Money in relationships

[DCICassieStuart]

I agree with you, I can't imagine asking for permission or even discussing something I want to buy if it's not a big purchase. Equally would not want my boyfriend to spend money that I earned. I know people say it comes down to trust but I'm not working to then limit my financial freedom.

I don't think everything in a relationship must be shared, yes we're building a life together but we're also two individual people.

Also, I know some people hate thinking like that and believe it's not possible for that to happen to them, but I've heard too many stories of relationships breaking down and people becoming horrible to each other. It would give me too much anxiety to be so financially connected.

That was a huge thing on Mumsnet. I can remember constant parroting of 'All money is family money anyway'

Ah no. MY money is MY money. HIS money is HIS money, and the money that we put in the joint account together to pay the bills etc is OUR money.

 

[Be More Pacific]

Despite what my hero Judge Judy says, my opinion is that everything should be joint.

It seems to be an old fashioned viewpoint these days but it just seems alien to me for couples to have separate money and even actually owing each other money. It's such a bizarre concept.

I worked with a married woman with teenage kids who did this and she actually had to offer her husband £3 for a taxi so she could borrow his car to get to work - that was just one of many examples! I also remember reading on a forum about a couple who bought everything separately. When one ran out of teabags, they asked the other to borrow one and their response was "you should have planned better!" They didn't get the teabag!

I just couldn't be doing with all that ridiculous nitpicking!

I don't work anymore (retired on medical grounds) and I honestly couldn't imagine being with someone who would begrudge sharing their money with me.

Bottom line, if you need sharing bodily fluids then you share everything.

 

[judgejohndeed]

Oh, I see. Yeah, that isn't how I have ever run a joint account AT ALL.

I don't understand this fixed idea of "mine" and "your" money when you're a couple living together and building a life together. Sorry, just don't get it

I'm not really sure what's not to be understood about it? 'My' money is the money I earn from work, 'his' money is the money he earns from work. The life we're building together e.g. our house, pet insurance, food, is paid for jointly from a joint account...but if I want to buy shoes, lipsticks, bags whatever that he won't use or benefit from I don't expect him to pay for that at all? Obviously it would be different if one person has no income like SAHMs who need a different set up, or people who have a big disparity between incomes, but neither of those apply to us.

Or do you discuss every single thing before buying it?

And this is what I want to avoid...surely if all your money is 'your' money plural, you must be talking about everything you buy? I don't want to have a discussion if I want to order something from Amazon quickly, I'm not a child asking permission. Seems odd.

 

[Heybooboo]

What an interesting thread.

There’s just two of us, we have no children - just a dog. We have no mortgage so just have utilities etc. We have a joint account and I put in 30% of my salary in each month. I then use the rest of my money by saving it for investments (property). I then have some leftover for myself but, I genuinely don’t splurge often. Every season I’ll buy new clothes but, never excessive.

I earn a good wage but, my partner earns a hell of a lot more. We are both generous so each use are left over money on our families. He usually pays for most of our holidays as he loves luxury ones.The rest of his income goes towards the future (children/early retirement) and investments. He has a financial/wealth advisor. It works for us!

I just found out that my friend and her husband have an excel spreadsheet. He plans everything to the pound and gives her an allowance. If she wants her hair done she has to ask for permission. He’s the breadwinner and better with money. Personally, I couldn’t live like that. I’d tell him where to go.

The end reminds me of a friend, they recently had a baby and her husband is very tight with money. She hasn’t a single thing new all hand me downs from friends. Not that there’s anything wrong with that but she asked permission to buy her an outfit and was told no. He happily buys expensive alcohol for himself weekly though, he even started to complain when the baby didn’t finish a bottle as it was wasting money could they give her less at feed times. He’s already made comments on wasted food when it comes to weaning.
There’s being careful with money but this i think is a bit extreme and controlling

 

[judgejohndeed]

I know that will sound odd to some, but I come from a home where my dad financially abused my mum and it left her living in poverty with us kids while he was travelling the world with his mistress. So I never want to be in a position where that could happen to me, I need my own account and to be in control. This works for us, my husband is happy with the arrangement and he knows why I need to feel secure and in control of my own money at all times.

It's not odd at all, the majority of lawyers would tell you to do this. It's a very brave and perhaps even naive person who plans their finances around the idea that their relationship will never break down. I know a couple who split very recently who both have very well paid jobs and had a lot of money (over 100k) in their 'joint account' that everything goes into. One of them has subsequently drained it.

 

[coconochanel]

Personally I dont think Id ever put all my money in a joint account. I'd rather both of us put some in a joint account and then keep some money for ourselves.

