How do you handle finances in your marriage?

That is all. And no I'm not married...yet.

You'll never have to worry about finances, since you go to OSU, so just throw around cash. Not everyone will be as fortunate as you, however.

My wife handles the checkbook and the bill paying except AEP which I do online. She's too paranoid to trust other things to online pay and not to write checks, though I keep working on her. As far as major purchases I have learned over 15 years of being together that anything more than $20 needs to have a requisition form put through the household finance dept.

What do you mean by "handle"??

We spend less than we earn and we review our total savings and investments together quarterly.

I mean I never see it, write in it, balance it, or know the exact amount inside of it at any given time.

Con_Alma;572562 wrote:What do you mean by "handle"??

We spend less than we earn and we review our total savings and investments together quarterly.

Paying bills, purchasing items, joint checking, etc.. I'm curious if you have both people working, if things are kept separate or if everything is pooled.

You'll never have to worry about finances, since you go to OSU, so just throw around cash. Not everyone will be as fortunate as you, however.

lol'd

We split up the bills. She pays some. I pay some. We share a joint checking and savings, but I have my own separate checking as well that I use for business expenses. We each have a credit card.

It works for us. She is better than I am with keeping dates (bill pay included), and I'm better with numbers. Together we do a pretty good job.

sleeper;572573 wrote:Paying bills, purchasing items, joint checking, etc.. I'm curious if you have both people working, if things are kept separate or if everything is pooled.

We pool everything. We have joint checking/savings. We're both on our credit cards and other loans/bills. Basically, we keep a $1,000 cash cushion in our checking account and monitor anticipated expenses, so we don't really have issues with bouncing checks. We've kept track of every penny we've spent for the last 5 years, so we have pretty good ideas of what we'll spend each month and what we need.

Once a year (usually in the week between Christmas and New Year's), we sit down, come up with an annual budget, do a review of the past year, and just generally set aside a few hours to figure out where we are and where we are heading. I handle the day-to-day bill paying, but send quarterly updates to Mrs. FFT so we're in the loop.

Basically, we do all our finances together, but then we just communicate and plan a lot to make sure we're on the same page.


EDIT: re purchases, if it's something less than $100 and we "need" it, we don't discuss it--one of us just buys it. If it's something that is just a want, if it's under $50 or so, we don't discuss it. But if it's a need that is over $100 or a want that is over $50, then we talk it over first. Depending on how big/expensive it is, Mrs. FFT often comparison shops and does some research first before we buy.

With the exception of our student loans, we're both on all accounts (except for 401k, etc.). We keep the student loans separate in case one of us dies--last we checked, if we didn't combine them, the person's loans would die with them.

Also, to the extent you have kids or have one spouse earning significantly more than the other, you'll want to look into life insurance to ensure that there is some sort of cushion after death. A financial planner (or the WSJ's Lifetime Guide to Money) can get you started on that route.

Sleeper, thanks for the explanation. Here's the best I've got as a response.

Everything is pooled except for qualified accounts including deferred comp.

Both are now working since my children are old enough to not need a stay at home parent.

Whoever sits down and has time pays the bills.

If we need or want something we buy it. If the item will be used by both people we tend to discuss it first.

I take my pay monthly and my wife gets paid twice per month. The compensation goes to a variety of places and accounts but the net remaining of each check goes into one checking account that we both use to pay the monthly expenses from.

I work, she works. We pool our money into a joint checking account. Pay all the bills from there.
I have a 401(k), she has a 403(b) that we both contribute 10% of our pretax income into (my company matches 7% hers matches 2%, i think). We are listed as each other's beneficiary on those, but we don't have our names on the accounts.
We have an investment account that we put $500 a month into (it's our pay off our debt/pay for kids college fund). both on that.
my company stock is mine, she can't do anything with it. but it was a performance bonus, i didn't buy it.
We also have 1,000 each set aside that we agreed we'd keep before we got married.

we have 2 credit cards, (only 1 we actually use the other is the rainy day fund) both on those.

j_crazy;572591 wrote:... We are listed as each other's beneficiary on those, but we don't have our names on the accounts.
....

There's no way you could have both your names on those accounts.

that's what i said. i'm like the beneficiary, if she dies, i get it. vice versa.

I'm aware you said it. It was worded as if you chose for it to be that way. I simply added to what you said that there's no way it could be listed in both your names.

I handle all the money (like a real man should), she gets an allowance.

We both work and both of our checks are direct deposited into one bank account. She has bills that she pays, I have bills the I pay. She handles the bank account. I sell stuff on Ebay, and I use the paypal account for everything I need to do.

I make it, she spends it.

It is a fact that finances are one of the top reasons for divorce.
My wife has certain bills and responsibilities and i have mine. We have never had a joint account, we pay bills out of our own checking accounts. We each contribute into our 401K's and have our own savings accounts. Each extra bill/expense is discussed. This keeps harmony between someone who needs to have money in reserve to stay happy (me) and she is an impulse buyer with very loose money management skills.

We keep everything together. She pays the bills, I setup the monthly budget and do our investments. She is more organized, I am more math/logic which is what defines our two roles in that area (her doing bills, me doing budget/investments).

I manage all product manufacturing and quality control, she is in charge of recruitment and distribution. Collections are done jointly with delinquencies typically falling my way for reinforced resolution.

After my ex wife I will always no keep finances seperate. My fiance and I split almost everything down the middle, I make alot more than her so I cover a little more on some things, but it will be seperate! I by no means hesitate to give to her but no one, not even my future wife will have free reign again on my hard earned cash!

We both work, her pay is more than twice of mine. One checking account, one savings account. We set aside money every week into envelopes that includes money for food, gas, entertainment, allowance for her, allowance for me. We discuss major and some minor purchases. My pay check goes into savings, we want to pay cash for the kids' college tuition. It's taken us 20 years to get to this point and we have had many fights over money when we were po' (so little money we could not afford the 'or in poor). If you are married then it should be one main account to pay bills and family purchases. If you both agree on cash allowances or a certain percentage of the pay going into separate accounts for fun money that is a good idea.

Don't use credit cards unless it is an emergency or have cash to pay it off when the bill comes in.

^both myself and my fiance have 0 credit cards, loans, or car payments. It is cash for everything!

We currently have joint savings, one joint checking to pay the mortgage and separate checking for our main spending. We will be combining our separate checking accounts into one soon so it will be easier for her to balance. I make (a vast majority of) the monies but she keeps track of them.

Commander of Awesome;572625 wrote:I handle all the money (like a real man should), she gets an allowance.

Single, eh?

O-Trap;572575 wrote:We split up the bills. She pays some. I pay some. We share a joint checking and savings, but I have my own separate checking as well that I use for business expenses. We each have a credit card.

It works for us. She is better than I am with keeping dates (bill pay included), and I'm better with numbers. Together we do a pretty good job.

That is pretty much what my parents do