Someone just found out after split from his spouse that she didn’t file his tax return for 5 years. It seems that the wife promised and didn’t deliver. Also, the husband was totally ignorant about it. He never asked to see the Notice of Assessment from CRA. If he did, he would have found out. Finally, he caught up with his tax filings. Unfortunately, it turned out that he owed taxes and had to pay hefty penalty.
Sometimes, one person inside a relationship or marriage took care of the household finance while the other one is in complete oblivions because he or she really doesn’t like dealing with finance or numbers. They find it overwhelming and confusing and try to avoid it as much as possible. They might think that they are so lucky to find someone who can take care of it for them, and this person is someone they can trust.
Unfortunately, breakup in a relationship or marriage is quite common these days. Trust usually is the issue like the one example above. Not sure why the wife did that. Was that on purpose? No idea. It seems that the lesson learned here is to learn some financial literacy. Please see here for some free resource I collected. Treat it like a life skill such as swimming or something. Try to participate in the household finance such as budgeting, tax return filing, investing, etc. Learn as much as we can.
I don’t want to say don’t trust anyone. It is very disappointing to feel that in a marriage. One thing for sure is that oblivion in person finance is a ticking time bomb. Hope this never happen to you.
Worthfy Financial Literacy Counselling 