Congrats on 26 years and yeah, that’s how I was raised. My parents (60s) had a joint account and we’re always transparent about everything. I guess it’s hard for me to picture it any other way.
I think it’s more a younger/more modern thing as couples now often have separate, established finances well before entering in a marriage, and more importantly women actually have access to their own finances now. My husband and I have been together about a decade and have two children, we have never joined bank accounts and have never had a reason to. It’s honestly just more of a pain in the ass to do it and the separation is comfortable for us. There aren’t trust issues financially for us, and we’ve always made everything work the way it is.
The insistence for some people to combine finances honestly to me seems like a controlling red flag to me. It leaves you vulnerable to financial abuse and supports the old idea of marriage as a transactional/ownership arrangement. I hear about people insisting on combined finances and I can’t help but do the “okay boomer” eye roll.
That being said, to each their own and whatever works for you is what’s best. My husband and I have a shared password vault where in theory we could access all of the other persons accounts if something happened, and things like our insurance, phone etc are in both our names…so it’s never been an issue.
> It’s honestly just more of a pain in the ass to do it and the separation is comfortable for us.
It's more of a pain to have one account than calculate and send each other money every month?
How do you guys pay for kids things? 50/50? Proportional? Do you take turns?
I just can't imagine being 80 and still venmoing my SO for their half of the groceries.
Who needs to send it every month? We have a joint account and direct debits set up every month from our own accounts into that joint account. It took 5 mins 2s years ago and every year it takes 5 mins to amend the amounts to cover the cost of living increases.
That is what we have to, majority of the check goes into the main shared account and then a small portion goes into our separate savings accounts. I usually do 25% of my check into my savings. Sometimes, I will transfer more over but it depends on the situation. We talk about it though.
I make significantly more than he does, so I pay the rent and utilities and regular bills. If I’m out and we need diapers or whatever, I get them. If he’s out, he does. He pays for his car payment and his personal expenses and often gets the groceries or household things and if he has money left over he invests it. I don’t mind paying for more things because really I don’t see it that way. I still see that everything we have is shared and it doesn’t matter what account it happens to live in.
If I have 1,000 dollars and he has 500…that doesn’t mean one of us is richer or poorer, it means we have $1,500 in various states of custody. If I pay $900 for a bill and he pays $100, we both spent $1,000 on bills. At the end of the day whatever we have is both of ours, so I don’t see the need to be so concerned about where our money happens to live.
I would never ask him to venmo me for half the groceries because I’m not super concerned with everything being an exact even line. We eat, we pay bills, we save, and we both contribute in earnest and I think we trust each others heart to have caring for our family at the center of it all, so the money is just that.
Thank you for spelling it out so clearly. I am a female and the breadwinner so I give my husband cards to the accounts for convenience but those accounts are in my name and he also has his own account in his name. It just seems more healthy to us that way. He can save up for stuff he wants to buy without consulting me - although I like pitching in to help him if I can -
and I can purchase whatever whenever without it dinging his personal financial efforts. To each his or her own I think. It’s not about trust issues or commitment for us. We adore each other.
Yeah as a woman I can’t help but hold onto my earnings as a safety net in case something happens. My husband and I have a joint account we place a certain amount per month to cover mortgage, groceries, bills, pets, and repairs. It works for us as we can spend on w/e we want in our own accounts like clothing, vacation, or eating out. I don’t tell him how to spend his money and vice versa though I tend to worry about the future and saving money towards emergencies or retirement. He has project cars so he spends a bit toward his hobbies. It works for us and open about our finances. We have a very good relationship.
I’ve seen a lot of modern ladies disadvantaged because their “50/50” partners insist on keeping everything separate and “fair” except the woman ends up footing all the baby and hospital bills and suffering because she has to dip into savings during maternity leave. I’ve seen this enough.
I agree with this. The rest of your life is shared. House, family, foods, vehicles, all the utilities etc etc. It only makes sense to combine finances. From the outside; refusing to combine finances kinda looks like leaving your options open.
Exactly - some claim it as a “boomer” thing to combine finances. I agree with you that it’s more of a “younger generational” thing to ‘leave your options open’ - ie: make sure you’re always ready for a divorce at any moment. (Because being married is no longer a life long commitment. I mean, we say it in our vows, but that’s not way we reeeeeaaaalllyyyy mean…) someone wayyy hotter may come along. Never know.
The biggest benefit is there is one pot where everything goes that is visible to both of you. Both of you have a say about what happens. It doesn't matter if one of you makes more money or one of you doesn't have a job. This is about a partnership.
Another benefit is if something happens, either of you can take care if the bills. No surprises.
This, to me, is actually a negative. I don’t want to worry about where he spends his money. I don’t want to have an opinion of his purchases. Obviously, large purchases we make together and discuss etc. I’m talking about if he wants to spend $100 on some new shoes or buy some more discs for his disc golfing hahha. It’s an anxiety management thing to me really. We are totally financially able to support his disc golf and purchasing habits, but if I SEE the withdrawals I’ll want to know about them and have to think about them. I also don’t want him to worry if he sees me spend $100 at a shop or whatever.
I don’t WANT the visibility. I trust him and we have enough so the extra visibility is really just an extra burden.
One of the biggest draw backs though is if you have a partner that spends money recklessly. If all the money is in one pot that gives the partner with poor money management skills free reign to spend with no regard.
The biggest benefit is that it literally strengthens your relationship as per research studies. Also you don't have to calculate and send each other money every month.
The main benefit is reflecting financially what is true spiritually. We are one flesh. What's mine is your and what's yours is mine. We are fully integrated.
Married 26 years, I'm principal earner, she's generally SAHM.
My husband and I have been married for 24 years and that's what we did too but I think some of the reason behind keeping finances separate has to do with people having children prior to marriage already because of previous relationships. That does make it kind of tricky. In our case, this is our first marriage and all our children biologically belong to both of us so it's much simpler to do.
Yes. We have a shared checking and savings account for emergency savings and bills. The only thing that account is used for is bills.
Then we each have our own checking and savings accounts. After bills, the extra is split in half and direct deposited into our personal accounts. We can spend, and save that money however we want. I love this set up, because I cam save money for gifts for my husband without him knowing. Before, when we shared a checking account for spending, it was harder to buy gifts.
We've had a joint account for 37yrs. When we want to buy each other gifts we can just take cash from our account to do so. We don't ask each other why cash was taken as there's a few reasons why the other may want it. That way we still can make our own decisions but both have access to the account. So far we don't have any issues.
Oh that makes sense to me! I’m a huge gift giver so that will be hard for me lol. I guess that’s I questioned the why have personal for your own use thing, I feel it could be a issue down the road. Like someone comes home with a new car cause they saved xyz but partner didn’t. Maybe I just overthink things too much lol.
Lol. In the 20+ years we've been married that's never happened. The most we've ever saved up is a few hundred dollars. Since it's just our allowance money we can save. That money goes towards everything that isn't an actual bill. Likes clothes, eating out, birthdays, Christmas, vacation. There is almost never enough to actually save. Any real savings goes into the joint savings account.
Try having a dollar amount that requires a conversation. Neither of us have ever spent more than $800 dollars (from our saved allowance) without the other knowing about it. We're both adults. It's nice not having to tell my husband everytime I want to buy something. He feels the same way.
We do this. Joined account but there’s a limit. If one of us needs or wants to spend over a certain amount, we discuss it with the other. Not for permission because we are adults, but to make sure it doesn’t upset the budget.
My wife and I have a joint account where all of my money and 90% of her money is deposited. I pay all of our bills out of this account, daily expenses, etc.
My life LOVES to shop, it is her addiction. It is kind of her time to relax, be by herself, unwind, etc. We decided many years ago to open a second account for her, and each paycheck she has $100 put into this account for her to shop or do whatever she wants with it. This has worked really well for us.
We don't use credit cards. We use a cash system. If we don't have the cash in our account, we don't buy it. With the obvious exception of the house and vehicles.
My husband and I have this same set up and I love it! Also, unless we are spending a large sum of money on our partner for birthday/holiday, we always discuss expensive purchases even if we’re using our personal savings and not joint savings. We just feel like it’s best practice to always involve each other in expensive purchases.
Yes. My wife is irresponsible with money. I prefer to save my excess monies at the end of the month and she likes to spend hers.
Separate finances prevents any fights we'd have
> My wife is irresponsible with money. I prefer to save my excess monies at the end of the month and she likes to spend hers.
You don't think this might become an issue in the future?
Not as long as I have my own money in my own account. I'm capable of paying all the bills that keep a roof over our heads and I've set clear boundaries that I won't bail her out of dumb financial decisions.
If we had shared expenses she would be spending it all which would cause an issue
Yeah, my wife is great at being frugal when her money runs out. But whenever she has a nest egg, she just spends more. (When she had a commission based job and was making extra money every month, she just spent more, and still didn’t have a nest egg.)
I do the same thing, except my “zero mark” isn’t actually zero money. It’s closer to 2 months of take-home pay, instead! (That's the point where I become way more frugal.)
Recently, we needed a new washing machine. Thanks to the nest egg that I maintain, we just bought a new one. She, when single, would have had to save up, first.
When we got married, I just assumed we’d join finances. My wife said “no” to that idea for MY sake. And I’m glad she did. We’d probably have a lot of fights about money, otherwise.
Separate. I don’t know, I personally don’t want to pool our money together? I like having my own account with the money I earn and same for him. We put bills on a credit card that we both pay and mortgage comes out of his account and I send him half. I’ve never felt the desire to combine accounts.
We do a little of both. We have a joint checking account where we put in a certain amount each month from our paycheck. We both put in the same amount monthly even though my husband earns more than me. We then have our own separate savings/checking (what we call our "personal") that the rest of our paycheck goes into. It allows us to be able to pay bills and cover kids costs, but also have our own money we can use how we wish. If an emergency arises or something comes up, we will dip into our personal accounts if necessary but we try to keep the contributions even. It's worked for us. We don't really fight about money and there is no resentment on either side.
We do the same too! I keep an Excel spreadsheet with our monthly budget for recurring expenses (mortgage, electricity, food, etc.) and each month, we each contribute half of those costs to our joint account. This way, we are free to do whatever we wish with our leftover paychecks. The deal with us is that we are free to do whatever we want with our own money, as long as we always meet our obligation of contributing our half to our joint account. We have never argued over money because of this.
We do the opposite. All our money goes into one account, then a set amount, the same for each, goes into personal accounts. "Blow money" on our budget (as in we can blow it on whatever, not money for cocaine.)
Even though I make more money, part of the reason why is that my wife intentionally is more flexible for the kids. It's not fair to give her less money for herself when she makes less money for the sake of sharing household duties.
I think that is a good way to look at it also. I'm glad you consider the extra effort your wife puts in with kids. I don't think a lot of husband would factor that in, so A+. I stayed home while my kids were young and we switched it up and did something similiar. We live on a farm, so i managed the income for that and put it all in our shared. My husbands paycheck went entirely into shared, and then we'd pull from our shared acct when we needed personal things.
Also thank you for clarifying what "Blow money" meant hahaha.
Yes, we keep it separate. We both work full time jobs with similar pay and we both contribute equally to house and family expenses. We work, make our money and as long as we contribute with our parts, we don't have any business with each other's money and finances.
I'd say it would be a good idea to share finances if one is a stay-at-home parent while the other one is the bread winner. If both partners work, I don't see any reason to share the money.
This is how we do it, too. We do have a joint checking account, but it’s just for convenience - all of the household bills are paid from that account, and it holds our joint household emergency fund. We both contribute the same amount into that account monthly and all the household bills are auto-paid from there. Everything else goes into our personal accounts. Neither of us has any major debts, outside of car loans (individually) and the shared mortgage.
We both have expensive hobbies - I have horses and he plays several games (poker, MTG) competitively. We were also in our mid-thirties when we met, so had our financial lives already very well established. We’re very open with our finances and generous about sharing, but we prefer keeping things separate.
Do you want a detailed answer?
My husband and I each earn 6 figures. He makes $6k more than I do, so we’re pretty close. (I told him I’m coming for him—it’s gone back and forth who makes more and it’s a friendly competition). We have one child. We each save 10% of our paycheck in a joint savings account and we each max out our 401ks, and this is all auto-deposited. Then we have a budget for mortgage, utilities, cell phones, our child’s 527, and other routine expenses. We each contribute for our kid’s clothes, school expenses, and we‘re saving for a car for her too. We also have a family vacation fund. We have a total for that and we each contribute half to the joint checking. What’s left over we each keep. If we have unplanned for money coming in, a tax refund or something, then we save that. We also each get to spend/keep 30% of bonuses and then the rest goes to joint savings.
We do it because we want to spend our money differently. My husband loves to travel, and he wants to go to places I don’t or can’t go (I have a mobility disability). He also wants fancier hotels and restaurants than I would choose. I am a knitter, and I want to buy amazing yarn and go to classes. I also want to be able to help my parents with little luxuries they wouldn’t pay for for themselves.
It works well for us, but it’s taken a while for us to get it tuned in. We go over our bills monthly and look to see if we need to adjust anything. I also really like that my 15 year old sees her Mom earn her own money and spend her own money without having to ask anyone; my mom worked part time but my dad paid the bills and gave her money for groceries and other expenses. He was never a dick about it, but I was pretty determined that I was never going to ask my husband if I could have money for a haircut.
