Tales from the Wallet: How Do You and Your Partner Talk About Money?
Here's a question that's come up a few times in our various money snapshots: How often do you talk to your partner about money? Particularly for those of you who are married or Permanently Coupled (and may be legally entitled to some of your partner's money), do you talk regularly, have easy access to information about the others' accounts, or something else? Or, on the flip side, do you have an arm's length approach to your partner's finances — a strict line between My Money/Your Money?
(Bonus question: If you do talk about finances, at what point in the relationship did you discuss net worth, debt, salary, and retirement savings?)
As I've written before, my husband and I are Common Potters — all income we've made after we got married has gone into a joint account, and we make decisions together about retirement savings, large expenditures, and similar things. I know exactly how much he makes, and I give him regular updates on my income, which fluctuates from month to month. All of our accounts are accessible to both of us through Mint, too.
{related: how to split expenses with your partner}
But, as I've also written before, I tend to manage all of our finances, so he almost never looks at the accounts. Early on in our marriage I would give him a State of the Union rundown about finances on our anniversary — net worth, change, large debts — but that fell away in favor of random, less regular, as-the-mood-strikes kind of updates, usually after I've updated our financial snapshot. (Both times I was pregnant we had a loooong talk to get our accounts in order before labor.)
{related: how married couples split finances after having kids [CorporetteMoms]}
For the bonus question: I seem to remember that we first talked about money after we started to get serious, but well before engagement. To me — particularly with a partner — I think I would have had to think long and hard if our financial habits were really dissimilar. I was a fifth-year associate at the time, so I knew I made a lot more than him, but I've always been the type to pay off my credit card in full every month, put money into savings, and in general live well below my means.
{related: love, marriage, and prenups}
I remember being a bit scared of how this talk would go — I'm not sure I would have done well married to a guy who had a “head in the sand” approach to credit card debt, for example.
As it turned out, my husband at 28 a) didn't own a credit card, and b) had a fair amount of savings considering he didn't make a lot of money at the time. (We talked more about financial compatibility in our post on dating someone with less money or more time.) But talking about finances early(ish) showed me that we would probably be pretty financially compatible — and to sign him up for a credit card to start his credit history.
{related: how did your parents talk to you about money?}
Readers, over to you: Do you know how much money your partner makes and/or has in their accounts? How often do you discuss money, either in terms of strategies and goals or just general “state of the union” kinds of talks?
These are some of our latest favorite financial books for beginners:
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We talk about it all the time! In part because my husband works in finance but I am a “hobbyist” investor. Right now our setup is my accounts, his accounts, and our accounts, but we each have visibility into the other’s personal ones. It happened organically because we set up a joint account before we were married and then just never did anything with our personal accounts after we married. We started talking about money pretty early but I suppose that was also when we got serious because you start to talk about going on vacations together, etc. Both of us have big saving mindsets and are also high earners, and I really think that was a point of compatibility for us. We set up a joint account not long after moving in together (which was about 6 weeks before we were engaged – I would not have moved in with someone that wasn’t “the person I was going to marry”). I know exactly how much he makes and vice versa and although we have additional personal accounts, when we talk about it, it’s how much have *our* investments made and how much do *we* have in retirement.
My story is eerily similar to Kat’s – when we met my husband and I were both in school (him PhD, me law). I had a negative net worth due to loans, etc. and he somehow had $20k saved despite living in the Bay Area on a <$25k/year stipend (this was 10 years ago now so not as crazy as it is currently, but it was still expensive). It was clear from the beginning that we had similar attitudes about money and were both frugal savers. He had never had a credit card though and I was the one who pushed him to first sign up for one (paying it off immediately of course) so he could start building credit. When we were dating, we were pretty scrupulous about splitting expenses evenly but then when we got married we became one potters. Now I manage all the details of our money, although of course he he has a general idea what we make, what our big expenses are, and how much we have in savings.
do you think it is easier for guys to save $20k despite living in the bay area on less than $25k stipend? asking because of the discussion earlier–in addition to all of the obstacles at work that arise for women, i also frankly think that life is just more expensive for us (hair, nails, clothes, shoes, furniture).
Hmm, maybe. I’m not terribly girly and don’t spend much money on hair, nails, clothes and shoes myself. I know a lot of professional women who spend big on that stuff, but I think many people cut back when they’re in school. I think for my husband it was a combination of not having any expensive hobbies and being more willing than I am to live with roommates. Maybe some of it is a male vs. female thing but I think a lot of it is just personality.
