best way to pay bills / mortage etc when in a couple

carl_t

hi all

Im wanting to know the best way to pay bills and mortgage etc when in a couple in a new house.
do we have our own accounts and then also a shared one which the bills and mortgage come out of etc ?

I am splitting the money so we both end up with the same amount every month between us, I think this is fair because I earn more.

comments please

getmore4less

Make sure you have the exit plan agreement properly documented.

Who owns the house in what proportions

It can be sensible to seperate the capital/equity assets from the day to day running costs

Kayalana99

Me and my partner have a joint account that his wages go in, and all the bills are taken out apart from food then we each have our own ind accounts which with my wage I pay for the food and give him abit extra to make up for fact he is paying all house bills.

Personally think it would be better if everything went into joint account and then we used the money between us i.e for savings hoildays baby stuff but he would never go for it as he likes his spare money to be his which is fair enough.

Our way works for us as he tends to get abit more left over but he earns more then me & I don't really spend much but spilting 50/50 of the rest makes sense.

floss2

We share ours on a percentage basis: DH brings home twice what I do, so he pays the same precentage of money as his percentage of take-home pay into the household bills account,which covers all household-related bills - mortgage, personal pension contributions, insurances, car tax, housekeeping/food shopping etc.

We both save roughly the same amount each month.

We both have roughly the same amount of "pocket money" each month in our own bank accounts.

xxlouisexx56

We just split everything in half

carl_t

but if i earn say 600 a month more than my partner, splitting the bills in half wont be fair will it, as I will have lots more spare money.
I want it to be fair

krlyr

There is no "best" way - just whatever works for the pair of you!

Some people have commented on the way OH and I do things - e.g. we own our house as tennants in common rather than joint tennants, meaning on paper he owns more of it than me. We both discussed it and felt this fair since he was putting 8 years of savings into it, and me only 2 or 3. As it stands, it's not like I'm only allowed to use 1 out of the 5 rooms we have :rotfl:, it's our house and we jointly benefit. But it makes for a fairer split should we split up (hopefully not, but being realistic, you just don't know), we get back what we put in. Since OH earns more than me, he has more spare cash a month so this goes as overpayments on the mortgage - again, reflected in our sums when we decided what the tennants in common split would be.

Everything else is split 50:50 but the bills generally are in my name, or joint names but paid out of my account. I buy the food shopping, just because our budget means I have the spare cash for it. We each have a spending allowance (the same amount each) we can spend as we see fit - save it for big purchases, spend on frivolous things, treat each other to a meal out or takeaway and so on. We each have savings accounts but either account would be used for household stuff, just whatever was easier (or half from each, e.g. when we replaced the fencing last year). I tend to pay for my own car but OH will offer money if I need it (but he has a work car he has expenses relating to, and that he uses the bulk of the time, so I don't mind paying for mine and him paying for his). Generally, our money is ours to use as a couple, but kept separately in terms of bank/savings accounts.

We've ummed and ahhed about a joint account but just don't feel it necessary - we'd only switch if it offered a good interest rate or some other bonus.

It works for us. I know other people prefer joint bank accounts, or pooling their cash, or keeping things entirely separately and each paying their own share of things (half and half, or split in proportion of income), you just need to come to an agreement between you on what works and what you both feel fair.

krlyr

carl_t wrote: »

but if i earn say 600 a month more than my partner, splitting the bills in half wont be fair will it, as I will have lots more spare money.
I want it to be fair

This is why it will vary. What is fair? If you were two single people, say you were both renting a house that cost the same - you'd earn more so you'd have more spare cash. Is it unfair that your OH earns less so therefore has less spare cash, or is it just a fact of life?

You just have to decide on your principles as a couple. Do you feel that as a couple, both of your incomes belong to both of you equally? Or do you feel that, while you both benefit from the house equally, your 50:50 split only extends to that - and any spare cash you have after the mortgage and bills remains yours to spend/save/give away as you see fit?

It's all personal. If you feel it's fairer to split your income between you, go ahead. If you feel you're justified in having more cash than your partner, that may not be wrong either. You could look at ways that benefit the both of you - like in my case, my OH earns more and overpays the mortgage, which benefits me because I'll be mortgage-free sooner. However, it also benefits him because it reflects in how much of the house he owns. This won't affect me as long as we (touch wood, fingers crossed, and all that!) stay together but if we were to split then I think it's fair that his share of the house reflects his hard work and perseverance within his job to work his way up to the wage he earns. Maybe we're a bit cynical, maybe we're just realistic - we just both agreed that a house was a huge financial commitment that we wanted to look at with a worst-case-scenario kind of attitude and reflected that in how we went about purchasing it.

Also, remember that what you decide now doesn't have to reflect how it will always be. I'm in a career where I could end up earning more than my OH - we'd probably readdress the percentage/split if this were the case and I started making more overpayments with my money. And we did things differently when we rented - everything was 50:50 and any excess cash was ours to do as we pleased (initially just spending money but then we decided to buy so it was all saved for that). We don't want kids, but if you did, you might find the balance has to be readdressed again then - does she stay off work with the kid(s), in which case, your income will be the only income. Does she work part-time - do you readjust your figures so she has some more spending money, and money for the kid(s)' stuff, and so on.
There's no one set rule for every couple or every circumstance.

bellevie

I cant see what is fairer than equal % .
Thats percentage of your income, not percentage of bills.

If you earn 2000 50% of your monthly income 1000, if your partner earns 1400 their 50% will be 700. You pay more as you earn more but you are both sharing the load.

katie1812

All of our wages go into one account and then all bills and mortgage etc come out of this account. If one of us wants to buy something we just use that account. We have our personal accounts but only use online if we don't want the other to see (birthday and Christmas times!) but we just lump all our money in one and then spend it no % things or nothing. And he earns double what I do.

Nicky_Noo_Na

As already mentioned different things work for different people.

We get paid into our own bank accounts and transfer a set amount each to a joint account that is for all bills, food and joint expenses to come out of. We're then left with roughly the same 'fun money' each which is for us to each spend as we wish which works for us as we have massively different spending habits - I spend little and often through the month and he saves for a bit and then blows it on an expxensive item but the no judgement aspect works well for us. It's also nice to feel like you have your 'own' money especially for when wanting to treat your partner or buy presents etc in secret which you can't do with a single joint account.

I like the idea of splitting bills as % of income - seems v.fair.