Budgeting - Newly Married Couple

Nuncle

Hi there folks!

In 6 weeks time I will be a married man. I have lived with my parents up until now and haven't had to pay much in the way of household bills. I'm moving in with my wife to her house which is fully furnished, but could do with some improvements.

My question to you is what bills should I expect to pay, how much, and how frequently.

e.g. how much should we budget for home heating (oil central heating, small semi detached house)

McKneff

You really need to be sitting down with your future wife to discuss this.
But you should be expected to be paying half of everything. Full stop.

there are 2 of us here in a semi, for gas and electricity we pay around £110 per month.

Hooloovoo

Nuncle wrote: »

In 6 weeks time I will be a married man.

My condolences.

My question to you is what bills should I expect to pay, how much, and how frequently.

e.g. how much should we budget for home heating (oil central heating, small semi detached house)

You say you'll be moving in to her house, I presume you mean she is already living there. So she will already know how much she is paying, and you'll be able to contribute half of that.

I assume you are also budgeting to purchase half her house from her.

Nuncle

McKneff wrote: »

You really need to be sitting down with your future wife to discuss this.
But you should be expected to be paying half of everything. Full stop.

Thanks, we have discussed it. My future wife is very frugal, but isn't great at keeping a track of expenditure, so I've already got some information, but not everything.

And paying half goes without saying. Cheers!

Nuncle

Hooloovoo wrote: »

My condolences.

Haha!

Hooloovoo wrote: »

I assume you are also budgeting to purchase half her house from her.

This isn't something that occured to me beforehand, so thanks, I will add this to my budget!

Keep the bills and figures coming! Rough is better than nothing.

pumpkin_soup

McKneff wrote: »

you should be expected to be paying half of everything. Full stop.

I don't see why.

You need to come to an agreement with your wife over joint finances that seem fair to both of you.

You might well find that half each is the best way to split bills. But you might just as easily find another arrangement that seems fairer (eg if one of you earns 20k and the other 30k, you might decide to split the bills 60/40.).

The two of you are the only ones who can decide how to split bills fairly between yourselves.

Congrats on your impending wedding!

tanith

Congratulations on your wedding, I really think talking about this with your future wife and discussing what her expectations are would be in order. Everyone has different idea about such things and you need to agree in the main. We have a joint current acc we use to pay all joint bills, but hubby pays in more than me as I am retired and he's still working we renegotiated the figures when I retired and came to an arrangement.. I pay for my own car for instance but all household expenditure is shared. I know some think separate bank accounts is madness in a marriage (whats yours is mine and whats mine is yours ) but it works for us to keep our finances separate apart from the joint bills account... good luck on your big day..

mgdavid

in complete opposition to the previous poster - your marriage will with a bit of luck and a lot of work, last a lifetime, during which your financial positon will have ups and downs. Sometimes she may earn more than you (if you were unemployed for instance), sometimes you may be the only earner (when you start a family perhaps), so why not come to a simple arrangement that covers all possibilities and lets you both take equal and shared responsibility for finance? Pool your earnings into a joint account, budget for all regular bills and basic household expenditure, agree a monthly amount each for day-to-day incidentals, and any residue can be squandered or saved, after discussion and joint decisions. Transparency is the name of the game, even if the banks don't believe in it!

Faith177

Me & OH were in a similer position to you.

When he moved in with me I had already owned my home for a number of years. We agreed straight away that all the household bills council tax, Sky, phoneline ect would be split half & half.

I have a different account for household bills. So we both pay our half in by standing order. Then we just let that account tick over when there is some spare money in there we either split it between us or buy something we will both use.

The rest of our money is then our own for our personal bills ie credit cards, loans ect I don't believe my OH should pay for debit I had before him and he feels the same about his. Also all our own bits come out of this so for me travel to work, lunches and treats.

Food shopping he is hardly at home so I do most of this as it is mainly my food I'm buying but maybe you could split it or take it in turns. We take it in turns to pay for our animals food

As for home improvements we haven't really had much of this. I tend to pay for most of it though as it is my house. If he wants to give me some towards then great but I wouldn't expect him too

Hope this helps

Nuncle

Thanks for messages so far guys. I was wondering if anyone had hard numbers of what they pay for bills, especially those that aren't easily lifted off my future wife's bank account statement. For instance, I know how much she pays for the TV license, the mortgage, and the phone bill etc. as these are set in stone and come out every month/quarter. What I am more interested in is things that don't have a set amount each month, and things that come in sporadically. Things like grocery shopping; is £100 per week a typical amount for two adults? Also, the oil for central heating is very hard to quantify as my OH has not lived in her house the whole time she's owned it. What is a reasonable estimate of expenditure on heating oil for a small house for two working adults, using the knowledge my OH needs to be warm at all times due to her health? My stab in the dark is £300 a year.

As for the approach we have agreed on for budgeting and spending, we will have a shared account and our own personal accounts each. Shared/household expenses will be paid out of the shared account, personal expenses out of our own. Everything will be split 50:50.

margaretclare

I've no idea about oil central heating, so can't comment. But further to what others have said - we're a retired couple each with our own bank accounts but with a joint account which we both tip into, to fund the household expenses. We put in £200 a month each because some expenses are quarterly - car insurance and house insurance, we get a better deal by paying quarterly. We each put in £170 a month for food. For us, council tax is the biggest monthly expenditure. Your wife-to-be will have been getting single person's discount on this, 25% reduction in her council tax bill, but that will stop when you move in.

DH moved in with me in 1997 and the title was already in my name. Following our marriage in 2002 I insisted on putting the title into 'joint tenants'. There was no question of him 'buying half'.