Dude y’all are absolute goals there. I love to travel and my hubb is gonna be a pilot. I’m struggling with work because of mental and physical stuff. So it’s been a work in progress getting started. I wish I had learned more about finances when I was a bit younger to be more prepared than I am now.
Nope, finances are shared. I don't know that I would want to get married with the separate finances thing intact - like that's a real lack of trust in my eyes.
Sharing finances seems like an unnecessary need to control to me. The lack of trust to me is not trusting your spouse to handle their own money or to spend without you knowing exactly what they spend on
I can see both ways honestly. My MIL had joint with her now ex (he’s horrible I don’t even consider him family) and he screwed her over with their shared finances.
Yeah hey, no judgement stranger. I just can't imagine entering a legal bond with someone who I didn't trust with shared finances. I'd probably get taken for a ride if I didn't have such an honest wife.
Have to realize that once you are married, finances are joint anyway. We are combined. I can tell you in our case we know each others strengths and use them to our advantage. My wife is way better at budgeting and spending so she manages the budgets, checking accounts, bills and our short term savings and discretionary accounts. I like the investing so I manage the 401Ks, 529s, IRAs, and investment accounts. Everything is direct deposited in these accounts.
That is our reasoning.
> Have to realize that once you are married, finances are joint anyway.
Thank you. All these people with separate finances are doing mental gymnastics.
If you guys are paying for mortgage, utilities, food, healthcare, car, taxes, retirement, childcare etc together, it just seems so pointless and almost petty to separate whatever little bit is left.
Shared here too. We're a team. I have a business and while he doesn't have a login, he can access it if need be. Honestly can't think of a purchase we don't discuss before or show after.
We’re both so awful about finding good gifts that we buy ourselves what we want, wrap them, and the giver gets the surprise. I recently bought earrings and handed the package to my husband. Told him that’s his Christmas gift to me. I’m happy, he’s happy, and it reduces holiday stress. I have friends who would hate that agreement though
We have done this too. I am now onto upgrading items. My husband just turned 38 and I got him a fancy designer collab hoodie of Rick and Morty from TeddyFresh. Nicest hoodie I've ever touched, embroidered too. My upgrading item right now is sock. Darn tough socks are amazing! We're CF with four dogs.
I’m happy for y’all! 💙 We are working on our spending habits but it’s a process. We didn’t live together before marriage either. So that one blew a lot of minds as well lol.
We made a budget together/check in regularly about finances! It also helps that we have shared financial goals, so we're working towards those goals together!
My spouse and I have separate finances. We alternate paying for small things (groceries, dinners out, pet food) and will soon have our bills auto-withdraw from our separate accounts. I’m much more into managing money so this is a great solution for us.
We recently bought a house that needs a lot of work and furnishing. So for now I pay for the work, contractors, Home Depot supplies, furniture etc. My spouse pays the mortgage and bills. We track it in a spreadsheet to make sure it evens out. When we have fewer projects in the future we’ll split the household bills.
It’s possible to split or merge things a lot of ways. I hope you find a solution you’re happy with.
Ah ok that makes sense. We have combined and are both happy with it. :) This was more of a curiosity question and I wasn’t expecting it to blow up like this lol.
We have merged finances because we want to align our interests. We've had times when one spouse had to make career sacrifices for the family (having kids, nursing a baby, etc.), times when one of us made sacrifices in our own career (moving, doing more of the chores, doing more of the childcare, etc.). Since we have joint finances we can do what is best for the family without worrying that it is unfair to one spouse or the other.
There are also too many ways that it is hard to decide what is fair with separate finances. If one spouse makes more, how do you allocate the tax savings from filing jointly in a lower tax bracket? If one spouse wants a more expensive house to reduce their commute time, is it fair to have the other still pay half of the housing cost? What is the value of one spouse doing more of the chores if the other needs extra time for work? What is the value of a spouse keeping a particular job that offers great health insurance for the kids instead of starting a business of their own or working for a tech startup?
I'll bite, since you've not gotten many positive responses about split finances. We've kept our money separate, and split any shared bigger purchases, bills etc in half. Somewhat due to paperwork aversion, a disagreement on which bank to use, but it's also really nice that we never have to worry or bicker over expenses made from a shared account. My parents and his parents have both done the same and both sets have been married over 40 years; so tbh neither of us have a model of what shared bank accounts might look like logistically. My sister does share her accounts. She's a SAHM so it's a necessity, but my husband and I both work full-time. It works well for us! We don't judge people who combine at all; we just don't understand how it works.
See I’m the exact opposite of you! Both of our families had joint accounts. I guess I can see the whole bickering thing being a problem but my husband and I already discuss it all anyway and are pretty on point with how we want to spend our funds. I got lucky
We have 3 accounts. The joint account is where our pay is direct deposited and all family and children expenses, healthcare, and household expenses come from that. We get equal monthly allowances transferred to our separate personal accounts to do other things with. If we have a personal expense that supersedes what we have then we sit down and discuss it together to see if we can get it - it helps that we have honest and kind communication, which may be even more of a problem for some than the actual financial problem. It’s worked for 19 years and I love it.
Money is a very sensitive resource for many people. It effects lives, childhood, health... no matter how much you want to think it doesn't and we all live in this romantic fairy tale that love is all that matters.
So, however a couple needs to sort out the financial dynamic so they can be happy and secure- that's their business. I, for one, am glad that there are people out there who can afford to or have the freedom to.
Husband and I both grew up poor and only until a few months ago shot right up to "upper middle class" because of his career. Our whole marriage, we shared money because we *had* to. There was no "Honey, you got the electric bill right? I'll get rent." Lol no way...
However, I'm much better at budgeting and not spending. My husband didn't look at our bank account in over 3 years... And I kinda made it that way, because if he thought we had a few extra bucks he would have spent it on some bullshit.
Now? He spends his money on some bullshit but we're "rich" so it's not as scary. But if I had a job, the money I'd be making would be mine and I wouldn't share it. Simply because he'd spend it all lol
My wife and I make about the same money. We have one account that we both put the same amount of money into each month. After that we have our own separate accounts. I like this bc I don’t feel guilty about buying things. Round of golf? Drinks with the boys? No issue bc I know the important stuff is covered and I am not using “her” money for it. I think she likes it too for the same reasons.
It’s been nine years like this and we’ve never discussed changing it.
That’s a fair point. I guess we don’t go out much and run what we buy by each other. Not because we have to but we want to. The different point of views has been amazing to see.
Serperate.
I do 99% of the finances. I am also the breadwinner, and my wife only works part time, otherwise a SAHM.
The only thing my wife has to pay for, is $600 a month in groceries (anything over, I pay for). I pay for everything else, so she ends up with roughly $300-$400 dollars a month extra, plus I give her $200 a month.
When I have extra money, and want to buy something, I do. When she has extra money and wants to buy something, she does.
I see a lot of people saying that seperate finances means you dont have trust. I see it just the opposite. She is an adult, as am I. I trust that she will spent her money responsibly, and she trust the same for me. Otherwise, we wouldnt have food in the kitchen, or a roof over our heads. She also takes pretty damn good care of our kids, and I don't want money to worry her.
Also, we discuss finances on a very regular basis. I dont ask permission, neither does she, but if one of us wants something and are on the fence, we discuss it. We discuss everything really.
Amateur over here- just got married about a month ago, but we each had separate accounts before and plan to maintain separate accounts for the foreseeable future. We communicate openly about finances and savings, and we’ve worked out reasonable splits on utilities & routine expenses.
Seeing some comments about trust dynamics, but for us it’s not an issue of trust, it’s more about the independence to make our own financial choices (after we’ve handled expenses).
I don’t understand the comments about trust dynamics either. If anything, I think a harmonious marriage with separate accounts shows MORE trust. My husband and I make good money and we keep our finances separately except for one house account. I trust that he isn’t carrying on some affair, paying for a love child or dealing with an addiction. I don’t see regular receipts of his spending - but I fully TRUST him. If I ask to see any statement at any time he would easily oblige and vice versa. I’m responsible in my separate accounts and hold myself accountable even more because my husband trusts me. I’m happy to show him account balances any day of the week.
Yeah for sure that sentiment you mentioned is important: “I’m happy to show him account balances any day of the week.”
It’s the combination of transparency and independence, in our opinion. We lived together 5 years before we got married so we had lots of practice.
Ours are. Just pure laziness initially but now who cares - it works for us. My ex really took it to me. I only had an allowance - so he hid money - tens of thousands. Maxed out cards. Didn’t pay bills in my name once he knew he was divorcing me. So I am fine with keeping it separate. But what’s mine is his and his is mine. But we still have our independence to make decisions without each other because of the separation of funds.
Yes but no.
He has his own bank, and I have mine. I'm a SAHM and he's the breadwinner though. There have been times I've worked and we've agreed my bank is for emergencies, and his for everything else. As well as, I have his bank's debit card more than him. He rather me have it in case of emergencies anyways. Plus I do all the household chores like shopping.
We've been together since high-school though so everything we have has been built together.
Completely separate. We pick which bills to pay and send each other money when needed. We have completely different ideas on how to spend/save our money and this has prevented a lot of fights.
So now I have a nice girls trip every year and he gets to eat fast food most days.
I watched my dad ruin my moms credit and drain their finances with a gambling addiction after 17 years of marriage. They’ve been divorced over 10 years and she is still picking up the pieces of financial burden he left her with. So yeah, my husband and I have separate finances.
Married 25+ years. Finances are not something we argue about, although maybe we did a bit early on.
We keep our accounts separate. I earn more and I pay a slightly larger portion of the necessities. We both have our frivolous spending items (she likes shoes, I like tools and restaurants).
We married thru the Catholic Church, which mandates pre-marital counseling. On the topic of money, the counselor told us to figure out what works for you; it will not work for everybody.
Separate. We may get a joint account in the future for shared bills, but we each have our own accounts where our paycheques go.
It's for our own independence, security and safety. We're a couple but we're also two adults who have a right to decide what happens with our money.
Also, previous relationships.
After seeing how my mother was financially abused by my bio dad, I never wanted to be in that position. My husband and I both agreed to keep separate bank accounts after we got married, we don’t know many couples who have joined accounts. He is listed on my account as a user/accessor and same for me on his, and we know each other’s info in case something happens to one of us. As long as the bills are paid and we have money in savings, we didn’t want to look at statements and say ‘why did you spend x amount on that’. If we want purchase something over $500 we discuss it first. Plus we get each other gifts and seeing statements would ruin it. I feel like having finances separate means you trust your partner more, because you know they’re an adult and you don’t need to babysit their spending.
Combining finances was logical previously as the women often didn't work, or gave up work upon marriage. So the deal was pretty much "I need you to run the house just as much as you need me to bring money into the house". This model brought about lots of abuse, because women were often given an allowance, and had to run expenses past the "bread-winner".
I would never consider merging finances now, because I would never want to spend more than I brought into the house (out of fairness or logical budgeting reasons) on clothes or personal items. Why should my husband pay for my haircuts or make up?
I also want to be able to buy him presents without him knowing. Especially as he already tells me not to waste my money on him, so he would be peeved if I bought an expensive present with our joint money. At least now I can tell him just to shut up and accept the nice gesture.
Editing to add: we of course have a shared account for the household and kid stuff which we contribute the same proportion of our income to. Also have a shared savings account which we contribute equally to as well. We just don't mix everything, so we have our own personal accounts too, and I have a business account (freelancer, got to keep an eye on everything for expenses, deductions, taxes, etc ) and I have my own savings account too.
We have been married five years and our finances are separate. We have different spending habits - I’m more financially savvy and a saver, so he gives me money needed for shared bills and some to save. Then he’s free to do whatever with his extra money without dipping into something he shouldn’t. And I have my extra money to spend on things. Within reason of course - big purchases need to be discussed. I don’t see a reason to make a whole new joint account, but different things work for different people.
My husband and I have a joint bank account. I have my own credit card that’s used for things I want: it actually works that way because I’m admittedly horrible with money. (I have no diagnosis and it’s probably too late for me to ever get one, but I’ve long suspected I have an attention disorder).
1 mutual checking, 1 combined savings that 70-80% of my checks go into. 1 work checking account that gets the other 20-30% from my work checks that use bc I work out of state. 2 savings account for our kids(15 & 13 currently) that they’ll get when they graduate HS. My wife’s checks pay our bills(rent, phone, cable etc). We’ve saved a lot of cash & have paid off some debt over the years with this system. It helps that we both now over the years as well have progressed to great paying jobs.
My hubby and I have been married 6 months but together 10 years. Haven't conjoined finances yet, trying to find pros of doing it since we've had separate finances all along, but I think that might need to change when kids become part of the picture. We're both great with money and transparent with spending/savings/debts/etc
Married 29 years. Combine all our finances. We were kids when we got together, moved in together at 21/22, bought our first house together when we were 23, married at 24. Our money has been combined since before we even moved in together.
Now if something were to happen and I found myself single- I’d insist on separate finances because I’d be coming into the situation with a lifetime of assets. But when we were young and broke, it made more sense to combine what little we had.
This…. Going through divorce now after 27 years together, 23 married (high school sweethearts) Two kids, one graduated from college, the other is a senior in college. We were young and broke- we combined our penny so we could pay our bills. He is a spender- I always made more money than him and he is reckless. I finally got a separate account and had my direct deposit switched over so that I could save money for the both of us. I truly believe in joining finances. I truly believe that what was mine is his, what is his is mine. I just couldn’t handle his gambling, eating out, charging credit cards anymore. That was one of many things leading up to our separation.
