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BE SMART ABOUT SOCIAL SECURITY If you and your spouse were already drawing benefits, you will be able to elect the higher benefit going forward. If you yourself haven’t claimed any benefits
yet, you have a choice: You can take either your survivor’s benefit based on your spouse’s work history, or the retirement benefit based on your own record. You then can switch to the other
benefit, if it ends up being higher, later on. KEEP THE 401(K) Are you still in your 50s? Although it’s possible to roll your husband’s 401(k) or IRA money over to your own retirement
account, don’t rush to transfer the 401(k), Weingarten warns. As a widow, you’ll be able to withdraw money from your late husband’s 401(k) whenever you need it, regardless of your age,
without paying a 10 percent withdrawal penalty. (It will still be taxable as ordinary income.) If, instead, you move the 401(k) to a rollover IRA, you’ll have to pay a 10 percent penalty on
any withdrawals from that IRA before you turn 59 ½, as well as the taxes. TAKE A TAX OPPORTUNITY If your family income doesn’t fall substantially when you are widowed, you may be bumped
into a higher tax bracket, because the income cutoffs for filing singly are much lower than they are for couples filing joint returns. So make the most of your more generous tax treatment in
the year of your spouse’s death, when the IRS still lets you file as a married couple, suggests Carolyn McClanahan, a Jacksonville, Florida, financial planner. In that year, take taxable
withdrawals from 401(k) or IRAs so that they take full advantage of whatever bracket you’re in, even if you use the money to create a rollover Roth IRA or just to put some extra in your
non-IRA savings account. LINE UP YOUR CREDIT CARD You may be surprised to learn that you may not be an equal account holder of your credit cards. You may be listed as just an authorized user
of a card that is entirely your husband’s account. If that’s the case, the card issuer will eventually learn of your husband’s death and cancel the account. Don’t wait for that, McClanahan
says. Let the company know of your husband’s death. “Most issuers will work with the spouse to get them a card,” she says. Better yet is to take preventive measures while your spouse is
still with you: Either establish joint credit card accounts (in which both of you are liable for making payments) or become the primary owner of at least one card. DON’T RUSH THE BIG STUFF
You’ve heard it before, but don’t be in a hurry to move, sell a house (or even a car) or write big checks for your kids in the immediate aftermath of a death, McClanahan warns. You may
regret choices made in haste and grief. And you can always settle your finances and your life later on. _Linda Stern, former Wall Street editor for Reuters, has been covering personal
finance since the 1980s._