My husband and I met when we were 20, but we didn’t really start talking finances until we were serious and in a more adult stage of life (when we were 25 and I was out of law school and he was in med school). We knew each other’s debt level because we were dating when our loans were taken out, and he knew how much I made and my bonuses and all. Until we got married, we kept our finances separate and I paid for most stuff cause I had a job and he didnt. Once we got married, we sat down and figured out our collective pay, divvied up how much we wanted to save and spend on various things, and created a joint budget which we put into Goodbudget. As long as we’re both diligent about tracking our purchases, we have a good sense of how much we collectively have saved and spent at any given time, even though we don’t have access to each other’s personal accounts (we both have online high-interest checking accounts). Of the two of us, I’m more likely to spend, so our collective sharing of expenses has reined that in.
Married, we talk about money all the time. I am the main finance person in the family and do all of our allocating and investing. My husband could probably care less about most of that, but we do usually run larger single purchases by each other (like for items over $100), and I sit him down 2-3x a year to make sure he understands our finances, agrees with my general philosophy or what I’m doing. Also, I want him to understand what’s going on if anything ever happens to me.
We started mixing finances about 2 years into our relationship, after we graduated law school and when we moved in with each other (about 2 years before we got married). We have been together about 10 yrs now. When we started- he had more debt but more income potential… since then we’ve both had times of unemployment and each of us has at times made more than the other- it’s just easier for us to do everything together (& I also consider the risk spread to be one of the benefits of marriage).
We talk about money pretty regularly. When we met we both basically had nothing. He wasn’t making much money and I had negative money from law school loans. We were apparently very confident in our relationship and opened a joint checking account before we got married and after we got married we moved all of our cash into joint accounts. We are both fortunate to be making significantly more money than we had anticipated. We both have access to all of each other’s accounts through Mint. I manage our day to day finances but have gotten him on board with maximizing credit card points which has paid for some very nice vacations. We have very similar money philosophies – hate debt (prioritized paying off my student loans ASAP, don’t carry credit card balances, etc.), max our retirement accounts each year, generally don’t have super expensive tastes.
We try to keep our “fixed” costs relatively low (I think they are high but compared to friends/colleagues with similar incomes they are low), auto-transfer a significant portion of our take home pay to a high yield savings account where we are saving for a down payment and have a significant portion of our monthly budget allocated to a “slush fund” of sorts that is a catch all for all non-necessities. Sometimes this gets spent on clothes, sometimes tickets to events, sometimes travel, sometimes nothing at all. We don’t have any hard and fast rules on money but generally consult with each other before spending more than $200ish. We are about the same in terms of how much we spend on “frivolous” things so it works out pretty well for us in terms of neither feeling like the other is spending more.
We check in pretty regularly on spending/saving/investment accounts. It doesn’t happen often but sometimes we’ll have a month where our spending is higher than normal and we both acknowledge we need to dial it back. Having everything shared means there’s no hidden purchases, but also holds us accountable to each other. We aren’t really nit picky of the others purchases. As long as overall spending is in reason, we have an unspoken agreement not to question the others purchases. On the (very) rare occasion one of us tries to surprise the other one, our share accounts often ruins the surprise but that’s not a good enough reason for us so far to get separate accounts.
We rarely talk about money – there isn’t a lot of talk about in our case. My husband and I got married late (late 30s), so we both already had our own checking, savings, investment accounts, and credit cards. We just added each other to the existing accounts (except credit cards), but still treat the accounts as separate on a practical basis (his pay goes into his account, mine goes into mine, etc.). We don’t look at each other’s credit card statements or run purchases by each other unless it is something we are choosing together, like a sofa or a car, but that is more to agree on what we both like than about money.
Fwiw, we’re both very much into FIRE and enjoy watching money pile up more than spending it. We save/put to our mortgage more than 90% of our take home pay.
+1, we run separate accounts as well. He invests more aggressively than I do, so we balance each other out.
I wish I were like Kat and the rest of you. I had a DISASTEROUS relationship with my ex over money, mainly b/c I was the only one bringing in money and he was always draining whatever extra my Dad didn’t take away from me to protect it from my ex!
Thank god for my dad spotting my ex as a sponge. He somehow knew that Sheketovits was never going to amount to anything and warned me early that he was using me both for my money and my looks. Thanks to dad and the 401k and the IRA and my new partnership retirement account, I will be protected economically now that I am no longer so pretty and men are not pushing each other away to impress me! FOOEY on that anyway. I want a man who is a man, not a sponge!