 

[DanaScully]

My choice is separate current/savings accounts and an additional joint account for any days out, meals, household, groceries etc.

I would never completely merge my finances with another person, regardless of marriage or how long we've been together.

My mum always taught me to keep some money separate and secret in case I ever needed to escape.

 

[Isa Drennan]

I find this thread so interesting

 

[Isa Drennan]

Joint account for everything. If you're married, everything should be shared. Money is something that can easily be argued about and if everything is joint there is no problem in my experience. Old fashioned, but IMO it's just a much better way to handle it.

I don’t agree. If one partner earns significantly more than the other it’s not just an automatic case of “everything should be shared”. Being joint would create problems for me, growing up with one parent relying solely on the other financially, then realising how frightening that is when redundancy/illness or any other unforeseen circumstance hits, has made me determined to always have some form of financial independence.

Being married isn’t a justification for everything being shared. You can still easily share from having separate accounts. I wouldn’t like to rely on someone or have to justify every purchase.

 

[Be More Pacific]

I've mentioned this before on here but I worked for a mortgage broker and one of our advisers had an appointment with a married couple. On the morning of the appointment, he got a call from the guy asking him to come a bit earlier. It turned out the guy had a child conceived during a one night stand, who he'd never had any contact with, and it happened way before he'd even met his wife - but he'd never told her about it. The CSA were taking payment at source and he wanted to show our adviser his 'real' income before his wife got there. She'd never seen his payslips. Anyway, because of the CSA payments, their affordability was completely fucked and they couldn't get the mortgage they wanted. I'd love to have been a fly on the wall for that discussion. I often wonder if it did all come out in the end.

So, I'd be very suspicious if someone refused to show me their payslips or tell me what they earned.

 

[GeorgeP123]

Kind of glad I'm single lol. Pay my own bills and buy my own Louis Vuitton without getting ear ache lol but hopefully when I do end up in a relationship we would half the bills. Half all the bills and put this into an account. I've learned from my last relationship to be selfish with money.

 

[Satisfying Click]

I cannot stress enough to folks to make sure that if they marry someone, be on the same page with finances. It should be as much of a dealbreaker topic as having children or religion.

I learned the hard way. I cohabited with an utter bastard in my 20s. I was naive and in love, I thought playing house would be wonderful. I was a student and working part-time - he was very old-fashioned in terms of fixed gender roles so that I was doing 90% of the housework, all the cooking, full-time studying, but he was 'modern' enough to ensure bills and outgoings were 50/50. In the end, I came away with whatever I could carry out of there on my own. I tell younger friends and family that whatever they do, be careful when living with someone - don't try to mimic a legal marriage as the law is very unlikely to protect you, and whatever you do, do not take on any of their personal debts as yours.

Happy ending - I married a fab guy who often drives me up the wall, but is a very good egg. We're on the same page with money i.e. it's ours (and in part that's why we married - to ensure a legal forum if we were to divorce. Not the most romantic way of looking at marriage, but after past experience, I thought it was sensible). We've been following the Dave Ramsey method which has been life-changing in a number of ways, but I really look at money differently now.

We don't have a joint account, I think we couldn't really be bothered. He earns more, so he pays for food shopping, dinners out so I don't pay with more of a proportion of my salary. We run individual purchases of >£200 past one another as a courtesy. Mortgage likely to be paid off in 3-4 years if we're sensible. We don't have children so that also helps in terms of cash flow

 

[Fanaff]

It is really interesting to see how people manage it and how different it is. I don’t agree with the whole “we are married so share everything and if you don’t it is odd” everyone has different experiences and has seen how things can go wrong. I have been married for 12 years, together 16 and we have a joint account for the house, bills, the kid and cat then our separate accounts for our own spends. I like new clothes, my husband likes a gamble on football and this way, he can’t get angry with me (expect for when I make him go to the post office with 18 packages to return ) and I can’t be cross at his flutters (it’s only small amounts, he’s not got a problem!) It works for us and that’s what matters.

My friend got into over £80k in debt and her husband had no clue. When they split, he expected to get a good chunk of cash from the equity in their house...he got less than £10k. Being married, a team and sharing their money didn’t help help him at all.

 

[judgejohndeed]

Joint account for household stuff, separate accounts for whatever disposable money we have. We split holidays etc. I would never put all my money in a joint account, too much faff keeping up with who put in what and if I want to splurge on something for myself I don’t want to feel like I need to discuss it with my partner or, worse, use money that was his rather than mine (e.g. if he had more come in that month than me)

 

[Chandler Bing]

I had lived on my own for years so had all bills already in my name (just had to change address when we moved), my husband didn't have anything except his phone bill so I have kept everything in my name and he has a standing order monthly for half of everything.

