Wealth Planning

Financial Wellness for Women: A 7-Step Guide

May 16, 2022

|Financial Wellness for Women: A 7-Step Guide | Aspiriant|Financial Wellness for Women: A 7-Step Guide | Aspiriant|Financial Wellness for Women: A 7-Step Guide

Women tend to ensure their family’s basic financial and other needs are taken care of before their own. It often comes with managing a household — caring for children, a partner, maybe even aging parents.

Often, women are taking care of family finances on their own: According to Pew Research Center, one in four mothers are single. And despite the fact that more than 57% of women have a job, they continue to face a lot of societal pressure to be an involved parent. Consequently, women often set aside their own financial wellness.

Financial wellness is defined as understanding and mindfully managing your income, investments and spending so you can achieve your financial goals. It’s important that you feel confident and capable of making the long-term, as well as basic short-term, financial decisions for yourself and your family. As wealth managers, we’re like the fitness trainers — helping women take care of themselves by bringing their financial picture into focus and providing guidance and encouragement to stay on track.

So here are seven positive financial health and wellness tips that you can use for every stage of your life to take care of yourself, as well as your family.

1. Take a financial inventory

The first step toward financial wellness for women is knowing what you have, where you have it and how to access it. This is especially important if you do not manage your own finances. Understand what your household assets and liabilities are by creating a personal balance sheet. Also consider:

  • Are you accumulating 401(k)s from previous employers? Do you know how to access these accounts? How are they invested?
  • Are you able to cover your expenses each month without tapping into credit card debt? Where are you spending excessively?
  • What are the gaps in your financial education and knowledge? How will you fill them? Don’t be afraid to ask questions. It’s better to know what you don’t know then to never ask at all.

2. Have a flexible financial plan

Financial planning provides a roadmap that guides you toward achieving your goals. A wealth manager can help you create a financial plan by analyzing your information and listening to what’s important to you. Your financial plan should evolve as you evolve. You can’t predict what the future holds, but you can take actions that will build your economic security.

  • Understand your spending. You may have high income, but wealth is all about what you are able to save, protect and grow.
  • Set your own goals and be intentional about how you work toward them. It’s important to quantify goals so you can realistically plan for them.
  • If you’re going through a major change like a divorce, career transition or loss of a loved one, it may be an appropriate time to review your financial plan.

3. Put your money to work

Goals-based investing is key to helping you achieve your goals. As you focus on the long-term, you should look toward high net worth investment strategies that will take the appropriate level of risk while preserving your growing wealth.

  • Line up your investment time horizon with your goals, which will be done through the financial planning process.
  • Put your savings on autopilot. Try to save money automatically in an investment account each month so you don’t think of it as money available to spend.
  • Check your tax withholding. Are you giving the IRS an interest-free loan every year? If you’re receiving large tax refunds, consider reducing your withholdings so you have more in each paycheck to invest in yourself.
  • Understand your risk tolerance and align it to your investment allocation. The amount of risk you need to take may change over your lifetime.

If you exercised nonqualified or incentive stock options at the beginning of the year and haven’t sold the underlying stock, consider if it still makes sense to keep holding it.”

Whatever your “why” is, internalize it by reminding yourself of the purpose of your money so that you stay focused on what you’re striving to achieve. This will allow you to be more confident with your financial decisions and help you avoid choices that aren’t aligned with your goals.
Set aside time each month to keep track of your financial affairs. Review credit card statements and bank account activity to make sure there aren’t any fraudulent transactions. If you find budgeting keeps you on track with your spending goals, a budgeting program can also help you monitor your activity. (Mint, YNAB and Quicken are popular.)


Natalie Morrella
Natalie Morrella

Director in Wealth Management, Partner

Natalie considers it a personal calling to help clients keep up with what’s going on in the marketplace so they can better understand how those changes impact their financial success. She’s a specialist in helping clients, some spanning multiple generations, develop comprehensive financial plans with an eye toward the future.

She joined Aspiriant in 2017 as part of the merger with Stanford Investment Group, an independent wealth management firm in the Silicon Valley. Prior to the merger, she worked with SIG for 12 years, solidifying her role as a long-term financial planning specialist.

Natalie earned her Certified Financial Planner™ (CFP®) license in 2012. She attended San Jose State University where she earned a Bachelor of Arts degree in Public Relations and Minor in Communications.

Natalie actively volunteers at her children’s’ school and competitive soccer league. She enjoys spending time with her family, traveling and hiking.

Talia Pierluissi
Talia Pierluissi

Director in Wealth Management, Partner

As Talia moved from philanthropy to tech startup to Aspiriant, her career and professional activities always included helping people realize their goals. Her passion for philanthropy and expertise in equity compensation and liquidity event planning empowers clients to make financial decisions that are both strategic and personally meaningful.

Serving as a Director of Wealth Management, Talia provides customized financial planning and wealth building strategies for clients and their families. She brings experience in philanthropic planning from her years in development at the School of Engineering at Stanford University. She later co-founded SearchFox (acquired by Yahoo) and joined Stanford Investment Group in 2005. Talia came to Aspiriant as part of the 2017 merger with SIG.

She earned her Master of Business Administration from Anderson School of Management at the University of California, Los Angeles. Her B.A. is from the University of Chicago. She is a Certified Financial Planner™ (CFP®).

Talia also provides wealth management services to her community. She is co-chair of the Jewish Community Federation and Endowment Fund Professional Advisors Network. And she volunteers for the Financial Planning Association Pro Bono Program and IRS Volunteer Income Tax Assistance Program.


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