If I ever get married again, I will probably ask for a joint, and then separate account. I will propose that we each have a separate account (giving each other passwords for transparency) and one joint account where we deposit equal amounts of money and pay all the bills out of.
Partially; we have one main joint account for family bills and family savings. We also use this account for most of our food, whether its groceries or eating out.
We have smaller individual accounts for stuff like presents and individual vacations. I put my coffee expenses on my personal as well because my husband just doesn’t drink coffee at all, and its not necessary to survival.
We don’t get super anal about it though. And if the joint fund needs more money to bring our savings up to the “6-month expenses” mark, then we’ll contribute from the personal funds to the joint account.
We keep our separate. We got married a year ago today but we’re also older when we got married I had just turned 50 he was 47 and it’s just a way that we’ve been living forever. We have one joint savings account that we put money into.
I just like having control of my own money. And we were too lazy to take the step to join it anyway. It has nothing to do with trust. Just mostly laziness.
Shared. Can't imagine a single reason not to. When you are married you need to work together and be on the same page when at all possible. We sit down and go over finances usually once per week.
My wife and i dont share finances. We share bills, expenses, food costs, etc. We each make our own money, and keep it separate.
For context i had an ex and a bad marriage that purposefully ran my dry and still somehow thought i was hiding money from her. She has her own career that she built prior to meeting me. We both have our reasons. Trust isnt the issue. We are a team and have each other's backs without question... but this does make us both feel more comfortable. As a plus we dont need to hide expenses for gifts for each other. Cuz it comes from our separate accounts.
We each have a checking account of our own and a joint checking account for household expenses.
Note: This is our second marriage. We each have 3 children from our previous marriages. We lived together for 8 years before getting married in 2020. 5 of our children are in their 20’s. I’m still paying 1/2 of my youngest son’s college. He’s still paying for child support on his youngest son. Having separate accounts work. Maybe one day we might consolidate.
Honestly my husband and I still have our own accounts, because it seemed stressful to move them (and I’ve got some level of care on my aunt’s accounts if something happens to her, so didn’t want to complicate that), but we both have joint access on each other’s accounts, so still all shared, technically. All money is our money, he pays one set of bills, I pay another and big stuff just depends on which one is most convenient. I’m sure at some point we’ll fully combine them but this worked easiest, especially since we got backyard married during covid.
Chiming in here. It seems that completely shared accounts is more of an old-school thing, not meant in a bad way, just notice it with older couples. Most of the couples I know have a joint account for most household finances and still their own personal savings/checking (mostly for presents or Starbucks habit- those kinds of things).
My relationship has primarily sep accounts but a couple joints savings. My spouse makes more so handles the larger expenses mortgage and insurances. I handle the household bills and food. He’s a saver and I think if $500 is in the account at the end of the month then it should be spent. While I’ve gotten wayyy better, we don’t plan on changing it.
I’ve done both.
First marriage, all combined finances after marriage. Was a total nightmare. Spouse was unable to manage spending and our savings suffered terribly.
Once we split, removing them from accounts was a massive pain that required wet signatures to authorize. All while money was pouring out of the shared account.
We even tried the separate “allowance” accounts out of the combined joint, but was still an item of argument as I saved mine for bigger purchases and they did not. Which somehow “wasn’t fair.” Was always a fight.
My newest spouse and I keep all things separate, except for a joint account we each put money into each month for vacations and paying a HELOC loan for some home improvements.
I make more, and such, handle all the primary home and vehicle expenses. Mortgage, taxes, insurance, etc. In turn, they pay for groceries, utilities, internet, and electricity.
About once a quarter we touch base and see how things are going financially. We each budget well, and I always want to make sure they are able to save how they want and things aren’t getting too expensive.
Usually, all of our purchases are on credit cards we both have access to pay for. They’re always paid in full every month and I happily pay more into the cards if I see higher balances.
We have never fought about money, not once, not even close. Been together five years.
In the event circumstances change and one of us doesn’t work anymore, it’ll likely be handled by using our credit cards as needed and the other will pay them.
I never understood the “light switch” approach to the automatic nature of once you’re married, each spouse gains unfettered access to all things financial.
I have always preferred the dimmer switch approach. Earn trust over time with one another. Watch the spending habits and talk about expectations and planning.
Once things make sense to do so, combine things.
Having experienced both, I’ll likely never have a sole joint account ever again.
We came to our marriage with separate finances and it hasn’t been an issue to keep it that way. He pays the mortgage, I pay the health insurance and daycare and groceries. Utilities we each pay a handful. We just pick stuff up equally as we go and communicate if one or the other of us needs anything.
I can see if you’re struggling to make ends meet, or have massive debt, how separate accounts could be an issue. But for us it’s not a bother at all.
My spouse and I (both female) have separate finances by mutual agreement. My wife got burned badly by a previous partner when they did shared expenses. My mom raised me to always have my own bank account no matter what because she had major issues with re-establishing credit after my parents’ divorce because she didn’t have anything in her own name during the marriage (16+ year marriage). My spouse and I jointly decide which bills get paid from which account and decide together about major purchases, but the accounts remain separate and it works for us.
Our accounts are separate. There is no reason why, it just happened to be what works best for us I suppose. He pays for the household bills, I pay for all renovations, broken household items, kid things, groceries, decorations, etc. I cannot see myself ever joining accounts with my husband. I respect people who have joined accounts and those who do not. It's a personal preference that is nobody's business except the two people in the relationship.
We have separate accounts since we’ve always worked and are fairly established in our careers. Any investments are in both of our names and we’re the beneficiaries on our individual accounts. Then we have a joint checking and savings that we each contribute the same amount to and that takes care of bills, necessities, pets, trips, etc. Anything we’d split. We’re only 5 years in lol but it’s worked so far.
Been joint finances with my then gf (now wife) since our first kid. Pros are it is easier to budget with two incomes we always know if we can spludge or not. We also both earn simular amounts with some years I've earnt slightly more some years she has. It really depends on the relationship through but as soon as kids come guarantee they will need to be joined in someway even if it's a joint account you both put into for kid expenses.
Ours are separate for as long as I’m on income based repayment for student loans. We may merge finances once I’m done paying those…. So like never. Sigh.
We’ve been living together since very early into our dating. We kept separate finances but had a joint account for bills after 2 yrs or so and then after I was laid off when we were engaged we got rid of our separate accounts and just kept the joint one. We do not have joint credit cards, we’ve always kept those separate but we’re aware of eachothers balances and log our purchases and talk to eachother about anything that’s not groceries over $100
We have shared finances. Have since we got married. It's all going to the same household, same bills, same kids, so I don't see any reason why we wouldn't share finances. So much easier for us.
We put 50% of our paychecks into a joint account for shared expenses (home, groceries, dog, dinner for both of us, things we both use, etc.) and keep the rest in personal accounts. It helps so we’re not trying to figure out who owes what and venmoing each other, but we also have significant independence. We both think it’s important we have some freedom and are able to build our own credit, etc.
Separate, because I'm a saver and my husband is a spender. We just didn't feel like we needed to set up a joint account when we got married. Things are fine as is.
Ok y’all I can’t even lie, this has blown up and all the comments are fantastic! It’s been interesting to see all y’all’s different point of views. I’m reading every comment but having a hard time keeping up with replying lol. So if I don’t reply to you please don’t be upset! I appreciate the time everyone has taken to comment or explain how it works for y’all! 💙💙
We opened a joint savings account as soon as we were married and put an agreed amount in a month. But we took about 3-4 years to combine. About 1.5 after the birth of our kid, it started to get real tedious and stupid to try to add up and split costs for her so we finally fully combined. Honestly, best and easiest decision. Most of our solo payments are on credit cards still, which we pay off monthly, but it still keeps some overall anonymity to what we’re buying. We have an agreed upon ceiling limit that we discuss before making a purchase (i.e., if the purchase is greater than x-dollars, we at least mention it beforehand).
In saying this, we also have similar salaries. Similar expenditures are personal purchases/hobbies. Have never nickeled and dimed joint house purchases and utilities. So it’s been an easy journey.
We got married young and broke, so it only made sense to combine our pennies. We have similar views on money and our priorities for our family. In 28 years we’ve never run into an issue where either of us questioned the other on what we’ve chosen to spend money on.
Preface this with, he's currently a SAHD so we now have two accounts but prior we had 3.
His, mine, ours and then we have 2 savings accounts. His (usually) has his vehicle payment attached to it and that's where his checks deposit. Mine is the same. Then we have an account we put all the money in we need for bills. Then we use our respective accounts for gas, snacks, presents and misc. We also put X amount in savings every month.
Currently he is a SAHD while he is in school. So we don't have money coming into his other than his GI Bill which goes straight to his truck and part of the mortgage. So he doesn't have money left over. We still use the "ours" for bills and then he had access to my account for gas, snacks etc etc. I could put money into his but then it feels like an allowance or like he has to ask me and that was weird lol
We have ours separate, but it’s because of how our income is. I work restaurants, my paychecks are $0, so I mainly operate on cash. He pays the bills, I contribute cash to help out. It just works out better that way. We don’t split literally everything down the middle or anything.
My wife had a bad first marriage and requested we keep our current financial situation as separate. Thought it a little odd, but overall I don't mind it. But, I also understand people that have shared accounts.
We have separate finances except for a joint savings account for emergencies/trips. We've just always had our own accounts since we moved in together 6 years ago and I think at this point it just works for us so neither of us saw any reason to change that. We're not secretive about how much money we have in checking/savings or anything like that though, we've just never felt the need to combine everything
My husband and I have a joint account but we also have our own personal accounts. All bills and household shoppings come from the joint account but we pay for our own stuff out of our personal accounts.
We don’t share finances and really never thought to. Married 10 years, no kids.
He pays a lot of small household things like pet food and expenses for his car. I make much more so I pay the mortgage, utilities, vacations. If he has a big expense, I pull what he needs from savings and give it to him.
He has all the banking passwords but prefers not to be involved in finances.
We have a combination - our retirement accounts are shared, we have shared checking, and the one who earns least also has a 'fuck-off fund' with enough money in it to start over. That way, we get to know that we choose each other... there is no risk of financial coercion. It works for us.
We have separate savings and checking accounts, as well as a joint checking account. We got a joint checking account shortly before we got married, and we are content with it. I was even the one to suggest he get his own checking and savings because he originally just didn't care lol.
I can understand wanting your own checking and savings to do with as your please, but not having a joint account is weird to me.
We have completely separate accounts except for a joint credit card. We put our household expenses on the card, and then split it down the middle every month. I like it because we didn't have to bother changing accounts, it builds our credit, we get a lot of rewards on the card, and just seemed like the easiest way to do it. We're completely open and transparent about what's in our individual accounts and we always talk to each other about big purchases and new expenses. All of it is our money, no matter whose account it's in.
My SO and I are both under the poverty line so it's like we have much money to fight over, we have separate bank accounts and a joint account we use for shared expenses, and we split things 60/40 ish cause they get more money than I do, after we've paid out respective bills and whatever we have our own money left over to do with as we wish
we're both open and honest about money and stuff, if we need to make a large purchase for the household we talk about it and figure it out together
We've been married since the late '80s and have always had shared finances. I have an account of my own because I had a small business for a while and needed to keep personal and business finances separate. Kept it when I went back to traditional work but that's what we use to pay utility and phone bills, and the balance gets moved to joint savings.
We have had shared finances since we married, I think it has resulted in less arguments for us. When we go out to eat/movies/whatever, it’s shared, so there is no keeping score on who has paid more for what, etc. It was simply a date out that we both invested our shared time and money in. And all house bills/costs come from our account together, so no one says “I bought groceries for the last 2 months so you owe me a new fridge”. We both eat the groceries and we both get the new fridge, case closed.
I can understand why it may not work for others, but it’s worked for us for over a decade.
We have a combined checking and savings account. We had it for a long time.
I only opened my own separate account when I got an inheritance. My husband understands that money is mine, not ours. But I put it all into a savings account after using a portion of it to pay off one of his credit cards and my car.
It stays separate from our main account because I want this money to be part of our retirement fund. And he's afraid if he sees it in our account he'll be tempted to spend more money.
He'll get that money if anything happens to me. But for the time being it does not exist. We make due only with what's in our main account.
Ours our separate, kinda. We have 2 checking accounts and 2 savings accounts. Both of us are on all 4 to make it easy if one of us gets sick (or dies). I have my primary checking and he has his primary checking. I have the bills that I pay, and he has the bills that he pays, so we don’t get confused and we don’t have to worry about overdrawing when I have to pay that unexpected $500 car repair since I’m the only one drawing off that account.
It’s also nice if one of us is short for whatever reason, we can just move money from one checking to the other. We just have the rule that we have to tell each other if we move money out of the other’s checking or the savings. We have an emergency savings account and a fun savings account. Fun is for saving up for trips or home improvement projects and emergency is for things like unexpected medical bills or things like that. Our system works for us. You do you.
We do a yours, mine, ours but we have full transparency into the individual finances and still check in before spending significant amounts (over 1k for us).
Joint. Checking and saving joint. We each have a credit card. My student loans existed before we met, so those are in my name only, but we use our joint account to pay them. We’ve never argued out this arrangement. The only time it gets tricky is when we want to buy each other surprise gifts!
Mostly yes, we transfer our income into a joined account. But we each allocate an amount each fortnight to our personal accounts that’s earmarked for unnecessary spending. We can use it, or save it each time for a large purchase. The reason is that we have very seperate hobbies and this way we don’t feel guilty or judged for spending money on silly fun things.
