Not too many women are involved in the process of planning family wealth. Oftentimes, most women, especially those in marriages, find themselves dependent on their husbands when it comes to planning family wealth.
This is replicated in other family financial matters outside the institution of marriage. Take family inheritance for example. Many women are either left out of this process or cheated out of their rightful shares as their brothers taken everything.
Traditionally, the roles left for women are constrained in the kitchen. These range from writing the household budget and family grocery bills, cooking and maintaining the home.
However, Rhina Namsia, the founder and chief executive officer of The Acemt Consulting, a training and consultation company that provides financial planning and investment advisory, reckons that it is time for women to move from these restrictions.
Ms. Namsia says that it is time for women to embrace bolder roles that involve planning family wealth and which will guarantee them financial freedom and independence in the long run.
“Women need to move from writing family budgets to sitting at the table of succession planning; from managing household expenses to shaping generational wealth,” she says.
For too long, points out Namsia, women have been seen as the keepers of the family budget like managing daily expenses, stretching every shilling, and making ends meet.
“But true empowerment begins when we move beyond the monthly grocery list and take our place at the table where decisions about inheritance, legacy, and generational wealth are made. It’s time for women to be not just financial managers, but wealth architects,” she says.
“I say this having trained and worked with women for close to 4 years now. Often, when a woman is asked a question about money, it will mostly revolve around bills and expenses, very rare will you hear about investments and generational wealth that they too contribute into.”
The conversation around women and money must evolve. Budgeting is powerful yes, but it’s only the starting point.
Namsia says that for women, the real transformation happens when they are included and when they take initiative in succession planning, estate management, and long-term wealth preservation.
“We’ve seen women being harassed even by their own kin over property that they have been included in the Wills. But the facts are way far from just the family having the money, but how the wealth/perceived is perceived from the onset,” she points out.
“Writing a budget sustains a family for a month, but succession planning sustains a family for generations.”
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