married (yay!), splitting expenses but sharing life, or joining incomes and combining financial lives too.
• You might be together but living apart, working towards a future with kids, thinking about fostering, adopting, IVF or surrogacy; or perhaps something a little more complicated.

When it comes to being partnered in the LGBTQIA+ community, there's really no such thing as average.

There's no right or wrong way to live a purposeful life, just what works for you both.

Life can be twice as exciting with twice the resources — and twice the risks to manage.

Living life as a couple, you’d probably be wondering how to best protect each other now and for the future.

• Being LGBTQIA+ and partnered doesn’t protect you from the normal stresses of partnered life. The #1 reason for all relationship stress is uncertainty around money matters; and for those who are more 'spenders' than 'savers', this can be really challenging.
• Financial differences can be challenging for all couples, but especially LGBTQIA+ ones. Do you combine income and debts, or keep them separate? How do you best manage your personal and shared financial risks? How would long term disability affect your relationship? What happens if you need two incomes to live your lifestyle but you suddenly find yourself with only one (or none) due to sickness or injury? 
• Longer-term financial security (even retirement) when you don't have children of your own to rely on, means you’re more reliant on your partner and your families of choice. If you or your loved ones depend on your income, you’ll need to protect it.

A top priority for a couple is protecting your income and your debts, to reduce the financial impact upon you and your partner if something unexpected happens to you

Why LGBTI couples need specialist financial advice

• Not everyone and everyone's partner is Out (or Out equally). Many LGBTQIA+ people make subtle yet profound changes to their everyday lives to minimise the risk of experiencing discrimination to themselves or their partner, often hiding their authentic selves.
• A specialist financial adviser who you can trust and feel comfortable with, who instinctively understands you, can be a stable foundation for your decisions about your shared financial lives.
• Today, many LGBTQIA+ couples are facing complex decisions about caring for their aging parents who may have limited support, and meager retirement savings and who have been less than supportive of their now adult LGBTQIA+ children.

Learn what's right for you

If you’re partnered, it's time to learn more about your options, and your partners' options and then take action to protect a fabulous future together (and your ability to continue to afford living it).

• One of the wonderful things about our community is the sheer variety of flavours to be found in our relationships - we're redefining and celebrating family in many ways. So whoever you choose to share your life, whether that's logical or biological, we celebrate that too.
• Whether your currently doing roommates finances – where you keep track of who pays for what and split common expenses, whether you're doing joint finances - where you focus is joint financial projects together like completing study, building a career or a business or buying and selling real estate, or whether your relationship has evolved towards merged finances - where your names are shared on assets, projects and plans – your success is in your focus and commitment. Celebrate that - and protect that.
• And while you're getting organised, why not check your 'beneficiary nominations' in your super funds, life insurance policies and check your 'Power of Attorney' is up to date.

We’d love to help you with all of that.

Other considerations:

• Are you a Couple in Business? You probably have additional business risks to manage. Let us help you with that.
• Are you considering IVF or surrogacy? You probably have some longer-term planning ahead. Let us help you with that too.