Getting married - what do we do with our cash??

Rachel83

We have a joint account my OH gets paid into that coveres all the direct debits.
I have my account that i get paid into, all shopping, clothes etc come from my account.
Left over money in the joint accounts usually put into savings or goes towards treat stuff.

Andyf33

One joint account that everything gets paid into, mortgage/bills etc come out then share the rest on your life together. I earn approx 85k/year more than my wife and I just accept that we share everything.

Sometimes we do disagree on financial issues - so we have an unwritten agreement.....i do as im told and the mrs gets what she wants

mquine

Nicola1982 wrote: »

I am getting married to my long term other half on 16th May (v excited!) but am getting a bit worried about our money situation. We have lived together for the last three years and have done our joint finances by having a joint account into which we pay the necessary amount each month to cover bills etc but keeping our own individual accounts. This has become a real pain in the bum as I manage it myself and am always asking him to contribute more etc which he questions (we spent how much on their gift???? etc etc.) and it feels like im trying to steal from him (but im not!).

Surely the real issue is that you're not budgeting properly and telling your OH that you both only need to contribute £X each month, when £Y would be more realistic?

I would say a 'one pot' system is only a good idea when one partner isn't able to work, e.g. because of retraining, redundancy, illness or childcare. If both partners are working full time and have no children, I would stick with a 'three pot' system. Just be more realistic about how much you need, as a couple, to live on.

spudnik

I think we must be a little bit strange we've been together 9 years lived together 3 and are getting married in august.
Before this year he paid the rent and i paid everything else, roughly at the beginning it was an equal amount although i earned 40% less than him.
Now i don't work and he is now paying all the bills and he is realising how much they are and is quite shocked. But now i can't contribute and haven't for 6months i don't ask for anything for my self in fact i am quite embarassed even putting the name brand shampoo in the shopping trolley because i feel like i am sponging off him, thankfully he doesn't feel that way.

thescouselander

We do it the same as the OP. We both have our own accounts but we also have a joint account into which we pay money covering things like the mortgage and household bills including food. Since I earn a lot more than my other half we pay some things like the mortgage proportionately to our pay. This means I pay more but I am happy to do so because then we have a similar amount of spending money left over so we can do things together.

I usually manage the finances and I have created a spreadsheet that details everything that should go out of the account - its pretty accurate now so there is rarely need to top it up. Since everything is in the spreadsheet we can both see what's going in and out so neither of us feels like we are being ripped off. A payment goes into the joint account from our own account by standing order at the beginning of the month and thats that. As another poster said, its all about budgeting properly.

We are getting married next year and we don't expect anything to change. We have discussed pooling our money and we both agreed it would get messy as it would be difficult to work out who was spending what. We would also feel guilty about buying things for ourselves as it would seem like spending the other half's money.

This works for us anyway.

shoppaholic_returns

I don't really get this mine and yours thing,to me if your getting married everything should be OURS, I earned alot more than my husband for a few years,now he earns very well and I dont work. I manage the finances and he doesnt even ask, he trusts that I will make the most pertinent decision on finances, (I was a financial advisor for 10 yrs), and I just get on with it.

I may missing something but I dont see what all the fuss is about, unless maybe there is something to hide

shoppaholic_returns

Andyf33 wrote: »

One joint account that everything gets paid into, mortgage/bills etc come out then share the rest on your life together. I earn approx 85k/year more than my wife and I just accept that we share everything.

Sometimes we do disagree on financial issues - so we have an unwritten agreement.....i do as im told and the mrs gets what she wants

Sounds like our house!!!:rotfl::rotfl::rotfl:

thescouselander

shoppaholic_returns wrote: »

I don't really get this mine and yours thing,to me if your getting married everything should be OURS, I earned alot more than my husband for a few years,now he earns very well and I dont work. I manage the finances and he doesnt even ask, he trusts that I will make the most pertinent decision on finances, (I was a financial advisor for 10 yrs), and I just get on with it.

I may missing something but I dont see what all the fuss is about, unless maybe there is something to hide

I don think you can dictate what people should do just because they are married. Everyone is different, what works for one couple could be completely wrong for another. It is down to the couple in question to come to an arrangement that best suits them both.

MrsTinks

DH and I still have no joint account - mainly due to neither of us getting round to sorting one
Now this doesn't in the least mean we don't share the outgoings etc - he pays the mortgage every month and some of the bills, I cover most of the bills. He does earn a lot more than me (not that I am on a low salary) but he also has more debts... ultimately if either of us is running low then the other helps out. I usually take care of the biggies like car insurance - only because I am the only one organised enough to have money put aside to pay it in cash When I go on maternity leave in 5 weeks time then he'll have to sub me as the maternity pay won't cover all the outgoings sadly but I have built up a little buffer too so it's not too bad.

Ultimately you have to do what works for you but regardless of how you do it then make sure you always discuss things - especially when it comes to money! I rarely buy someone a present without DH knowing before I buy it... and vice versa - then again I'm the skinflint in the house and the one who put a stop to him bailing every one and their dog out of trouble (and jail a couple of times...) because it always had to go on cards and that is half the debts he has... because oddly enough no-one ever paid him back. What with him being on a good salary obviously he didn't need it back now did he? ARGH! And he's too nice to ask them to repay it.
If his family repaid what they owe him from loans and bail we'd probably halve our debts... But in our minds we've written that money off long ago and now we just don't lend any more. If they get into trouble it's their look out - if it's dire enough then we'll send food and clothes but that's it...

Pee

Marriage does mean that you have a legal obligation to maintain one another, and that any money is effectively owned by you both, even if only in one name, to be divided as the court as it sees fit if you cannot agree.

I hope it never comes to that, and the fact you are thinking about this now and talking about it is a very good sign.

I don't know the answer. I have my own money and my boyfriend has his and it works fine because we are both working and both earning good money.

I've previously been in a relationship where I was the main breadwinner, and been very generous, but I've felt like that, that I was being very generous and that I was being taken advantage of. (I was.)

If I were to have children in my current relationship, that would mean both of us taking a substantial pay cut and there being a lot less money to go around, it might well mean that I am being the one subsidised.

I think the fairest approach is that you do a budget and then if 90% of each of your earnings are earmarketed for essentials, he then gets 10% of his income to do as he likes with and you get 10% of yours.