Who pays for what?

cookies_and_crem

My husband and I are paid into separate accounts from which we transfer all but our agreed allowance into a joint bills account which also pays for food, joint take-outs, petrol and anything for the house. Every few months the surplus is transferred into our joint savings to wallow until we decide on a holiday or.... just to wallow!

Our allowance is equal and is used for dvd's, games, gifts, nights/days out, clothes etc. Every few months on paper (or excel) we do a household income/expenditure budget and adjust our allowances if needed. Income to this home is pooled....

C.x

dreaming

This question always intrigues me as well.
When I got engaged (in 1970s) my OH was an apprentice and earned a pittance so I saved my wages for house/wedding and we used his for going out. When we got married and bought house we had joint account and both wages were paid in. There was rarely anything left over after mortgage and bills so there was no problem. Then we had children and I gave up work so lived on 1 wage in joint account. Again we didn't have much money for extras. Fast forward several years and I went back to work. Should have been a great time but unfortunately OH was very bad at handling money and got us into some sticky situations where we had to remortgage to pay off his debts. Then tried to have set amount of spending money each per month but OH didn't like being treated like a child (his words). Found out he had opened a sole credit card and had huge debt. After yet another remortgage I suggested we have our own accounts and each pay half of bills into joint account. Tried this for a while but found out he was in huge debt again - his excuse being that he was making up for when he was the sole earner and he didn't have any spare cash. When I tried to discuss ways to pay the debts off he felt I was trying to control him. Needless to say OH is now ExOH, and still in debt - although he & his partner seem able to afford 2 holidays abroad every year. I only have my mortgage (and am overpaying on that) and also have 6 months salary in ISA savings, and will never have joint finances with anyone again.
It is difficult when you start out with someone as it isn't very romantic to discuss finances. I know I trusted my Ex absolutely for many years, thought we wanted the same things from life and were totally committed to each other. I never dreamt he could/would deceive me so badly. However it is often said that the most common causes of marriage/relationship breakdown are money/sex/communication - and it is no coincidence that money is first.
Since then I often wonder how other people make it work and I guess the answer is that everyone has to find their own way.

cavework

We work like the programme Bread ..I love the china chicken and we have one!.
Hopefully there is no Lilo Lil
everyone in our house pays what they can afford and everyone in our house benefits.
We are a team and no we don't live in Liverpool though I would love to.
xx

thunderbird

jcr16 wrote: »

were married , were a team. nothing is mine or his ,it is our's.

when i worked we had two sets of wages going into our joint account and all bill's came from there. i'm now a stay at home mummy to our 3 children and i don't earn a penny but my day to day routine with our children and running the home is priceless, so hubbies wages now cover everything. thats how we as a team work and it works excellent for us.

A team - exactly what I was planning on saying :T

Fair play if other people have different ways that work better for them, but personally I can't get my head around having separate finances if you are married.

stepharoo

I'm a SAHM, and don't work, so my husband is the sole breadwinner and self employed. Out of what he brings home each month, the majority of it goes to our joint account, and then we each get a bit of money to our own accounts.

Most bills and grocery shops come out of the joint account, but our mobile phone bills come out of our personal accounts, as well as anything we want for ourselves. Whatever is left in our own accounts goes towards clearing our credit card debt. Even though I bring pretty much no financial contribution to our household, I try my hardest to budget for us and make our money go as far as I can.

bubblybee

Ever since we started living together all our money has been pooled. We split the bills i.e. some came out of his account and some came out of mine. Then when food and grocery shopping, whoever had money in their account paid for it.

Since we bought the house, we have a joint account for mortgage and a few bills, but the same principle applies. I earn more than he does and I probably spend a bit more on seeing friends and beauty products but we aren't extravagent and don't have the money to be.

Since the start of January I have rejigged our accounts so the same principle applies but I now have various savings going on ready for having children, Christmas, the House, etc. I've just organised it depending on which account will have money. I've clearly said how much spending money on groceries we have each month and we both live by it. Whilst we are not married, since we started living together we have both been 100% commited to the relationship and therefore all money is shared to whoever needs it that particular week or day or month.

Stkilda14

me and OH (since we were married) have had one account - both salaries go in and everything comes out of that. Couldn't be bothered to work out who pays. It is a marriage so all money is joint and all bills are joint. Couldn't imagine it any other way. He earns more than me, but I work just as hard with a full time job and two kids, so never feel things are anything other than equal.

sarah*a

OH's income is approx £1300 pm. Mine is £600. He pays rent £550 and gives me £650. The rest is his to [STRIKE]waste[/STRIKE] spend as he wants.

Out of the £1250 I pay for everything else. OH may pick up a pint of milk if I ask - and he has any cash left! His money does not cover lunches/travel etc - I sort all that out.

He has to buy my birthday/anniversary/valentines gifts from his money but I give him extra for xmas pressies. Last year I got :mad: at the amount he spent simply because he didn't shop around/shop sales etc - so this year I am giving him an extra £10 a month and it's upto him if he buys xmas gifts and puts them away or wastes it and has no spending money next nov/dec (it's working so far - I've been barred from a certain drawer and he's been sneaking stuff into it )

amancalledmartin wrote: »

.......I don't think he really has any idea what anything costs. But if anything happened to me he'd be screwed!

Same with my OH - I keep saying I must write a clear 'step-by-step' guide to the bills 'just in case' as he wouldn't think about things like renewing insurance or cancelling my Lovefilm! I have a bills book which is kept uptodate but it's all numbers to him - though he is slowly coming to understand that I don't just take all his money off him and spend it on myself.

He used to until I explained that the little I have left over each month pays for the any holidays we may have, train fares to visit family and occasional meals out/theatre tickets. I suggested he keep a little extra each month and organised/pay for all these things himself but he very wisely refused my offer :rotfl:

Indout96

Exactly the same as Stkilda14 for us, only thing we have separate are the ISA's

rmiller

We base it on our wages. For example, let's say our total bills equaled £700. I used to take home £950 and he took home £1300 just our joint income was £2,250. His % of our total income is about 57% and mine is about 43%. Therefore, he paid for 57% of the bills and I paid for 43%. OR I paid about £300 a month and he paid about £400.

We didn't stick to the percentages like mad, we normally would round it so that he paid 60% and I paid 40%.

Now that we earn about the same amount, we just split it in half.