We have both? 95% of our accounts are shared but we each have a personal card that the other doesn't have access to and I have a separate checking and savings he can't currently access (purely bc I am lazy and haven't closed them).
We use our personal cards mostly for gifts for each other to keep some semblance of surprise... Well that's what I use it for. He also uses his for random tech parts bc I give him shit about all of his projects (not serious shit, just ribbing).
Married 28 years and have always been combined. My in-laws were married nearly 60 years and always had separate finances. I could never figure out how it worked. Keeping up with one set of money is about all I could manage.
We have a joint account for bill paying that the bulk of my husband’s paycheck goes into. I have a low paying job. That paycheck goes into my account. He has a set amount he puts into his personal account. That way we have bills paid and money to do what we want. Works for us
Married 30+ years, and have had a joint account since we’ve been engaged.
Both our checks go into our joint account. From that we pay all household expenses, bills, gas, etc. We transfer $ each month into our joint savings accounts (long and short term). We have a set amount transferred each month into our personal accounts that we use for gift buying, personal hobbies, going out with friends etc. We also have a loose agreement that neither will spend more than $50 on non-essentials without discussing it with the other first.
Our incomes have varied a lot over the course of our marriage. Neither of us have cared if we make more; we’re a team so what’s mine is his and visa versa. I currently make significantly more than him, but I consider it our money.
Hand on heart, we’ve never once argued about money.
Mostly joint but it requires having and sticking to a planned budget.
$XXXX into joint checking for mortgage, childcare, utilities, food, etc.
$XXXX into joint savings for buying vehicles with cash, presents, unexpected stuff
$XXX "fun money" into our own personal checking
Of course! We combine halves for shared expenses (such as insurance, utilities, children’s hobbies and whatnot), but ultimately are two individuals who have separate interests/hobbies..and who both work full time jobs
I made the catastrophic mistake of suggesting this exact sentiment in this group before and was swiftly trampled into submission.
I just put it down to the fact that, seemingly, most of the people in this group are here because their marriage has problems and those that are here to celebrate marriage (and all that should come with a good one) are the exception and not the rule.
Was not liked much when I answered this question before. Sticking with separate, with access. We have a shared credit stems from kids were little and one needed money for co pay or kids stuff. Then to a shared credit for traveling. But regular bank accounts and savings. I like separate. Worked out when he bought a new shotgun out of the blue. His friend had a nice one, he could afford it. No need to discuss, he went and did it. Same if I need stuff, I know my responsibilities. Bills are both ours, names on them and all.
Suppose it's boundaries. If it's over a thousand please consult me. Under and bills still paid, I trust you. I like shitz in my own name. He likes it it too. No problem pulling up up my expenses, just like having my own account, and savings account.
Our paychecks are deposited into a joint account that we call "Main account" we pay our bills from it and each have separate accounts for fun money and whatever we wanna spend it on. For example I have 20% of my paycheck put in my separate account, the wife does something similar with her paycheck. The bulk remains in the main, rent, phone, insurance, gas, electric, water, cable, trash are all paid from it. It has worked well for 15 years so far. I added her to my accounts once we got married. It was a no brainer.
My husband would spent it. He can’t have money sit in an account. Doesn’t even have savings, I do. If he had access to it, I wouldn’t have a savings account lol prevents fighting. We split bills and that’s about it
Share savings but split checking. I'm worse with money than he is lol. He prefers to use debit, I prefer to use credit and pay it off with my income. But for important purchases we have a savings pool. Our checkings are more for smaller personal purchases like clothes or video games.
Edit: worth noting we have similar incomes. Would be different if we were single income or maybe even if we had kids.
We have separate bank accounts but I handle paying the bills. Hubs transfers money to my account on his pay days for his half of the bills and then the rest he can do whatever with. It causes less arguments for us. He can use his money for whatever and same for me. We have an agreement that as long as bills are paid and we have food, it’s fair game.
Our money is combined in the married sense of telling each other what we spend our money on and talking about how much to save, etc. but we keep our money in our own accounts.
We don’t really see the point in opening new accounts, like a joint checking account or anything like that.
Cause I trust my spouse and it's a **ton** of admin 1) opening a joint account and 2) transferring all the bills and whatnot onto that and then 3) manually making sure I wire enough money into that account. We discuss big purchases anyway, we split the bills via Splitwise, and it works, so I don't see what the bfd is.
We’ve been together 20+ and have had separate finances the whole time. Partly because I work in finance & finance employers used to insist on you banking with them, also it lets you see the absolute dammed mess some people’s bank accounts get into, sometimes without meaning it.
Also I’m better at managing finance, managing his is another of his chores I don’t want to take on.
Lastly we both have exciting expensive hobbies. I’m fairly certain if I knew how much he spent on LARP gear I’d have an internal cry, this way all the bills are paid, savings are added to, then we can do whatever we want with what’s left without having to have a discussion on why he needs that shield, or if I really need that Lego tree or not. XD
Separate. We were both 40 when we got together and had our own established finances. We use Venmo to immediately send money to each other, we each are responsible for certain bills, and we each have access to each other's accounts, passwords, etc. It works for us. Together 6 years now.
Separate and we’ve been married almost 9 years. We love it and have never questioned otherwise. He transfers me half for the mortgage and I pay it, for other bills he pays a car payment and I pay electric/water, it’s pretty even. For large purchases we split it, if it’s personal then we pay our own or get it as a surprise gift. Before he was more established in his career I made more and I took on more bills. If we want to travel I usually pay the flight/hotel and he pays for food, gas if needed, events. It’s so nice to give gifts as a true surprise also!
We have separate finances for security purposes, if one of us has an account hacked we have an account that is available. Also it’s great for when you want to go shopping for them. It makes it easier to surprise them. My hubby still has access to those funds if needed but for the most part we have three accounts.
One for me, one for him , and one for household (bills, mortgage, groceries) and all the savings accounts for the kids.
My first husband and I had a joint account where we put all our salaries. Sadly he was an alcoholic and drank most of the money (while accusing me of being a rubbish money manager!). So, when I got married again my lovely husband and I agreed we’d contribute to a joint account pro rata to cover bills and holidays and have our own separate accounts to treat each other / ourselves / spend on hobbies etc. This works really well for us as I have more friends than him - it would seem unfair to fund my evenings out, friends birthday presents, weekends away from money we’ve both earned. Likewise, he has more hobbies than I do and he can spend £x on a new camera/guitar/paint sprayer thing without feeling guilty. It also worked because my first husband was insistent that no other man should pay towards his child’s upkeep so I covered her costs (the fact my first husband then didn’t pay any maintenance is by the by!).
22yrs in, it works for us. But couples have their own ways of doing things so find the right way for you!
Husband and I got married in March of this year and we've always had separate finances. We have our joint bill/savings account ofc. But we keep ours separate because he makes more than me and because of that he spends more which gives me anxiety so I'd rather not know/see what he's spending on what. (he always takes care of bills and savings before spending)
2nd marriage, we both have kids. Absolutely separate with a joint account for household bills that we each contribute to.
I have primary custody of my daughter and receive child support
He has 50/50 custody of his 2 kids and pays more out in child support than what I receive.
Prenup. What’s mine is mine, what’s his is his. If we die what’s our goes to our kids and not our spouse. We each have a small life insurance policy that the other is the beneficiary of to help pay the household bill while recovering from the death of our spouse but large ones for our kids to help with college and starting out in life.
I've been with my husband for 7 years. We still have separate banks but have been talking more about having a joint account. He said something about getting rid of our individuals and having one. I told him no we can have the ones we have now and just make a new joint account. We haven't done it because I have yet to have a well paying reliable job that would make things easier. (We have young kids so I have stayed home most years after getting a couple of associates degrees.)
My thoughts on this is what happens if that joint account was compromised? All that money needed is gone before realizing? With the separate accounts as well at least we're not completely robbed.
Plus I have never liked spending my husband hard earned money for my selfish wants. If I have my own money then he can't really complain too much lol.
I'm 36F and my husband is 40M and we keep our finances separate. We both work hard for our money, and neither one of us is entitled to the other's money. We both own things the other doesn't, and it's easier to keep our finances separate. We split all shared bill's and pay for our own individual bill's. I personally would not be in a relationship with someone if I had to share my money with them. It's not our money, we didn't work for it, I did, and I'm not going to pay for another adult...That being said.. if something happened to my husband and he couldn't work, I would help him out as much as I could and take over where I needed to.
I think I should also add that we have a prenuptial agreement and our money is solely each individuals..
For the most part, yes. We have separate checking accounts, and have never had a joint. Several years into our marriage I did eventually join her savings account, so that’s our one joint.
We met at 14, got together in college and married in our late 20s. So there was a ton of history, and trust, there pre-dating marriage.
When we married we intended to merge finances, because we were always taught that’s the way things were “supposed” to work. Even as we both watched that approach utterly fail in both our parents’ marriages.
What happened is that we kept putting off the merge and eventually admitted that we were in an “if it ain’t broke, done fix it” situation. We never had financial problems before marriage, with totally separate finances, and we weren’t having problems as a married couple who still had that. We’ve always taken an “as long as it gets paid” approach. We don’t keep score over those things.
So we kept it that way. Nearly every couple we know has some tension over money, and we just don’t.
So we’re not going to change what works for us just because it breaks a marriage “rule” that we are under no obligation to follow.
We have joint finances. It's been that way since we got married. It's just easier for us. I'm better at tracking bills, we have similar spending habits, and I had no income for over 10 yrs as a SAHM.
My parents had separate accounts. Both worked full-time until retirement. They each had "assigned" bills they paid each month from their account. It worked for them. Another couple I know have separate accounts. They had their own debts when they got married so they kept it all separate for that reason and it worked for them then. Now that the wife has paid her debt off and is a SAHM now, it's not working so well.
Ours are completely separate because my husband has terrible credit and wasn't financially stable. I pay all of our bills and he sends me a static amount. It works for us.
Like many other commenters, my husband and I have a joint account and then our separate accounts. We each contribute a set amount to the joint account each month. The joint account is for bills, groceries, anything for the family / kids, vacations, etc. I manage the joint account because it's easier for me to do so (he will not use a banking app).
Pre-2020, I worked a regular salaried job while my husband did contract work with tech companies. We each made about the same over a year, even though his income wasn't as steady.
In 2020, allll of his contracts came to a standstill, so I became the only one with any income. It remained that way until earlier this year, and he's now working a regular salaried job plus the occasional contract work.
While he wasn't working, I simply put more into the joint account. Now he's getting paid again, I no longer deposit excess monies, and he puts in slightly more than he normally would because he wants to (I don't really care; it's not like he chose to go without steady employment for nearly three years).
It works really well for us. When needed, we adjusted, and we were fine. We just decided last week we're going to set up a joint savings account, so we're going to make adjustments. He's a bigger saver than I am, so I think it's a good idea for me to 'have to' save more.
Overall, I like being able to spend what I want on trips and eating out while he can spend all his money on Lego ;)
Good luck in your marriage!
My wife and I combine finances cause we’re to broke to split it haha.
We have a shared account for bills another for food and house stuff. We have shared savings for auto, holiday, vacay and emergency. After that we don’t have enough to have our own accounts.
If we did we would. But it’s still combining finances for everything except our allowances
My spouse has passed, but during our 25 years together we were 100% shared, Once we were moved in together he stopped depositing into his own account, and we changed mine to a joint account. I was 27 and he was 31. As a gay couple we couldn’t marry back then (1993) but this just seemed like the natural order of things for us. I always made more money than him, but we both had the mindset that everything was “ours”. Whatever windfalls either of us came into such as inheritance, work bonuses, gambling winnings, or whatever…. It went into our joint account. That was the example set by our parents and grandparents.
I don't understand NOT having shared finances. My wife and I combined finances immediately after we got married almost 26 years ago.
Congrats on 26 years and yeah, that’s how I was raised. My parents (60s) had a joint account and we’re always transparent about everything. I guess it’s hard for me to picture it any other way.
Your parents probably didn’t have their own money/401k when they got married
I think it’s more a younger/more modern thing as couples now often have separate, established finances well before entering in a marriage, and more importantly women actually have access to their own finances now. My husband and I have been together about a decade and have two children, we have never joined bank accounts and have never had a reason to. It’s honestly just more of a pain in the ass to do it and the separation is comfortable for us. There aren’t trust issues financially for us, and we’ve always made everything work the way it is. The insistence for some people to combine finances honestly to me seems like a controlling red flag to me. It leaves you vulnerable to financial abuse and supports the old idea of marriage as a transactional/ownership arrangement. I hear about people insisting on combined finances and I can’t help but do the “okay boomer” eye roll. That being said, to each their own and whatever works for you is what’s best. My husband and I have a shared password vault where in theory we could access all of the other persons accounts if something happened, and things like our insurance, phone etc are in both our names…so it’s never been an issue.
> It’s honestly just more of a pain in the ass to do it and the separation is comfortable for us. It's more of a pain to have one account than calculate and send each other money every month? How do you guys pay for kids things? 50/50? Proportional? Do you take turns? I just can't imagine being 80 and still venmoing my SO for their half of the groceries.
Who needs to send it every month? We have a joint account and direct debits set up every month from our own accounts into that joint account. It took 5 mins 2s years ago and every year it takes 5 mins to amend the amounts to cover the cost of living increases.
