What Is a Financial Readiness Plan?

A Financial Readiness Plan is a practical framework for creating your in-case-of-emergency plan and building your Financial First Aid Kit.

It helps you organize what matters, identify gaps, prepare the people who may need to step in, and choose practical next steps before life happens.

Start with what matters most today and build your plan one step at a time.

When Life Happens, Readiness Matters 

Life can change quickly.

A health event, caregiving decision, job transition, family emergency, or major financial choice can require information, conversations, and action all at once.

The Financial Readiness Plan helps you prepare ahead of time. Use it to:

• Organize important information
• Ask better questions
• Define roles and responsibilities

• Prepare the people you trust to step in when needed 

• Prepare for important conversations

• Make decisions grounded in your goals and values

Start where you are. Focus on what matters today. Build your Plan over time.

Your Free Financial Readiness Plan includes:

✔  The complete Financial Readiness Plan

✔  Stepping In Checklist: What to Do When It Matters Most

✔  Unclaimed Property Search Checklist

Start with one area, identify one useful next step, and return whenever you’re ready to keep building.

👉 Designed for personal use and professional conversations

Your Plan also includes the Get Ready Newsletter, with ideas, questions, conversations, and trusted resources to help you prepare before life happens. You can unsubscribe at any time.

Your Financial Readiness Map

The Financial Readiness Plan is organized around 10 interconnected domains that provide a broader view of the people, information, decisions, and transitions that shape your financial life.

✅ Stepping In Plan
✅ Personal Mission & Decision Compass
✅ Life & Care Plan
✅ Your Support Team
✅ Risk Protection Plan
✅ Estate & Final Wishes
✅ Property, Assets & Digital Life
✅ Financial Dashboard
✅ Philanthropy & Impact
✅ Transitions, Work & Next Chapters

Start with the domain that matters most today.

Guided by the Six Principles of Financial Readiness, the Plan helps you begin with purpose, seek understanding, identify what may be missing, think long term, protect what matters, and exercise good judgment.

Use It for Yourself or to Help Others Prepare 

The Financial Readiness Plan can be used by: 

• Individuals: Organize the areas of your financial life that matter most and choose your next steps.

• Families: Prepare for shared responsibilities, important conversations, and future decisions.

• Professionals: Use a broader framework to support client conversations and identify areas that may need attention.

• Educators and Advocates: Introduce financial readiness through community conversations and educational programs.

  The Plan provides a shared framework for preparing before decisions become urgent, while giving each person the flexibility to begin where it matters most.

Why I Created the Financial Readiness Plan and why it’s free

Throughout my career, I’ve seen people face important financial decisions under pressure, often with information scattered across several places and little time to understand their options. 

Those experiences reinforced a simple belief: the best time to ask questions, organize information, and have important conversations is before a decision becomes urgent.

The Financial Readiness Plan is the guide I want people to have before life happens and it's free because everyone deserves the opportunity to prepare.

The mission is supported through books, the Get Ready Library, Get Ready Insiders, speaking, and partnerships with organizations promote financial readiness with their communities.