Start where you are now. I titled my account sheet "What I did with the money". Write down every transaction, and everything you find out about. You may need to bring in bookeeping help, and your running tally will help tremendously.
Date; income or expense; what for or source of income; paid, by what source, date paid, ck. Number, paid to:. Also, when opening mail, list: checking account number/savings, debts owed, monthly bills, dates due, insurance id numbers, if you run across a will, wrte the date, the attorney's name, address phone. You are an information gatherer for the next 90 days. Delay paying any medical bills, you might need them to decrease income allowable to qualify for medicaid. Wait for the Medicare Explanation of benefits to arrive, every 90 days. Carry a notebook and pen with you at all times, do not rely only on technology. You can enter data at night, when you get home. Do not throw anything away for awhile. Depending on how organized your husband did things, all will be revealed. Adopt my philosophy when it comes to paperwork. "WHATEVER CAN BE DONE BY PAPERWORK, CAN BE UNDONE BY MORE PAPERWORK." = a concept, not to be taken literally. If you don't have bookkeeping or accounting experience, an essay will suffice. Don't panic, you have enough concerns right now.
Can you give us more info about what you're facing? Do you know where he keeps things? Checkbooks, account numbers, monthly bills, etc? Did you help with any of this before? Do you have money coming in from retirement accounts, or pensions? Do you have your tax statements from previous years?
Give us more info about your situation and you'll get some very specific information.
It might help also to start with an itemization of all the income vs. all the expenses, so you in effect have a balance sheet.
Taking some time to gather all the data and catalogue it might take some time and be frustrating, especially if it's not yet organized. Do it a bit at a time, take a break and do something completely different, then start again.
This is what I do, buy a bunch of 3-ring binders, and put all the utility bills into one... all the credit card statements in another.... all the bank statements into another binder.... all the car repairs and related items into another.... etc... and if your hubby has stock statements to put into a larger binder as those statements can be quite thick.
Start where you are now. I titled my account sheet "What I did with the money".
Write down every transaction, and everything you find out about. You may need to bring in bookeeping help, and your running tally will help tremendously.
Date; income or expense; what for or source of income; paid, by what source, date paid, ck. Number, paid to:. Also, when opening mail, list: checking account number/savings, debts owed, monthly bills, dates due, insurance id numbers, if you run across a will, wrte the date, the attorney's name, address phone. You are an information gatherer for the next 90 days.
Delay paying any medical bills, you might need them to decrease income allowable to qualify for medicaid. Wait for the Medicare Explanation of benefits to arrive, every 90 days.
Carry a notebook and pen with you at all times, do not rely only on technology. You can enter data at night, when you get home.
Do not throw anything away for awhile.
Depending on how organized your husband did things, all will be revealed.
Adopt my philosophy when it comes to paperwork. "WHATEVER CAN BE DONE BY PAPERWORK, CAN BE UNDONE BY MORE PAPERWORK." = a concept, not to be taken literally. If you don't have bookkeeping or accounting experience, an essay will suffice.
Don't panic, you have enough concerns right now.
Give us more info about your situation and you'll get some very specific information.
Taking some time to gather all the data and catalogue it might take some time and be frustrating, especially if it's not yet organized. Do it a bit at a time, take a break and do something completely different, then start again.