Ask the Readers: How do YOU communicate about money?
In yesterday's Q&A post, I shared about how I communicate about finances (by writing up a report every month).
But today, I wanted to open it up to you all. I'm sure that we've got a whole bunch of relationships represented here, and I'd love to hear what works for you. What tips do you have for successfully communicating about money?
And hey, if you want to, feel free to share what hasn't worked...you can help another couple avoid the pitfalls you've fallen into.
The floor, it is yours.
I'm recently engaged, so I've not had the experience yet of combining two incomes into one budget. However, I've shown my fiance the spreadsheet I keep, and he's open to using it. I don't spring it upon him all at once because he's not a budget nut like I am. Also, I find he's most talkative in the moring, so I like to bring up these topics after he's had breakfast. 😉
Four AM? Really Kristen, what kind of a schedule is that? I thought that I got up early, but 4 AM? (I was awoken earlier than usual this morning by a wrong number!)
Money communication. About 35 years or so ago when I was sitting down tearing my hair out because we didn't have enough money to pay the bills, in spite of being frugal, my wife probably saved my life when she said to me, "Would you like me to take care of paying the bills dear?" At that time MEN paid the bills. I said Thank You dear, yes I would love that, probably thinking at the time that she would not be able to handle it. But handle it she did and she has paid the bills ever since then. I have absolutely no idea how she does it. We never seem to get behind, or if we do she doesn't tell me about it. My level of stress has fallen by several levels and I am certain that I am alive today because of those 12 little words.
Thank you darling, I love you.
Every month I give my husband an update of our networth and the balance of our savings and retirement accounts. We typically just save everything to one account and then make large transfers once per year into our retirement accounts, rather than numerous small transfers. Of course, that's for IRAs, not 401(k)s which are deducted from our paychecks. I say that to add that we don't talk much about money most of the time. Rather, a few times per year we'll have discussions of how much to manage our savings and retirement, but nothing terribly regular, except networth.
I handle the finances in our home, but I often discuss them with my husband. For example, every two weeks when I get paid, I put a little money into a money market account for savings. Every time that happens, I tell him what our new total is. I also keep a binder with all our bills in it, so if he really wants to look through it, he can.
I am the "budgetor, financeor" in our household. My husband and I attended Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University class through our church. It has certainly brought home the power of budgeting. My husband is great with numbers, just not money. We find in our house it works if I am the money manager. I have an Excel spreadsheet that I use to keep track of bills and which pay period money goes to what bills. I also make a two week menu and my grocery list reflects the menu. I also shop at Aldi so it is possible for $250.00 a month to feed four adults, a 12 year old boy, and a three year old granddaughter. I fill envelopes with cash for things such as gas (for work), vacations, vehicle maintenance, etc... I am to utilize my church's online giving website so I can tithe with the click of a button. It isn't easy to say no and stick to a budget but I want to live debt free.
I'm really looking forward to hearing some words of wisdom on this 🙂 I am especially curious to hear from anyone in situations where "traditional" gender money roles are switched (David's comment got me thinking about this). I'm 24 and live with my boyfriend but our finances aren't really mixed (other than we casually switch off paying for groceries, nights out, etc.), but we've had some engagement talks and I know I want to spend my life with him. He's a wonderful man in every other way but he is pretty horribly disorganized with money - so needless to say if/when we get married I'm planning on handling the finances and he is okay with that 🙂 I also currently make a LOT more money than him and just have a lot more earning potential based on my degrees and where we live (my current industry is really big here, and we moved here for my job). I don't think he's upset/jealous about it in a "this is detrimental to my manliness!" kind of way, but I know he does feel bad that he can't contribute more right now, and embarrassed about dropping out of college. Anyone else deal with these kind of issues in money talks with their spouse??
I am the budget and billpayer in my house. My husband is awful with money and long term views so I have all the ( rewards) credit cards. He just asks me if he can buy things and is good about yes or no. He is always shocked to see our savings balance 😉 and his mom was pleasantly surprised when the private education loan she co-signed showed up paid. I do try to talk money with him monthly if only to say we were on track or not for the month.