We also write down what we buy over the month that's "joint" and whoever has paid out less will give the other half of the difference so that at the end we've both spent the same.

I know that will sound odd to some, but I come from a home where my dad financially abused my mum and it left her living in poverty with us kids while he was travelling the world with his mistress. So I never want to be in a position where that could happen to me, I need my own account and to be in control. This works for us, my husband is happy with the arrangement and he knows why I need to feel secure and in control of my own money at all times.

 

[DCICassieStuart]

We each have our own account and then have a joint account together. We both put money into the joint account to cover bills etc, and then what's left in our own account is our own money to do what we want with.
We both have a credit card. The odd time we'll stick something on the other person's card.
Holidays etc are generally split between us and when we go out for dinner etc, we tend to take it in turns as to who pays.

It probably helps that we have a similar attitude towards money, spending and saving etc.
My late FIL was retired by the time I met him, but I know he used have to hand over every penny of his wages to MIL when he was working because she 'ran the house' and that was the last he saw of them. My SIL now makes her husband do the exact same thing. Wonder where she got that from?!

 

[judgejohndeed]

We have the same, I have £65k of our deposit ring fenced as it is my parents money. In terms of actually paying it monthly it would be split but if I paid off a big chunk we’d do the same.

My friend bought at the same time as us, her parents gave them a deposit but her partner would not sign it. They have parted and sold and because legally he is entitled for 50% he’s asked for much more than he put it. She has to suck it up as he can legally claim even more.

That’s awful. That’s the problem with people saying ‘you should trust your partner’ mmm I do but people change when they split up. Who knows what will happen in the future - if my partner cheated on me, maybe I would think actually yeah I will take half of that money. So part of me wanting him to ring fence it now is I don’t want to become that person either! I think it’s kind of an older generation relic to share all your money because it works for those generations as they also don’t get divorced. I think it’s important to protect yourself - especially for women - and be a realist, and I don’t think that’s incompatible with having a healthy and trusting relationship. I’d rather that than be the one left high and dry.

 

[Octopies]

Personally I dont think Id ever put all my money in a joint account. I'd rather both of us put some in a joint account then keep some for ourselves.

same here I like the autonomy plus the independence / financial freedom of just being able to buy whatever I want without anyone knowing or having to explain anything. Also think it could be a breeding ground for resentment (‘why did you spend X on X this week?). It’s just what works for us, no judgement to anyone else.

Also although we’re in a long term relationship we’re very much two different people eg my OH is saving to go on a motorbike holiday with his mates! I don’t wanna pay for that as much as he doesn’t wanna pay for my Botox

 

[Amyb97]

We both have personal accounts which our salaries are paid into. We have a joint account for Mortgage we split 50/50 and bills, food, holidays etc we pay a percentage of what we earn (he earns more).

But he often has the tendency to promise to take me out for dinner (pre covid) then tell me I owe him £20. Despite me earning less I find myself treating him to a lot more things which I can be somewhat resentful about... especially when he buys all the latest tech so isn’t hard up

He also once took me out for my birthday dinner and told me if I wanted alcohol as opposed to a soft drink id have to pay for it myself.

 

[peanutbuttercupp11]

Me and my fiance both have jobs and incomes and have separate bank accounts and even after getting married have no plans to get a joint account. We've been together 9 years and were meant to get married last year but thanks to Covid this has been postponed several times to next year. I hate the idea that once you're married you merge into one being, after we get married we'll still be independent people and I want to keep my financial independence. I absolutely hate the idea of having to ask him for money or asking for permission to treat myself to something new.

He pays the mortgage and bills and I have a monthly direct debit set up for my portion, he earns quite a bit more than me so he pays a bigger share, our deposit was 50/50 though. Things for the house, weekly food shops, holidays etc. we split the cost 50/50 and when we go out to eat/for drinks we'll sometimes split but more often than not he offers to treat me. But when it comes to spending money our money is our own and we want to keep it that way, his hard-earned money isn't mine to spend on clothes or beauty products just like mine isn't his to spend on games or beers.

We both also have our own cars and are responsible for paying insurance/MOT etc for our own cars and we've never driven each other's cars. I've seen people say they don't understand couples who have separate cars but we both like it this way, again we are independent people and I like having my own things! He just recently had to fork out over £1k on repairs for his car so I'm very glad it's not a shared car