Divorce

As IRS checks start to pour in around the country, you'll soon hear a chorus of financial advisers telling you why getting a tax refund is a bad thing -- because it means you gave an interest-free loan to Uncle Sam. But at least for right now, that isn't a such big deal.

If you're divorced, your ex-husband or ex-wife might still be able to help you feather your nest in retirement. And there's at least one former-spouse benefit you won't need to go to court to get access to: payments based on their Social Security earnings record.

A few weeks ago, we asked DailyFinance readers for their best tips for putting your financial house in order. Many were quick to note that the foundation of financial security lies in being ready when disaster hits. Here are some of their best suggestions for planning for those rainy days.

Of all the regrets commonly expressed by the recently divorced, "I'm sorry I didn't pay my lawyer more money" is probably last on the list. But for one New York woman, the decision to go cheap on the legal fees led to a nasty surprise as she found herself with two husbands.

For all the anti-bank anger erupting across the country, relatively few of us are actually leaving our financial institutions.

You wed on a whim, on a bender, or whatever it was that compelled you to commit to love, honor and cherish. Now you want it over. Sound familiar? It may not work for Kim Kardashian and Kris Humphries, but if your union has gone from honeymoon directly to horror in a hurry, there's a fast easy way to end a marriage on the cheap.

A 53-year-old woman got divorced in May, and now, she wants to relocate to a new city and buy a little bungalow for herself and her 100-pound dog. But with her low income, she's wondering whether her best bet to get that home is deplete her retirement savings and buy it with cash. Our experts weigh in.

"To leave hundreds of millions of dollars vulnerable does not seem like a wise choice," says one matrimonial lawyer. Still, many of the rich and famous keep heading down the aisle without a prenup. It's a choice some eventually live to regret.

Splitting up makes a mess of your finances, as Lynn, a nurse living in Florida knows all too well. Her 2008 divorce from her husband of 28 years left her in debt, with bad credit, and with limited financial skills. She's already begun to dig out, but she needs a better plan.

Most married people look forward to enjoying their golden years together -- at least in theory. But sometimes, reality is more bleak. For a host of reasons, millions of us may enter retirement on our own, and a large fraction of divorced, never-married, and widowed Americans aren't doing enough to prepare for it.