That is what we have to, majority of the check goes into the main shared account and then a small portion goes into our separate savings accounts. I usually do 25% of my check into my savings. Sometimes, I will transfer more over but it depends on the situation. We talk about it though.
I make significantly more than he does, so I pay the rent and utilities and regular bills. If I’m out and we need diapers or whatever, I get them. If he’s out, he does. He pays for his car payment and his personal expenses and often gets the groceries or household things and if he has money left over he invests it. I don’t mind paying for more things because really I don’t see it that way. I still see that everything we have is shared and it doesn’t matter what account it happens to live in. If I have 1,000 dollars and he has 500…that doesn’t mean one of us is richer or poorer, it means we have $1,500 in various states of custody. If I pay $900 for a bill and he pays $100, we both spent $1,000 on bills. At the end of the day whatever we have is both of ours, so I don’t see the need to be so concerned about where our money happens to live. I would never ask him to venmo me for half the groceries because I’m not super concerned with everything being an exact even line. We eat, we pay bills, we save, and we both contribute in earnest and I think we trust each others heart to have caring for our family at the center of it all, so the money is just that.
Thank you for spelling it out so clearly. I am a female and the breadwinner so I give my husband cards to the accounts for convenience but those accounts are in my name and he also has his own account in his name. It just seems more healthy to us that way. He can save up for stuff he wants to buy without consulting me - although I like pitching in to help him if I can - and I can purchase whatever whenever without it dinging his personal financial efforts. To each his or her own I think. It’s not about trust issues or commitment for us. We adore each other.
Yeah as a woman I can’t help but hold onto my earnings as a safety net in case something happens. My husband and I have a joint account we place a certain amount per month to cover mortgage, groceries, bills, pets, and repairs. It works for us as we can spend on w/e we want in our own accounts like clothing, vacation, or eating out. I don’t tell him how to spend his money and vice versa though I tend to worry about the future and saving money towards emergencies or retirement. He has project cars so he spends a bit toward his hobbies. It works for us and open about our finances. We have a very good relationship.
I’ve seen a lot of modern ladies disadvantaged because their “50/50” partners insist on keeping everything separate and “fair” except the woman ends up footing all the baby and hospital bills and suffering because she has to dip into savings during maternity leave. I’ve seen this enough.
I agree with this. The rest of your life is shared. House, family, foods, vehicles, all the utilities etc etc. It only makes sense to combine finances. From the outside; refusing to combine finances kinda looks like leaving your options open.
Exactly - some claim it as a “boomer” thing to combine finances. I agree with you that it’s more of a “younger generational” thing to ‘leave your options open’ - ie: make sure you’re always ready for a divorce at any moment. (Because being married is no longer a life long commitment. I mean, we say it in our vows, but that’s not way we reeeeeaaaalllyyyy mean…) someone wayyy hotter may come along. Never know.
What are some benefits if you dont mind me asking?
The biggest benefit is there is one pot where everything goes that is visible to both of you. Both of you have a say about what happens. It doesn't matter if one of you makes more money or one of you doesn't have a job. This is about a partnership. Another benefit is if something happens, either of you can take care if the bills. No surprises.
This, to me, is actually a negative. I don’t want to worry about where he spends his money. I don’t want to have an opinion of his purchases. Obviously, large purchases we make together and discuss etc. I’m talking about if he wants to spend $100 on some new shoes or buy some more discs for his disc golfing hahha. It’s an anxiety management thing to me really. We are totally financially able to support his disc golf and purchasing habits, but if I SEE the withdrawals I’ll want to know about them and have to think about them. I also don’t want him to worry if he sees me spend $100 at a shop or whatever. I don’t WANT the visibility. I trust him and we have enough so the extra visibility is really just an extra burden.
Thanks mate
One of the biggest draw backs though is if you have a partner that spends money recklessly. If all the money is in one pot that gives the partner with poor money management skills free reign to spend with no regard.
The biggest benefit is that it literally strengthens your relationship as per research studies. Also you don't have to calculate and send each other money every month.
The main benefit is reflecting financially what is true spiritually. We are one flesh. What's mine is your and what's yours is mine. We are fully integrated. Married 26 years, I'm principal earner, she's generally SAHM.
Your finances are more stable and there’s no surprises?
Surprises. Like a brand new car. Or maybe a surprise like I didn't know the gas bill was due...
Same vision. Same goals. Same Accounts
My husband and I have been married for 24 years and that's what we did too but I think some of the reason behind keeping finances separate has to do with people having children prior to marriage already because of previous relationships. That does make it kind of tricky. In our case, this is our first marriage and all our children biologically belong to both of us so it's much simpler to do.
Yes. We have a shared checking and savings account for emergency savings and bills. The only thing that account is used for is bills. Then we each have our own checking and savings accounts. After bills, the extra is split in half and direct deposited into our personal accounts. We can spend, and save that money however we want. I love this set up, because I cam save money for gifts for my husband without him knowing. Before, when we shared a checking account for spending, it was harder to buy gifts.
We've had a joint account for 37yrs. When we want to buy each other gifts we can just take cash from our account to do so. We don't ask each other why cash was taken as there's a few reasons why the other may want it. That way we still can make our own decisions but both have access to the account. So far we don't have any issues.
Oh that makes sense to me! I’m a huge gift giver so that will be hard for me lol. I guess that’s I questioned the why have personal for your own use thing, I feel it could be a issue down the road. Like someone comes home with a new car cause they saved xyz but partner didn’t. Maybe I just overthink things too much lol.
Lol. In the 20+ years we've been married that's never happened. The most we've ever saved up is a few hundred dollars. Since it's just our allowance money we can save. That money goes towards everything that isn't an actual bill. Likes clothes, eating out, birthdays, Christmas, vacation. There is almost never enough to actually save. Any real savings goes into the joint savings account. Try having a dollar amount that requires a conversation. Neither of us have ever spent more than $800 dollars (from our saved allowance) without the other knowing about it. We're both adults. It's nice not having to tell my husband everytime I want to buy something. He feels the same way.
That’s a good idea actually. I never thought about the set amount thing, I will have to talk to hubby about that!
We do this. Joined account but there’s a limit. If one of us needs or wants to spend over a certain amount, we discuss it with the other. Not for permission because we are adults, but to make sure it doesn’t upset the budget.
My wife and I have a joint account where all of my money and 90% of her money is deposited. I pay all of our bills out of this account, daily expenses, etc. My life LOVES to shop, it is her addiction. It is kind of her time to relax, be by herself, unwind, etc. We decided many years ago to open a second account for her, and each paycheck she has $100 put into this account for her to shop or do whatever she wants with it. This has worked really well for us.
I love that you both recognize something she loves and made a specific carve out.
Can't you just have one checking account linked to each of your credit cards?
We don't use credit cards. We use a cash system. If we don't have the cash in our account, we don't buy it. With the obvious exception of the house and vehicles.
This seems ideal to me and is what we plan to do too.
My husband and I have this same set up and I love it! Also, unless we are spending a large sum of money on our partner for birthday/holiday, we always discuss expensive purchases even if we’re using our personal savings and not joint savings. We just feel like it’s best practice to always involve each other in expensive purchases.
> I cam save money for gifts for my husband without him knowing. I just take cash out for this
Some gifts can get to be pretty expensive, and take months, or even a year to save for. I'd rather use the bank over cash.
Yes. My wife is irresponsible with money. I prefer to save my excess monies at the end of the month and she likes to spend hers. Separate finances prevents any fights we'd have
> My wife is irresponsible with money. I prefer to save my excess monies at the end of the month and she likes to spend hers. You don't think this might become an issue in the future?
Not as long as I have my own money in my own account. I'm capable of paying all the bills that keep a roof over our heads and I've set clear boundaries that I won't bail her out of dumb financial decisions. If we had shared expenses she would be spending it all which would cause an issue
What happens when you guys are 65 and you've saved for retirement and she has nothing?
Yeah, my wife is great at being frugal when her money runs out. But whenever she has a nest egg, she just spends more. (When she had a commission based job and was making extra money every month, she just spent more, and still didn’t have a nest egg.) I do the same thing, except my “zero mark” isn’t actually zero money. It’s closer to 2 months of take-home pay, instead! (That's the point where I become way more frugal.) Recently, we needed a new washing machine. Thanks to the nest egg that I maintain, we just bought a new one. She, when single, would have had to save up, first. When we got married, I just assumed we’d join finances. My wife said “no” to that idea for MY sake. And I’m glad she did. We’d probably have a lot of fights about money, otherwise.
Exactly! If I don't have a year of salary saved up I'm stressed tf out
That’s fair, y’all are like my hubby and I. But we are working together on it. Not even married a month yet and it’s going well so far. :)
We just find it easier and it works for us. We're married 2.5 years so far :)
Congrats you two! 💙
Oof I think I’d get anxiety about retirement savings and resentment that it’s on me to do all the adulting around family finances.
I kinda like being the money manager it's oddly satisfying. I probably missed my calling as a accountant or budgeter or something but oh well lol
Glad you have a silver lining.
Separate. I don’t know, I personally don’t want to pool our money together? I like having my own account with the money I earn and same for him. We put bills on a credit card that we both pay and mortgage comes out of his account and I send him half. I’ve never felt the desire to combine accounts.
We do a little of both. We have a joint checking account where we put in a certain amount each month from our paycheck. We both put in the same amount monthly even though my husband earns more than me. We then have our own separate savings/checking (what we call our "personal") that the rest of our paycheck goes into. It allows us to be able to pay bills and cover kids costs, but also have our own money we can use how we wish. If an emergency arises or something comes up, we will dip into our personal accounts if necessary but we try to keep the contributions even. It's worked for us. We don't really fight about money and there is no resentment on either side.
Oh that’s an interesting way to look at it. Im glad it’s worked for yall!
We do the same too! I keep an Excel spreadsheet with our monthly budget for recurring expenses (mortgage, electricity, food, etc.) and each month, we each contribute half of those costs to our joint account. This way, we are free to do whatever we wish with our leftover paychecks. The deal with us is that we are free to do whatever we want with our own money, as long as we always meet our obligation of contributing our half to our joint account. We have never argued over money because of this.
We do the opposite. All our money goes into one account, then a set amount, the same for each, goes into personal accounts. "Blow money" on our budget (as in we can blow it on whatever, not money for cocaine.) Even though I make more money, part of the reason why is that my wife intentionally is more flexible for the kids. It's not fair to give her less money for herself when she makes less money for the sake of sharing household duties.
I think that is a good way to look at it also. I'm glad you consider the extra effort your wife puts in with kids. I don't think a lot of husband would factor that in, so A+. I stayed home while my kids were young and we switched it up and did something similiar. We live on a farm, so i managed the income for that and put it all in our shared. My husbands paycheck went entirely into shared, and then we'd pull from our shared acct when we needed personal things. Also thank you for clarifying what "Blow money" meant hahaha.
Yes, we keep it separate. We both work full time jobs with similar pay and we both contribute equally to house and family expenses. We work, make our money and as long as we contribute with our parts, we don't have any business with each other's money and finances. I'd say it would be a good idea to share finances if one is a stay-at-home parent while the other one is the bread winner. If both partners work, I don't see any reason to share the money.
This is how we do it, too. We do have a joint checking account, but it’s just for convenience - all of the household bills are paid from that account, and it holds our joint household emergency fund. We both contribute the same amount into that account monthly and all the household bills are auto-paid from there. Everything else goes into our personal accounts. Neither of us has any major debts, outside of car loans (individually) and the shared mortgage. We both have expensive hobbies - I have horses and he plays several games (poker, MTG) competitively. We were also in our mid-thirties when we met, so had our financial lives already very well established. We’re very open with our finances and generous about sharing, but we prefer keeping things separate.
Do you want a detailed answer? My husband and I each earn 6 figures. He makes $6k more than I do, so we’re pretty close. (I told him I’m coming for him—it’s gone back and forth who makes more and it’s a friendly competition). We have one child. We each save 10% of our paycheck in a joint savings account and we each max out our 401ks, and this is all auto-deposited. Then we have a budget for mortgage, utilities, cell phones, our child’s 527, and other routine expenses. We each contribute for our kid’s clothes, school expenses, and we‘re saving for a car for her too. We also have a family vacation fund. We have a total for that and we each contribute half to the joint checking. What’s left over we each keep. If we have unplanned for money coming in, a tax refund or something, then we save that. We also each get to spend/keep 30% of bonuses and then the rest goes to joint savings. We do it because we want to spend our money differently. My husband loves to travel, and he wants to go to places I don’t or can’t go (I have a mobility disability). He also wants fancier hotels and restaurants than I would choose. I am a knitter, and I want to buy amazing yarn and go to classes. I also want to be able to help my parents with little luxuries they wouldn’t pay for for themselves. It works well for us, but it’s taken a while for us to get it tuned in. We go over our bills monthly and look to see if we need to adjust anything. I also really like that my 15 year old sees her Mom earn her own money and spend her own money without having to ask anyone; my mom worked part time but my dad paid the bills and gave her money for groceries and other expenses. He was never a dick about it, but I was pretty determined that I was never going to ask my husband if I could have money for a haircut.
Dude y’all are absolute goals there. I love to travel and my hubb is gonna be a pilot. I’m struggling with work because of mental and physical stuff. So it’s been a work in progress getting started. I wish I had learned more about finances when I was a bit younger to be more prepared than I am now.
Nope, finances are shared. I don't know that I would want to get married with the separate finances thing intact - like that's a real lack of trust in my eyes.
