How dod you and your partner set up your finances?

bugslet

27 years together and never married. Always had seperate accounts, I'm not a joint or get married person, I like the idea of being independent and fortunately he was happy with that as well. I paid the mortgage, he paid council tax, utility. Food, probably 50/50. I bought most of the toiletries and all cleaning stuff and about 90% of the inside of the house. He paid for the gardener and upkeep of the building mostly. No idea who put the most in, it sort of developed like that and we were both happy.

He's about to move into a nursing home and in many ways, it's been useful that things are set up that way ( we had Lasting Power of Attorney in place and I recommend it to anyone), I'll have to move the utility bills into my name and that's it really.

Whatever works for your personalities, is what's the best!

VestanPance

When I was married we had the following:

Joint Account: Wages payed into this, all bills taken from this account.

Separate Current Accounts: A set amount transferred by standing transfer to each account to spend as we wished.

Joint Savings Account: Set amount transferred to this each month. Also used to save up for large things like holidays etc.

Joint Credit Card.

I liked this system as the joint account was never touched by either of us at all each month, as all it did was make payments. The separate current accounts meant we had some money to spend as we liked, and also gave you the ability to save up or buy something nice for your partner without them knowing about it.

I guess I'm old school in the what money earned was ours (no matter who earned most and that shuffled between us at times), not mine and yours. The only difference to the traditional model being the separate accounts that was basically free monthly spend. I found this avoided any arguments about who spent what and you knew exactly how much you had to spend without it impacting on bills or savings.

maman

aa2 wrote: »

Hi all

I've been with my partner for 6 years and we've always been completely financially independent. Were looking to combine our money and I was wondering how everyone else does it?

We are thinking of doing this;

Joint Savings - Everything which is left over from joint account.

Joint account - all wages in, all bills including each others (mobile phones, loans etc), petrol, food, vet bills basically everything apart from;

Individual account - An allowance for going out with friends, buying CD's, lunch, coffee's basically general living!

Individual Cash Isa - An independant savings account with a set amount going in each month for when one wants to indulge themselves with a new coat or save for a rainy day... or buy the other half a surprise expensive christmas present (if your reading this!).

What are your thoughts?

Katexx wrote: »

I just don't like the thought of having joint accounts; I like to be in control!

We do almost the same as OP but with a few tweaks. Like Kate I loathe the idea of a joint account so we have personal current accounts, a bills account in my name that we each pay into every month as DH is happy to let me manage the bills, a savings account each although if we need to touch them we'd each happily contribute to an agreed shared expense (like house renovations or whatever) and we have ISAs. Fortunately we're in a position that we never need to touch the money in the Isa's.

aa2

VestanPance wrote: »

When I was married we had the following:

Joint Account: Wages payed into this, all bills taken from this account.

Separate Current Accounts: A set amount transferred by standing transfer to each account to spend as we wished.

Joint Savings Account: Set amount transferred to this each month. Also used to save up for large things like holidays etc.

Joint Credit Card.

I liked this system as the joint account was never touched by either of us at all each month, as all it did was make payments. The separate current accounts meant we had some money to spend as we liked, and also gave you the ability to save up or buy something nice for your partner without them knowing about it.

I guess I'm old school in the what money earned was ours (no matter who earned most and that shuffled between us at times), not mine and yours. The only difference to the traditional model being the separate accounts that was basically free monthly spend. I found this avoided any arguments about who spent what and you knew exactly how much you had to spend without it impacting on bills or savings.

This is kind of what we want.

The reason (it seems everyone asks!) is that I take home a salary of nearly triple what she does and im also quite irresponsible with my wages. By having a joint account where both our wages are paid into it would give me a sense of personal responsibility to not waste the money in the joint and only the funds in my 'spend as i wish funds'.

The other reason is that i dont like feeling as if im paying for everything all the time, it means that i just see things as our money and our expenses as opposed to usually paying for everything, something that she is also not that happy with!

It will also give her some her some financial stability which im more than happy to give.

I suppose that sums it up?!

VestanPance

It worked for me. We never argued about about finances at all, or had any financial difficulties using that method.