Use a financial planner or organize and plan your finances yourself?

What to Do: Get help from a pro. Financial planners can help you organize your current finances and conceive a long-term plan to meet your goals (like upgrading your home or securing a target retirement income). Even if you understand personal finance, it’s hard to be objective about your own spending and savings patterns. Ask a friend who has had success with a planner for a referral, or visit the site of the Financial Planning Association (www.fpanet.org).

Hire an accountant to do your taxes or prepare your own tax return?

What to Do: If they are straightforward, do your own taxes. If you’re a salaried employee with regular deductions, interest, and dividends to report, say, you can get by without using an accountant. Software programs like TurboTax ($10 to $70, www.intuit.com) make preparing a return faster and easier than doing it by hand. But if your taxes are at all complicated (you own your own business; you live in one state and work in another), then hire a professional.