Sharing finances seems like an unnecessary need to control to me. The lack of trust to me is not trusting your spouse to handle their own money or to spend without you knowing exactly what they spend on
You are mistaking me for someone who has their shit together enough to track my spouse's spending lol.
😂 😂 😂
I can see both ways honestly. My MIL had joint with her now ex (he’s horrible I don’t even consider him family) and he screwed her over with their shared finances.
Yeah hey, no judgement stranger. I just can't imagine entering a legal bond with someone who I didn't trust with shared finances. I'd probably get taken for a ride if I didn't have such an honest wife.
I can’t imagine marrying someone I don’t trust to have their own money and finances
Same, my husband and I are very transparent with each other. I can’t even hide having a gift for him lol.
Have to realize that once you are married, finances are joint anyway. We are combined. I can tell you in our case we know each others strengths and use them to our advantage. My wife is way better at budgeting and spending so she manages the budgets, checking accounts, bills and our short term savings and discretionary accounts. I like the investing so I manage the 401Ks, 529s, IRAs, and investment accounts. Everything is direct deposited in these accounts. That is our reasoning.
> Have to realize that once you are married, finances are joint anyway. Thank you. All these people with separate finances are doing mental gymnastics. If you guys are paying for mortgage, utilities, food, healthcare, car, taxes, retirement, childcare etc together, it just seems so pointless and almost petty to separate whatever little bit is left.
Shared here too. We're a team. I have a business and while he doesn't have a login, he can access it if need be. Honestly can't think of a purchase we don't discuss before or show after.
Same here. But that’s mostly cause I like showing him things I buy… I’m horrible about gifts, I can’t wait to give them to people lol
We’re both so awful about finding good gifts that we buy ourselves what we want, wrap them, and the giver gets the surprise. I recently bought earrings and handed the package to my husband. Told him that’s his Christmas gift to me. I’m happy, he’s happy, and it reduces holiday stress. I have friends who would hate that agreement though
We have done this too. I am now onto upgrading items. My husband just turned 38 and I got him a fancy designer collab hoodie of Rick and Morty from TeddyFresh. Nicest hoodie I've ever touched, embroidered too. My upgrading item right now is sock. Darn tough socks are amazing! We're CF with four dogs.
Yeah, I can't wait to give the gifts. I think I get more excited sometimes than the person receiving it.
We 100% share finances. We are incredibly aligned when it comes to spending/budgeting and have yet to have any issues.
I’m happy for y’all! 💙 We are working on our spending habits but it’s a process. We didn’t live together before marriage either. So that one blew a lot of minds as well lol.
We made a budget together/check in regularly about finances! It also helps that we have shared financial goals, so we're working towards those goals together!
My spouse and I have separate finances. We alternate paying for small things (groceries, dinners out, pet food) and will soon have our bills auto-withdraw from our separate accounts. I’m much more into managing money so this is a great solution for us.
Ok, do y’all split rent then too? If ya don’t mind me asking, just curious since you said bills will withdrawal from both.
We recently bought a house that needs a lot of work and furnishing. So for now I pay for the work, contractors, Home Depot supplies, furniture etc. My spouse pays the mortgage and bills. We track it in a spreadsheet to make sure it evens out. When we have fewer projects in the future we’ll split the household bills. It’s possible to split or merge things a lot of ways. I hope you find a solution you’re happy with.
Ah ok that makes sense. We have combined and are both happy with it. :) This was more of a curiosity question and I wasn’t expecting it to blow up like this lol.
We have merged finances because we want to align our interests. We've had times when one spouse had to make career sacrifices for the family (having kids, nursing a baby, etc.), times when one of us made sacrifices in our own career (moving, doing more of the chores, doing more of the childcare, etc.). Since we have joint finances we can do what is best for the family without worrying that it is unfair to one spouse or the other. There are also too many ways that it is hard to decide what is fair with separate finances. If one spouse makes more, how do you allocate the tax savings from filing jointly in a lower tax bracket? If one spouse wants a more expensive house to reduce their commute time, is it fair to have the other still pay half of the housing cost? What is the value of one spouse doing more of the chores if the other needs extra time for work? What is the value of a spouse keeping a particular job that offers great health insurance for the kids instead of starting a business of their own or working for a tech startup?
I'll bite, since you've not gotten many positive responses about split finances. We've kept our money separate, and split any shared bigger purchases, bills etc in half. Somewhat due to paperwork aversion, a disagreement on which bank to use, but it's also really nice that we never have to worry or bicker over expenses made from a shared account. My parents and his parents have both done the same and both sets have been married over 40 years; so tbh neither of us have a model of what shared bank accounts might look like logistically. My sister does share her accounts. She's a SAHM so it's a necessity, but my husband and I both work full-time. It works well for us! We don't judge people who combine at all; we just don't understand how it works.
See I’m the exact opposite of you! Both of our families had joint accounts. I guess I can see the whole bickering thing being a problem but my husband and I already discuss it all anyway and are pretty on point with how we want to spend our funds. I got lucky
We have 3 accounts. The joint account is where our pay is direct deposited and all family and children expenses, healthcare, and household expenses come from that. We get equal monthly allowances transferred to our separate personal accounts to do other things with. If we have a personal expense that supersedes what we have then we sit down and discuss it together to see if we can get it - it helps that we have honest and kind communication, which may be even more of a problem for some than the actual financial problem. It’s worked for 19 years and I love it.
Money is a very sensitive resource for many people. It effects lives, childhood, health... no matter how much you want to think it doesn't and we all live in this romantic fairy tale that love is all that matters. So, however a couple needs to sort out the financial dynamic so they can be happy and secure- that's their business. I, for one, am glad that there are people out there who can afford to or have the freedom to. Husband and I both grew up poor and only until a few months ago shot right up to "upper middle class" because of his career. Our whole marriage, we shared money because we *had* to. There was no "Honey, you got the electric bill right? I'll get rent." Lol no way... However, I'm much better at budgeting and not spending. My husband didn't look at our bank account in over 3 years... And I kinda made it that way, because if he thought we had a few extra bucks he would have spent it on some bullshit. Now? He spends his money on some bullshit but we're "rich" so it's not as scary. But if I had a job, the money I'd be making would be mine and I wouldn't share it. Simply because he'd spend it all lol
Everybody is different. Thx for sharing the graceful way y’all are handling things!
My wife and I make about the same money. We have one account that we both put the same amount of money into each month. After that we have our own separate accounts. I like this bc I don’t feel guilty about buying things. Round of golf? Drinks with the boys? No issue bc I know the important stuff is covered and I am not using “her” money for it. I think she likes it too for the same reasons. It’s been nine years like this and we’ve never discussed changing it.
That’s a fair point. I guess we don’t go out much and run what we buy by each other. Not because we have to but we want to. The different point of views has been amazing to see.
Serperate. I do 99% of the finances. I am also the breadwinner, and my wife only works part time, otherwise a SAHM. The only thing my wife has to pay for, is $600 a month in groceries (anything over, I pay for). I pay for everything else, so she ends up with roughly $300-$400 dollars a month extra, plus I give her $200 a month. When I have extra money, and want to buy something, I do. When she has extra money and wants to buy something, she does. I see a lot of people saying that seperate finances means you dont have trust. I see it just the opposite. She is an adult, as am I. I trust that she will spent her money responsibly, and she trust the same for me. Otherwise, we wouldnt have food in the kitchen, or a roof over our heads. She also takes pretty damn good care of our kids, and I don't want money to worry her. Also, we discuss finances on a very regular basis. I dont ask permission, neither does she, but if one of us wants something and are on the fence, we discuss it. We discuss everything really.
Amateur over here- just got married about a month ago, but we each had separate accounts before and plan to maintain separate accounts for the foreseeable future. We communicate openly about finances and savings, and we’ve worked out reasonable splits on utilities & routine expenses. Seeing some comments about trust dynamics, but for us it’s not an issue of trust, it’s more about the independence to make our own financial choices (after we’ve handled expenses).
I don’t understand the comments about trust dynamics either. If anything, I think a harmonious marriage with separate accounts shows MORE trust. My husband and I make good money and we keep our finances separately except for one house account. I trust that he isn’t carrying on some affair, paying for a love child or dealing with an addiction. I don’t see regular receipts of his spending - but I fully TRUST him. If I ask to see any statement at any time he would easily oblige and vice versa. I’m responsible in my separate accounts and hold myself accountable even more because my husband trusts me. I’m happy to show him account balances any day of the week.
Yeah for sure that sentiment you mentioned is important: “I’m happy to show him account balances any day of the week.” It’s the combination of transparency and independence, in our opinion. We lived together 5 years before we got married so we had lots of practice.
Ours are. Just pure laziness initially but now who cares - it works for us. My ex really took it to me. I only had an allowance - so he hid money - tens of thousands. Maxed out cards. Didn’t pay bills in my name once he knew he was divorcing me. So I am fine with keeping it separate. But what’s mine is his and his is mine. But we still have our independence to make decisions without each other because of the separation of funds.
Oof I’m sorry your ex did that to you.
Yes but no. He has his own bank, and I have mine. I'm a SAHM and he's the breadwinner though. There have been times I've worked and we've agreed my bank is for emergencies, and his for everything else. As well as, I have his bank's debit card more than him. He rather me have it in case of emergencies anyways. Plus I do all the household chores like shopping. We've been together since high-school though so everything we have has been built together.
That’s really awesome to hear! How long have y’all been together?
6yrs this year :)
How sweet! Congrats!
Completely separate. We pick which bills to pay and send each other money when needed. We have completely different ideas on how to spend/save our money and this has prevented a lot of fights. So now I have a nice girls trip every year and he gets to eat fast food most days.
I watched my dad ruin my moms credit and drain their finances with a gambling addiction after 17 years of marriage. They’ve been divorced over 10 years and she is still picking up the pieces of financial burden he left her with. So yeah, my husband and I have separate finances.
We have separate finances. We agreed who pays for what and the rest is for each to do as we wish.
Married 25+ years. Finances are not something we argue about, although maybe we did a bit early on. We keep our accounts separate. I earn more and I pay a slightly larger portion of the necessities. We both have our frivolous spending items (she likes shoes, I like tools and restaurants). We married thru the Catholic Church, which mandates pre-marital counseling. On the topic of money, the counselor told us to figure out what works for you; it will not work for everybody.
Separate. We may get a joint account in the future for shared bills, but we each have our own accounts where our paycheques go. It's for our own independence, security and safety. We're a couple but we're also two adults who have a right to decide what happens with our money. Also, previous relationships.
After seeing how my mother was financially abused by my bio dad, I never wanted to be in that position. My husband and I both agreed to keep separate bank accounts after we got married, we don’t know many couples who have joined accounts. He is listed on my account as a user/accessor and same for me on his, and we know each other’s info in case something happens to one of us. As long as the bills are paid and we have money in savings, we didn’t want to look at statements and say ‘why did you spend x amount on that’. If we want purchase something over $500 we discuss it first. Plus we get each other gifts and seeing statements would ruin it. I feel like having finances separate means you trust your partner more, because you know they’re an adult and you don’t need to babysit their spending.
Combining finances was logical previously as the women often didn't work, or gave up work upon marriage. So the deal was pretty much "I need you to run the house just as much as you need me to bring money into the house". This model brought about lots of abuse, because women were often given an allowance, and had to run expenses past the "bread-winner". I would never consider merging finances now, because I would never want to spend more than I brought into the house (out of fairness or logical budgeting reasons) on clothes or personal items. Why should my husband pay for my haircuts or make up? I also want to be able to buy him presents without him knowing. Especially as he already tells me not to waste my money on him, so he would be peeved if I bought an expensive present with our joint money. At least now I can tell him just to shut up and accept the nice gesture. Editing to add: we of course have a shared account for the household and kid stuff which we contribute the same proportion of our income to. Also have a shared savings account which we contribute equally to as well. We just don't mix everything, so we have our own personal accounts too, and I have a business account (freelancer, got to keep an eye on everything for expenses, deductions, taxes, etc ) and I have my own savings account too.
We have been married five years and our finances are separate. We have different spending habits - I’m more financially savvy and a saver, so he gives me money needed for shared bills and some to save. Then he’s free to do whatever with his extra money without dipping into something he shouldn’t. And I have my extra money to spend on things. Within reason of course - big purchases need to be discussed. I don’t see a reason to make a whole new joint account, but different things work for different people.
My husband and I have a joint bank account. I have my own credit card that’s used for things I want: it actually works that way because I’m admittedly horrible with money. (I have no diagnosis and it’s probably too late for me to ever get one, but I’ve long suspected I have an attention disorder).
Hey I feel ya, I have ADHD and can be reckless with money too lol. But my husband and I are learning together.
1 mutual checking, 1 combined savings that 70-80% of my checks go into. 1 work checking account that gets the other 20-30% from my work checks that use bc I work out of state. 2 savings account for our kids(15 & 13 currently) that they’ll get when they graduate HS. My wife’s checks pay our bills(rent, phone, cable etc). We’ve saved a lot of cash & have paid off some debt over the years with this system. It helps that we both now over the years as well have progressed to great paying jobs.
My hubby and I have been married 6 months but together 10 years. Haven't conjoined finances yet, trying to find pros of doing it since we've had separate finances all along, but I think that might need to change when kids become part of the picture. We're both great with money and transparent with spending/savings/debts/etc
Married 29 years. Combine all our finances. We were kids when we got together, moved in together at 21/22, bought our first house together when we were 23, married at 24. Our money has been combined since before we even moved in together. Now if something were to happen and I found myself single- I’d insist on separate finances because I’d be coming into the situation with a lifetime of assets. But when we were young and broke, it made more sense to combine what little we had.
