By Pamela Yip / The Dallas Morning News Good financial planning means being prepared for life’s unexpected occurrences. For military families, that’s particularly important because of the transient nature of military life. Repeated back-to-back deployments make it imperative that both spouses have the same financial goals and decide how the stay-at-home spouse will hold down […]

Here’s a letter I received from an Army wife struggling post-deployment. I think many of us have experienced the frustrations she expresses here…. what does it mean to ‘support the troops’? If anyone knows of resources that can help this family, please comment below, or send an email. Dear Heroes At Home, My husband is […]

Here’s a post by Sarah Gilbert, who’s husband is an Army reservist deployed to Afghanistan. She writes honestly about how the financial windfall associated with a deployment helped her family. You can read the original story here. I don’t know whether it was minutes or hours or even a day: the time it took me […]

Don’t Ignore Retirement Planning When facing a deployment, your immediate goal should be getting through the year of separation. It can be tempting not to look beyond the date when you’ll be back together as a family. But with a little planning, a deployment year can really pay off for your family’s financial future. The […]

Setting Financial Goals During Deployment For some military families, a deployment is an opportunity to save money, or pay off debts. “With the possibility of combat zone tax-free income and a host of allowances (separation pay, hazardous duty) added to the monthly bottom line, you may be able to pay off credit cards, build your […]

(And other deployment finance mysteries…) I was sitting in the International terminal at LAX, waiting to board my flight to Australia to meet Paul for R&R. It was the first time I would see my husband in 9 months, and we had been looking forward to these two weeks as the trip of a lifetime. […]

What You Need To Know Before They Go No matter how much time you have to prepare, deployments always sneak up on you. “There’s so much to do,” says Michael Kothakota of Wolfbridge Financial, “Things like finances can fall by the wayside very quickly.” But Kothakota says that’s the last thing you want to happen […]

Nothing can dampen a deployment like arguing over money with your spouse at home. No family is immune to the challenges of managing a budget, especially from across the world! What I think worked well for Kelly and me was to sit down well in advance and do some simple math: what money is coming […]