Tax & financial planning content, verified by editors with credentials
Most personal-finance sites stop at "what is a 401(k)?" We go to the moments where the math is worth tens of thousands — and we name the editor who wrote it.
What we cover
Money in motion, not money in motion-pictures
Life Money USA is a practical tax and financial planning resource for US households navigating major life events: divorce, inheritance, business sale, layoff, retirement, equity compensation, self-employment, and real estate investing.
Most personal-finance sites focus on basic education. We focus on the decision moments where getting the math right is worth tens of thousands of dollars. Should I roll over my 401(k) after the layoff? Does QSBS apply to my exit? When does an S-corp election start beating an LLC? What does step-up basis actually do to my inherited brokerage account?
Every guide pairs a calculator with worked real-world examples, current 2026 federal + state numbers, FAQs answering the long-tail questions, and context on which specialist to consult next.
Editorial process
How a guide becomes a guide
Sourced + verified
Every figure cited (federal brackets, contribution limits, IRMAA tiers, QSBS cap) is cross-checked against an internal source-of-truth file with the original IRS / SSA / CMS URL and verified-on date. Stale numbers are flagged before drafting.
Quality-gated at 90/100
Drafts pass through a rule-based proofreader (catches generic-FAQ patterns, missing schema, content-length issues) and an LLM critique agent that flags factual errors, voice drift, and decision-stage misclassification.
Refreshed on cadence
Every January 1 (new tax year) and May 1 (mid-year regulatory pass), every figure is re-verified, dateModified bumped, and changes pushed to Google's Indexing API + Bing's IndexNow within hours.
Meet the editors
Credentialed editors per service
Each service is led by a credentialed editor whose expertise matches the decision area. Hover or click to see expertise.
Sarah Mitchell
CFP®, AEP®Sarah specializes in estate planning and retirement-income strategy — Roth conversion ladders, RMD planning under SECURE 2.0, IRMAA-bracket optimization, federal and state estate tax, and the §1014 step-up basis. She is a Certified Financial Planner (CFP Board) and Accredited Estate Planner (National Association of Estate Planners & Councils).
Michael Chen
CDFA®, CFP®Michael writes Life Money USA's divorce vertical — QDRO mechanics, splitting retirement assets, Social Security divorced-spouse benefits under 42 U.S.C. §402, post-TCJA alimony rules, community-property vs equitable-distribution states, and the §1041 transfer-incident-to-divorce rules. He holds the Certified Divorce Financial Analyst (IDFA) and CFP® designations.
David Kumar
CFP®, CRPC®David covers severance and layoff planning — RSU acceleration negotiation, ISO post-termination windows, COBRA-vs-ACA decision math, the Rule of 55 and §72(t) SEPP withdrawals, federal-employee VERA/VSIP, and visa-holder edge cases. He holds the CFP® and Chartered Retirement Planning Counselor (College for Financial Planning) designations.
Jennifer Park
CPA, EA, MSTJennifer covers business sale, QSBS §1202 planning, tech-comp tax (ISO/AMT, NUA, NSO/ESPP), and state-specific tax decisions. She is a Certified Public Accountant, an IRS-federally-licensed Enrolled Agent, and holds a Master of Science in Taxation. She writes the business-sale, tech-comp, small-business, and tax-planning verticals.
Emily Martinez
CPA, CCIMEmily writes the real-estate-investor vertical, covering 1031 exchanges, cost segregation, opportunity zones, and the passive-activity-loss rules under §469. She is a CPA and Certified Commercial Investment Member.
Yusuf Abdullah
CFP®, CIFE™Yusuf writes Life Money USA's halal-investing coverage — applying the AAOIFI Shari'ah Standard 21 screen to US funds (SPUS, HLAL, the Amana funds), sukuk and gold under Standard 57, and riba-free home financing. He is a Certified Financial Planner and a Certified Islamic Finance Executive (Ethica). Screening is a methodology applied to public holdings data, not a fatwa — rulings are flagged for qualified-scholar review.
What we are not
We are not licensed financial advisors taking client meetings, not registered investment advisers (RIAs), not tax preparers, and not attorneys. Life Money USA is an editorial content site, not an advisory practice.
Nothing on this site is personalized financial, tax, or legal advice. Use our content to build your understanding and to prepare for conversations with qualified professionals. When a decision genuinely requires specialist counsel, our guides name the specialist type — "cross-border tax CPA," "ERISA attorney," "estate litigator" — and explain why that specific specialist matters.
We participate in affiliate programs with financial tools (TurboTax, Fidelity, Schwab, Trust & Will, etc.). When we recommend a tool, we disclose the affiliate relationship and only recommend tools we'd use ourselves. See our affiliate disclosure for details.
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