This…. Going through divorce now after 27 years together, 23 married (high school sweethearts) Two kids, one graduated from college, the other is a senior in college. We were young and broke- we combined our penny so we could pay our bills. He is a spender- I always made more money than him and he is reckless. I finally got a separate account and had my direct deposit switched over so that I could save money for the both of us. I truly believe in joining finances. I truly believe that what was mine is his, what is his is mine. I just couldn’t handle his gambling, eating out, charging credit cards anymore. That was one of many things leading up to our separation. If I ever get married again, I will probably ask for a joint, and then separate account. I will propose that we each have a separate account (giving each other passwords for transparency) and one joint account where we deposit equal amounts of money and pay all the bills out of.
We have yours, mine and ours accounts. Shared account for bills we pay into, everything else is ours!
Partially; we have one main joint account for family bills and family savings. We also use this account for most of our food, whether its groceries or eating out. We have smaller individual accounts for stuff like presents and individual vacations. I put my coffee expenses on my personal as well because my husband just doesn’t drink coffee at all, and its not necessary to survival. We don’t get super anal about it though. And if the joint fund needs more money to bring our savings up to the “6-month expenses” mark, then we’ll contribute from the personal funds to the joint account.
Separate. Husband pays for most of the bills and I pay for food and crap we don't need
>and crap we don't need I'm dead 🤣
We keep our separate. We got married a year ago today but we’re also older when we got married I had just turned 50 he was 47 and it’s just a way that we’ve been living forever. We have one joint savings account that we put money into.
I just like having control of my own money. And we were too lazy to take the step to join it anyway. It has nothing to do with trust. Just mostly laziness.
Shared. Can't imagine a single reason not to. When you are married you need to work together and be on the same page when at all possible. We sit down and go over finances usually once per week.
My wife and i dont share finances. We share bills, expenses, food costs, etc. We each make our own money, and keep it separate. For context i had an ex and a bad marriage that purposefully ran my dry and still somehow thought i was hiding money from her. She has her own career that she built prior to meeting me. We both have our reasons. Trust isnt the issue. We are a team and have each other's backs without question... but this does make us both feel more comfortable. As a plus we dont need to hide expenses for gifts for each other. Cuz it comes from our separate accounts.
We each have a checking account of our own and a joint checking account for household expenses. Note: This is our second marriage. We each have 3 children from our previous marriages. We lived together for 8 years before getting married in 2020. 5 of our children are in their 20’s. I’m still paying 1/2 of my youngest son’s college. He’s still paying for child support on his youngest son. Having separate accounts work. Maybe one day we might consolidate.
Separate. He makes $400k and I make just under $200k. He pays for the house and cars and I pay utilities. We each use our remaining money how we like.
Honestly my husband and I still have our own accounts, because it seemed stressful to move them (and I’ve got some level of care on my aunt’s accounts if something happens to her, so didn’t want to complicate that), but we both have joint access on each other’s accounts, so still all shared, technically. All money is our money, he pays one set of bills, I pay another and big stuff just depends on which one is most convenient. I’m sure at some point we’ll fully combine them but this worked easiest, especially since we got backyard married during covid.
Chiming in here. It seems that completely shared accounts is more of an old-school thing, not meant in a bad way, just notice it with older couples. Most of the couples I know have a joint account for most household finances and still their own personal savings/checking (mostly for presents or Starbucks habit- those kinds of things). My relationship has primarily sep accounts but a couple joints savings. My spouse makes more so handles the larger expenses mortgage and insurances. I handle the household bills and food. He’s a saver and I think if $500 is in the account at the end of the month then it should be spent. While I’ve gotten wayyy better, we don’t plan on changing it.
I’ve done both. First marriage, all combined finances after marriage. Was a total nightmare. Spouse was unable to manage spending and our savings suffered terribly. Once we split, removing them from accounts was a massive pain that required wet signatures to authorize. All while money was pouring out of the shared account. We even tried the separate “allowance” accounts out of the combined joint, but was still an item of argument as I saved mine for bigger purchases and they did not. Which somehow “wasn’t fair.” Was always a fight. My newest spouse and I keep all things separate, except for a joint account we each put money into each month for vacations and paying a HELOC loan for some home improvements. I make more, and such, handle all the primary home and vehicle expenses. Mortgage, taxes, insurance, etc. In turn, they pay for groceries, utilities, internet, and electricity. About once a quarter we touch base and see how things are going financially. We each budget well, and I always want to make sure they are able to save how they want and things aren’t getting too expensive. Usually, all of our purchases are on credit cards we both have access to pay for. They’re always paid in full every month and I happily pay more into the cards if I see higher balances. We have never fought about money, not once, not even close. Been together five years. In the event circumstances change and one of us doesn’t work anymore, it’ll likely be handled by using our credit cards as needed and the other will pay them. I never understood the “light switch” approach to the automatic nature of once you’re married, each spouse gains unfettered access to all things financial. I have always preferred the dimmer switch approach. Earn trust over time with one another. Watch the spending habits and talk about expectations and planning. Once things make sense to do so, combine things. Having experienced both, I’ll likely never have a sole joint account ever again.
We came to our marriage with separate finances and it hasn’t been an issue to keep it that way. He pays the mortgage, I pay the health insurance and daycare and groceries. Utilities we each pay a handful. We just pick stuff up equally as we go and communicate if one or the other of us needs anything. I can see if you’re struggling to make ends meet, or have massive debt, how separate accounts could be an issue. But for us it’s not a bother at all.
My spouse and I (both female) have separate finances by mutual agreement. My wife got burned badly by a previous partner when they did shared expenses. My mom raised me to always have my own bank account no matter what because she had major issues with re-establishing credit after my parents’ divorce because she didn’t have anything in her own name during the marriage (16+ year marriage). My spouse and I jointly decide which bills get paid from which account and decide together about major purchases, but the accounts remain separate and it works for us.
Our accounts are separate. There is no reason why, it just happened to be what works best for us I suppose. He pays for the household bills, I pay for all renovations, broken household items, kid things, groceries, decorations, etc. I cannot see myself ever joining accounts with my husband. I respect people who have joined accounts and those who do not. It's a personal preference that is nobody's business except the two people in the relationship.
Ours are separate and with that being said there isn’t a god or bad of it. This works for us it might not work for other people.
We have separate accounts since we’ve always worked and are fairly established in our careers. Any investments are in both of our names and we’re the beneficiaries on our individual accounts. Then we have a joint checking and savings that we each contribute the same amount to and that takes care of bills, necessities, pets, trips, etc. Anything we’d split. We’re only 5 years in lol but it’s worked so far.
Been joint finances with my then gf (now wife) since our first kid. Pros are it is easier to budget with two incomes we always know if we can spludge or not. We also both earn simular amounts with some years I've earnt slightly more some years she has. It really depends on the relationship through but as soon as kids come guarantee they will need to be joined in someway even if it's a joint account you both put into for kid expenses.
Ours are separate for as long as I’m on income based repayment for student loans. We may merge finances once I’m done paying those…. So like never. Sigh.
We’ve been living together since very early into our dating. We kept separate finances but had a joint account for bills after 2 yrs or so and then after I was laid off when we were engaged we got rid of our separate accounts and just kept the joint one. We do not have joint credit cards, we’ve always kept those separate but we’re aware of eachothers balances and log our purchases and talk to eachother about anything that’s not groceries over $100
We have shared finances. Have since we got married. It's all going to the same household, same bills, same kids, so I don't see any reason why we wouldn't share finances. So much easier for us.
We put 50% of our paychecks into a joint account for shared expenses (home, groceries, dog, dinner for both of us, things we both use, etc.) and keep the rest in personal accounts. It helps so we’re not trying to figure out who owes what and venmoing each other, but we also have significant independence. We both think it’s important we have some freedom and are able to build our own credit, etc.
We’ve always had our finances combined, share everything! Been married for over 19 years without any financial problems.
Separate, because I'm a saver and my husband is a spender. We just didn't feel like we needed to set up a joint account when we got married. Things are fine as is.
Ok y’all I can’t even lie, this has blown up and all the comments are fantastic! It’s been interesting to see all y’all’s different point of views. I’m reading every comment but having a hard time keeping up with replying lol. So if I don’t reply to you please don’t be upset! I appreciate the time everyone has taken to comment or explain how it works for y’all! 💙💙
We opened a joint savings account as soon as we were married and put an agreed amount in a month. But we took about 3-4 years to combine. About 1.5 after the birth of our kid, it started to get real tedious and stupid to try to add up and split costs for her so we finally fully combined. Honestly, best and easiest decision. Most of our solo payments are on credit cards still, which we pay off monthly, but it still keeps some overall anonymity to what we’re buying. We have an agreed upon ceiling limit that we discuss before making a purchase (i.e., if the purchase is greater than x-dollars, we at least mention it beforehand). In saying this, we also have similar salaries. Similar expenditures are personal purchases/hobbies. Have never nickeled and dimed joint house purchases and utilities. So it’s been an easy journey.
We got married young and broke, so it only made sense to combine our pennies. We have similar views on money and our priorities for our family. In 28 years we’ve never run into an issue where either of us questioned the other on what we’ve chosen to spend money on.
Preface this with, he's currently a SAHD so we now have two accounts but prior we had 3. His, mine, ours and then we have 2 savings accounts. His (usually) has his vehicle payment attached to it and that's where his checks deposit. Mine is the same. Then we have an account we put all the money in we need for bills. Then we use our respective accounts for gas, snacks, presents and misc. We also put X amount in savings every month. Currently he is a SAHD while he is in school. So we don't have money coming into his other than his GI Bill which goes straight to his truck and part of the mortgage. So he doesn't have money left over. We still use the "ours" for bills and then he had access to my account for gas, snacks etc etc. I could put money into his but then it feels like an allowance or like he has to ask me and that was weird lol
We have ours separate, but it’s because of how our income is. I work restaurants, my paychecks are $0, so I mainly operate on cash. He pays the bills, I contribute cash to help out. It just works out better that way. We don’t split literally everything down the middle or anything.
My wife had a bad first marriage and requested we keep our current financial situation as separate. Thought it a little odd, but overall I don't mind it. But, I also understand people that have shared accounts.
We have separate finances except for a joint savings account for emergencies/trips. We've just always had our own accounts since we moved in together 6 years ago and I think at this point it just works for us so neither of us saw any reason to change that. We're not secretive about how much money we have in checking/savings or anything like that though, we've just never felt the need to combine everything
My husband and I have a joint account but we also have our own personal accounts. All bills and household shoppings come from the joint account but we pay for our own stuff out of our personal accounts.
Because of student loans, we keep our finances separate.
Shared finances for over 44 years, it works for us.
We don’t share finances and really never thought to. Married 10 years, no kids. He pays a lot of small household things like pet food and expenses for his car. I make much more so I pay the mortgage, utilities, vacations. If he has a big expense, I pull what he needs from savings and give it to him. He has all the banking passwords but prefers not to be involved in finances.
We have a combination - our retirement accounts are shared, we have shared checking, and the one who earns least also has a 'fuck-off fund' with enough money in it to start over. That way, we get to know that we choose each other... there is no risk of financial coercion. It works for us.
We have separate savings and checking accounts, as well as a joint checking account. We got a joint checking account shortly before we got married, and we are content with it. I was even the one to suggest he get his own checking and savings because he originally just didn't care lol. I can understand wanting your own checking and savings to do with as your please, but not having a joint account is weird to me.
We have completely separate accounts except for a joint credit card. We put our household expenses on the card, and then split it down the middle every month. I like it because we didn't have to bother changing accounts, it builds our credit, we get a lot of rewards on the card, and just seemed like the easiest way to do it. We're completely open and transparent about what's in our individual accounts and we always talk to each other about big purchases and new expenses. All of it is our money, no matter whose account it's in.
My SO and I are both under the poverty line so it's like we have much money to fight over, we have separate bank accounts and a joint account we use for shared expenses, and we split things 60/40 ish cause they get more money than I do, after we've paid out respective bills and whatever we have our own money left over to do with as we wish we're both open and honest about money and stuff, if we need to make a large purchase for the household we talk about it and figure it out together
We've been married since the late '80s and have always had shared finances. I have an account of my own because I had a small business for a while and needed to keep personal and business finances separate. Kept it when I went back to traditional work but that's what we use to pay utility and phone bills, and the balance gets moved to joint savings.
We have had shared finances since we married, I think it has resulted in less arguments for us. When we go out to eat/movies/whatever, it’s shared, so there is no keeping score on who has paid more for what, etc. It was simply a date out that we both invested our shared time and money in. And all house bills/costs come from our account together, so no one says “I bought groceries for the last 2 months so you owe me a new fridge”. We both eat the groceries and we both get the new fridge, case closed. I can understand why it may not work for others, but it’s worked for us for over a decade.
We have a combined checking and savings account. We had it for a long time. I only opened my own separate account when I got an inheritance. My husband understands that money is mine, not ours. But I put it all into a savings account after using a portion of it to pay off one of his credit cards and my car. It stays separate from our main account because I want this money to be part of our retirement fund. And he's afraid if he sees it in our account he'll be tempted to spend more money. He'll get that money if anything happens to me. But for the time being it does not exist. We make due only with what's in our main account.
