Married Fanatics: Joint money or separate money?

[JP4CY]

I guess I have yet to see why people think "its a hassle" to have separate accounts?

I have my account and know what I'm responsible for and so does she with her account. To me, that's not any more work.

 

[Sparkplug]

We have a joint account that we put equal amounts into and I have a farm account that I pay my farm expenses from. We keep the farm totally separate so that he is not a "active participant". He's an architect and the lawyers recommend neither is involved in the others business.

 

[thatguy]

wife and I put 80 pecent in a joint and 20 percent into personal accounts for when she wants to buy some new thousand dollar purse that is insane or when I want to go to Vegas and spend a grand on a stripper to tell me i'm cute. It works very well. IF you have direct deposit its really easy to set up.

 

[CyCrazy]

I guess I have yet to see why people think "its a hassle" to have separate accounts?

I have my account and know what I'm responsible for and so does she with her account. To me, that's not any more work.

This is exactly how we do it as well.

 

[wxman1]

It sounds to me like most of those who have separate accounts "blow" more and discuss less than those with joint. More power to you if you can make it work though.

No matter what it comes down to how well you communicate and are on the same page about how to spend and what not. Your marriage is going to get screwed up no matter what if you hold ill will against the other about their habits. This applies to more than just money.

 

[thatguy]

It sounds to me like most of those who have separate accounts "blow" more and discuss less than those with joint. More power to you if you can make it work though.

No matter what it comes down to how well you communicate and are on the same page about how to spend and what not. Your marriage is going to get screwed up no matter what if you hold ill will against the other about their habits. This applies to more than just money.

sigh....thanks for the advice Dr. It works if both parties are adults and one person isn't a dominating *******.

 

[3TrueFans]

I guess I have yet to see why people think "its a hassle" to have separate accounts?

I have my account and know what I'm responsible for and so does she with her account. To me, that's not any more work.

I don't think it necessarily sounds like more work, it just sounds like a lot of people who have separate accounts do it because they either don't want tell/ask to be able to spend money or want to be able to spend money without their spouse knowing, neither of which sound all that marriagey (I made that word up).

Also the aspect of splitting bills somehow seems weird to me, I'll pay mortgage, you pay cable, I pay phone bill, you pay insurance, seems odd again. That's what you do when you have a roommate.

 

[3TrueFans]

wife and I put 80 pecent in a joint and 20 percent into personal accounts for when she wants to buy some new thousand dollar purse that is insane or when I want to go to Vegas and spend a grand on a stripper to tell me i'm cute. It works very well. IF you have direct deposit its really easy to set up.

Do you just not want to see what she spends the money on? Or vice versa?

 

[cowgirl836]

no one has answered my question about separate accounts and saving toward a common big goal like a house or car. That would seem the most annoying to me just from experience trying to save and pay for our wedding out of separate accounts.

But whatever works, like wxman said, as long as there is good communication and understanding about what the goals and expectations are - which is important in any marriage, however you do your finances.

 

[SwirlingFloater]

We also have couple friends that do the joint account where the husband by far has the larger income, but the wife keeps the checkbook in her purse. The husband has to ask the wife for allowance or money to buy something he wants. (No matter how small the item)

Seems that the wife has a little more than the family checkbook stuffed in that purse.:twitcy:

He doesn't carry a credit card?

Nope, old school.

I don't think she allows it or trusts him with a card.

 

[CyPlainsDrifter]

Stupid to do seperates, it is like your roommates and are half assing your marriage. When you get married you combine your ENTIRE lives.

This ..... I can't imagine how doing it separately makes any sense at all. When you get married it's all the way in everything. This is just one more reason marriages are disposable today. I insisted on joint immediately when I got married 20+ years ago and I make 3x what my wife makes.

 

[NATEizKING]

I will probably keep separate at first. I don't see whats wrong with having separate as long as you each pay the bills proportionate to your income. I don't expect her to pay for my student loans or anything like that, I just like to know how much money I have and we would discuss any big purchases, we already do and we aren't married. I wouldn't be keeping them separate so I could buy stupid crap, I'd do it to make extra payments on loans and other purchases that would benefit both of us. We give each other money when we need it, I just like my money going to getting out of debt rather than a pair of $200 Ugg boots that will be destroyed in a year ot two.

 

[cloneluke80]

not being judgy with my post, this is just what works for us: 2 joint accounts we live mostly on 1 income we have a cash budget every month so not every little thing tracked we plan major purchases together - this is usually long annoying meetings but good to talk about

 

[Wx4Cy]

Isn't married joint by definition? One bed or two? Kinda the same thing to me I guess.

 

[MeanDean]

Not married and we were both older going in.

We each had our own accounts but once we decided to be together we opened a joint account that we each put $250 in every other week. That pays for groceries, utilities, household expenses, etc. Basically everything that we share.

We each keep our own accounts and split house payments. It evolved kind of naturally and works for us. Sometimes we need to supplement the joint account (i. e. big vet payment last fall) and we each just add some out of schedule to cover it. Our spending habits are WAAAY different and at our ages are not going to change so it works out well for us.

 

[CYKOFAN]

Joint account. I brought a lot more money into the marriage but it took all of it to get her to marry me.

 

[dmclone]

My wife would spend the checking account down to $1 regardless of how much is in there so I have 3 accounts. One for just bills that we never touch, one for daily living that we both use, and one just to hold the excess. The daily living one is always empty after 2 weeks.

Before we were married we did have separate accounts, I learned from that experience that I would have the setup described above.

 

[acoustimac]

I've had experiences with doing joint and separate. When it was separate my ex-wife (yes, this should say something) did what was described and hid away money which she used for various things unknown to me. It is just not a good thing to do from a trust standpoint. My current wife and I share accounts. Our communication about money is much more open and we respect each other's opinions and needs. Its a much better situation believe me.

 

[Cyclonin]

Completely joint, although I handle all the bills, savings, etc.

Our incomes are within $5K of each other, so thats not an issue. Even if they weren't, I don't think it would be an issue. I am quite a tightwad, and she likes to spend money on stuff I may not agree with. I won't lie, there were some arguments in the beginning, but we don't have any secret expenses. If she wants to go spend $250 at the mall, so be it.

I recently set up our budget for a very realistic measure of what we want to do. I don't spend a lot of cash each month outside of essentials.

We put about 20% of our income to retirement/savings, about 20% goes to taxes, 40% to monthly obligations, and 20% spending cash. It works really well for us, as I am very big into saving/investing, and she likes her mall trips.

 

[acoustimac]

Best thing we ever did to get us on the same page was attending Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University. It was amazing and did the trick for us.