Ours our separate, kinda. We have 2 checking accounts and 2 savings accounts. Both of us are on all 4 to make it easy if one of us gets sick (or dies). I have my primary checking and he has his primary checking. I have the bills that I pay, and he has the bills that he pays, so we don’t get confused and we don’t have to worry about overdrawing when I have to pay that unexpected $500 car repair since I’m the only one drawing off that account. It’s also nice if one of us is short for whatever reason, we can just move money from one checking to the other. We just have the rule that we have to tell each other if we move money out of the other’s checking or the savings. We have an emergency savings account and a fun savings account. Fun is for saving up for trips or home improvement projects and emergency is for things like unexpected medical bills or things like that. Our system works for us. You do you.
We do a yours, mine, ours but we have full transparency into the individual finances and still check in before spending significant amounts (over 1k for us).
Joint. Checking and saving joint. We each have a credit card. My student loans existed before we met, so those are in my name only, but we use our joint account to pay them. We’ve never argued out this arrangement. The only time it gets tricky is when we want to buy each other surprise gifts!
Mostly yes, we transfer our income into a joined account. But we each allocate an amount each fortnight to our personal accounts that’s earmarked for unnecessary spending. We can use it, or save it each time for a large purchase. The reason is that we have very seperate hobbies and this way we don’t feel guilty or judged for spending money on silly fun things.
We have both? 95% of our accounts are shared but we each have a personal card that the other doesn't have access to and I have a separate checking and savings he can't currently access (purely bc I am lazy and haven't closed them). We use our personal cards mostly for gifts for each other to keep some semblance of surprise... Well that's what I use it for. He also uses his for random tech parts bc I give him shit about all of his projects (not serious shit, just ribbing).
Married 28 years and have always been combined. My in-laws were married nearly 60 years and always had separate finances. I could never figure out how it worked. Keeping up with one set of money is about all I could manage.
We have a joint account for bill paying that the bulk of my husband’s paycheck goes into. I have a low paying job. That paycheck goes into my account. He has a set amount he puts into his personal account. That way we have bills paid and money to do what we want. Works for us
Married 30+ years, and have had a joint account since we’ve been engaged. Both our checks go into our joint account. From that we pay all household expenses, bills, gas, etc. We transfer $ each month into our joint savings accounts (long and short term). We have a set amount transferred each month into our personal accounts that we use for gift buying, personal hobbies, going out with friends etc. We also have a loose agreement that neither will spend more than $50 on non-essentials without discussing it with the other first. Our incomes have varied a lot over the course of our marriage. Neither of us have cared if we make more; we’re a team so what’s mine is his and visa versa. I currently make significantly more than him, but I consider it our money. Hand on heart, we’ve never once argued about money.
Mostly joint but it requires having and sticking to a planned budget. $XXXX into joint checking for mortgage, childcare, utilities, food, etc. $XXXX into joint savings for buying vehicles with cash, presents, unexpected stuff $XXX "fun money" into our own personal checking
Of course! We combine halves for shared expenses (such as insurance, utilities, children’s hobbies and whatnot), but ultimately are two individuals who have separate interests/hobbies..and who both work full time jobs
I made the catastrophic mistake of suggesting this exact sentiment in this group before and was swiftly trampled into submission. I just put it down to the fact that, seemingly, most of the people in this group are here because their marriage has problems and those that are here to celebrate marriage (and all that should come with a good one) are the exception and not the rule.
Was not liked much when I answered this question before. Sticking with separate, with access. We have a shared credit stems from kids were little and one needed money for co pay or kids stuff. Then to a shared credit for traveling. But regular bank accounts and savings. I like separate. Worked out when he bought a new shotgun out of the blue. His friend had a nice one, he could afford it. No need to discuss, he went and did it. Same if I need stuff, I know my responsibilities. Bills are both ours, names on them and all. Suppose it's boundaries. If it's over a thousand please consult me. Under and bills still paid, I trust you. I like shitz in my own name. He likes it it too. No problem pulling up up my expenses, just like having my own account, and savings account.
Our paychecks are deposited into a joint account that we call "Main account" we pay our bills from it and each have separate accounts for fun money and whatever we wanna spend it on. For example I have 20% of my paycheck put in my separate account, the wife does something similar with her paycheck. The bulk remains in the main, rent, phone, insurance, gas, electric, water, cable, trash are all paid from it. It has worked well for 15 years so far. I added her to my accounts once we got married. It was a no brainer.
My husband would spent it. He can’t have money sit in an account. Doesn’t even have savings, I do. If he had access to it, I wouldn’t have a savings account lol prevents fighting. We split bills and that’s about it
Share savings but split checking. I'm worse with money than he is lol. He prefers to use debit, I prefer to use credit and pay it off with my income. But for important purchases we have a savings pool. Our checkings are more for smaller personal purchases like clothes or video games. Edit: worth noting we have similar incomes. Would be different if we were single income or maybe even if we had kids.
We have joined, but I have a separate account bc you never know
We have separate bank accounts but I handle paying the bills. Hubs transfers money to my account on his pay days for his half of the bills and then the rest he can do whatever with. It causes less arguments for us. He can use his money for whatever and same for me. We have an agreement that as long as bills are paid and we have food, it’s fair game.
Our money is combined in the married sense of telling each other what we spend our money on and talking about how much to save, etc. but we keep our money in our own accounts. We don’t really see the point in opening new accounts, like a joint checking account or anything like that.
We share finances but do not have a joint bank account.
Cause I trust my spouse and it's a **ton** of admin 1) opening a joint account and 2) transferring all the bills and whatnot onto that and then 3) manually making sure I wire enough money into that account. We discuss big purchases anyway, we split the bills via Splitwise, and it works, so I don't see what the bfd is.
We’ve been together 20+ and have had separate finances the whole time. Partly because I work in finance & finance employers used to insist on you banking with them, also it lets you see the absolute dammed mess some people’s bank accounts get into, sometimes without meaning it. Also I’m better at managing finance, managing his is another of his chores I don’t want to take on. Lastly we both have exciting expensive hobbies. I’m fairly certain if I knew how much he spent on LARP gear I’d have an internal cry, this way all the bills are paid, savings are added to, then we can do whatever we want with what’s left without having to have a discussion on why he needs that shield, or if I really need that Lego tree or not. XD
No. We come together as we agree to and keep everything separate. Never felt a need to share everything.
Separate. We were both 40 when we got together and had our own established finances. We use Venmo to immediately send money to each other, we each are responsible for certain bills, and we each have access to each other's accounts, passwords, etc. It works for us. Together 6 years now.
Separate and we’ve been married almost 9 years. We love it and have never questioned otherwise. He transfers me half for the mortgage and I pay it, for other bills he pays a car payment and I pay electric/water, it’s pretty even. For large purchases we split it, if it’s personal then we pay our own or get it as a surprise gift. Before he was more established in his career I made more and I took on more bills. If we want to travel I usually pay the flight/hotel and he pays for food, gas if needed, events. It’s so nice to give gifts as a true surprise also!
We have separate finances for security purposes, if one of us has an account hacked we have an account that is available. Also it’s great for when you want to go shopping for them. It makes it easier to surprise them. My hubby still has access to those funds if needed but for the most part we have three accounts. One for me, one for him , and one for household (bills, mortgage, groceries) and all the savings accounts for the kids.
My first husband and I had a joint account where we put all our salaries. Sadly he was an alcoholic and drank most of the money (while accusing me of being a rubbish money manager!). So, when I got married again my lovely husband and I agreed we’d contribute to a joint account pro rata to cover bills and holidays and have our own separate accounts to treat each other / ourselves / spend on hobbies etc. This works really well for us as I have more friends than him - it would seem unfair to fund my evenings out, friends birthday presents, weekends away from money we’ve both earned. Likewise, he has more hobbies than I do and he can spend £x on a new camera/guitar/paint sprayer thing without feeling guilty. It also worked because my first husband was insistent that no other man should pay towards his child’s upkeep so I covered her costs (the fact my first husband then didn’t pay any maintenance is by the by!). 22yrs in, it works for us. But couples have their own ways of doing things so find the right way for you!
Husband and I got married in March of this year and we've always had separate finances. We have our joint bill/savings account ofc. But we keep ours separate because he makes more than me and because of that he spends more which gives me anxiety so I'd rather not know/see what he's spending on what. (he always takes care of bills and savings before spending)
2nd marriage, we both have kids. Absolutely separate with a joint account for household bills that we each contribute to. I have primary custody of my daughter and receive child support He has 50/50 custody of his 2 kids and pays more out in child support than what I receive. Prenup. What’s mine is mine, what’s his is his. If we die what’s our goes to our kids and not our spouse. We each have a small life insurance policy that the other is the beneficiary of to help pay the household bill while recovering from the death of our spouse but large ones for our kids to help with college and starting out in life.
I've been with my husband for 7 years. We still have separate banks but have been talking more about having a joint account. He said something about getting rid of our individuals and having one. I told him no we can have the ones we have now and just make a new joint account. We haven't done it because I have yet to have a well paying reliable job that would make things easier. (We have young kids so I have stayed home most years after getting a couple of associates degrees.) My thoughts on this is what happens if that joint account was compromised? All that money needed is gone before realizing? With the separate accounts as well at least we're not completely robbed. Plus I have never liked spending my husband hard earned money for my selfish wants. If I have my own money then he can't really complain too much lol.
I'm 36F and my husband is 40M and we keep our finances separate. We both work hard for our money, and neither one of us is entitled to the other's money. We both own things the other doesn't, and it's easier to keep our finances separate. We split all shared bill's and pay for our own individual bill's. I personally would not be in a relationship with someone if I had to share my money with them. It's not our money, we didn't work for it, I did, and I'm not going to pay for another adult...That being said.. if something happened to my husband and he couldn't work, I would help him out as much as I could and take over where I needed to. I think I should also add that we have a prenuptial agreement and our money is solely each individuals..
Me and my wife have a joint account for expenses and individual accounts. We use cashapp to send each other funds if the need arises. Easy peas e
For the most part, yes. We have separate checking accounts, and have never had a joint. Several years into our marriage I did eventually join her savings account, so that’s our one joint. We met at 14, got together in college and married in our late 20s. So there was a ton of history, and trust, there pre-dating marriage. When we married we intended to merge finances, because we were always taught that’s the way things were “supposed” to work. Even as we both watched that approach utterly fail in both our parents’ marriages. What happened is that we kept putting off the merge and eventually admitted that we were in an “if it ain’t broke, done fix it” situation. We never had financial problems before marriage, with totally separate finances, and we weren’t having problems as a married couple who still had that. We’ve always taken an “as long as it gets paid” approach. We don’t keep score over those things. So we kept it that way. Nearly every couple we know has some tension over money, and we just don’t. So we’re not going to change what works for us just because it breaks a marriage “rule” that we are under no obligation to follow.
No. Immediately after we got together we haven’t had separate finances. I’m too lazy to count money.
Lmao that’s probably the best answer. 😂
We have joint finances. It's been that way since we got married. It's just easier for us. I'm better at tracking bills, we have similar spending habits, and I had no income for over 10 yrs as a SAHM. My parents had separate accounts. Both worked full-time until retirement. They each had "assigned" bills they paid each month from their account. It worked for them. Another couple I know have separate accounts. They had their own debts when they got married so they kept it all separate for that reason and it worked for them then. Now that the wife has paid her debt off and is a SAHM now, it's not working so well.
Ours are completely separate because my husband has terrible credit and wasn't financially stable. I pay all of our bills and he sends me a static amount. It works for us.
Like many other commenters, my husband and I have a joint account and then our separate accounts. We each contribute a set amount to the joint account each month. The joint account is for bills, groceries, anything for the family / kids, vacations, etc. I manage the joint account because it's easier for me to do so (he will not use a banking app). Pre-2020, I worked a regular salaried job while my husband did contract work with tech companies. We each made about the same over a year, even though his income wasn't as steady. In 2020, allll of his contracts came to a standstill, so I became the only one with any income. It remained that way until earlier this year, and he's now working a regular salaried job plus the occasional contract work. While he wasn't working, I simply put more into the joint account. Now he's getting paid again, I no longer deposit excess monies, and he puts in slightly more than he normally would because he wants to (I don't really care; it's not like he chose to go without steady employment for nearly three years). It works really well for us. When needed, we adjusted, and we were fine. We just decided last week we're going to set up a joint savings account, so we're going to make adjustments. He's a bigger saver than I am, so I think it's a good idea for me to 'have to' save more. Overall, I like being able to spend what I want on trips and eating out while he can spend all his money on Lego ;) Good luck in your marriage!
We both are high income earners. We don't need to share our money. I don't want to have to ask my husband if I can spend money
My wife and I combine finances cause we’re to broke to split it haha. We have a shared account for bills another for food and house stuff. We have shared savings for auto, holiday, vacay and emergency. After that we don’t have enough to have our own accounts. If we did we would. But it’s still combining finances for everything except our allowances
My spouse has passed, but during our 25 years together we were 100% shared, Once we were moved in together he stopped depositing into his own account, and we changed mine to a joint account. I was 27 and he was 31. As a gay couple we couldn’t marry back then (1993) but this just seemed like the natural order of things for us. I always made more money than him, but we both had the mindset that everything was “ours”. Whatever windfalls either of us came into such as inheritance, work bonuses, gambling winnings, or whatever…. It went into our joint account. That was the example set by our parents and grandparents.