Hi Rachel,
This hits close to home for me as I was in a similar situation when I was your age (I'm now 38). I know a lot of people will say this is a big red flag in a relationship but I think if you're both willing to work on it that it can be overcome. Here is some advice (or what worked for me). 1 - Even though you'll be doing most of the money managing make sure he's in the loop. That means he needs to know what's going on (good and bad) and be involved in any big decision making. That may still mean you do all the research and put the options together but you need to make sure you're both making the decisions (even though it would be a lot easier to do by yourself).
2 - I've always made a lot more $ than my husband but we always have had the same "allowance". Most of our budget is accounted for in bills and savings but I think it's important that both people have their own spending money - and I think that money should not be tied to who earns what. (I especially think this is important if one is a stay at home parent)
3 - You are young and people can learn good money management. Be encouraging of your boyfriend and I'll bet he will surprise you. My husband will never be interested in managing the finance side of things but he is worlds away from the 23 year old with horrible finances that he was when I met him. You'll probably learn from him too (I know I have)
Good Luck!
I do the budget and pay the bills. We discuss large purchases, and whenever I put together a summary statement (in Excel), I email my partner/boyfriend (we are common-law) a copy. I keep him up to date (verbally) about where we are at, and whether or not it's ok to use the Visa or if he should be using debit. We only have one car, and I drive it, so I tend to do most of the shopping, or else we do it together.
Too, make more money, although once it's taxed and I pay my pension, it's not a ton more (we live in Canada). We both have a set allowance that we take for personal spending (such as something the other person is not really that interested in buying or doing). I think having some personal money is really important - at least for us.
We have "budget talks" a couple of times a year, generally when our financial situation has changed somewhat (a new bill, a raise, more taxes being taken out, etc.). To make those less unpleasant, we usually pack up all our paperwork and go to Shari's or some other restaurant and get dessert while we crunch the numbers.
Beyond that, while he actually PAYS the bills (writes the checks, makes the online transfers), I'm the one who keeps the checkbook up to date, deals with paychecks, and gets the appropriate amount of cash from the bank (we use a modified envelope system), so we both stay aware of where we're at, more or less, so there are no surprises.
We also talk over most purchases (not groceries, obviously, or other budgeted items), whether it's new shocks for the car or what we're buying a kid for their birthday.
What hasn't worked? Having just one of us do the whole thing. First, it's really tedious and a chore that neither of us want to do. Second, when one person doesn't know what's going on, either they're stressed about not knowing, or they're spending more than is affordable because they don't realize that last month there was an unexpected bill and things are a bit tight this month.
The biggest key, however, is love. I might get frustrated with Dave because he wants to buy something that I don't think is very necessary, and he might get frustrated with me because I spent too much money on kids' clothes and we have a whopping visa bill, but at the end of the day we're on the same team, and we love each other and are willing not just to forgive the other person, but also to be the sort of person who's willing to spend less in the first place so as to keep the peace.
When we met, I was debt adverse--and my husband was $15,000 in debt. We stayed in his condo, paid off his debt, and saved for a down payment on a house. We did all of that in about two years, thanks to two things: Quicken and a Debit Card. Debit cards had just come out at that time, and I got my husband to convert from credit cards to the debit card--where real money came out of our checking account in real time. That cut down on a lot of spending. We also started to do our finances on Quicken and have always used "buckets" in Quicken to save for the things we need--one bucket for summer camp, another for vacations, etc. Now, we're in a great rhythm of sitting down twice a month to pay bills, add up the checkbook, and add to our savings buckets. It's worked for us!
Badly. Money is a no go area in our house. One day I will tell him exactly how much I may or may not have, but until then I will try to be an ostrich. Foolish, foolish. If I had my time again I would have started with 'strictly no recrimination' discussions about what 'we' want and what 'we' are spending the money on. For any newly weds.... talk to each other. It's the best way.
Us, too. 🙁
Oh yes, that's very good advice. I wish Mr. FG and I had communicated better about money early on.
My 11th grade personal finance teacher said in class once "You and your spouse will probably fight about money and you'll never fight that you have too much. So talk about it and get in good habits together before you start shouting." Mr E. was right!
Battra92, it's so cool that you had a personal finance class in high school! Was it required, or were you an unusually forward-thinking and responsible teenager?
I married a CPA. 🙂
Me, too!! It works for us, because neither the money nor the numbers stress him out-and it sure stresses me out! I am reading your communication comments avidly, however, because I sometimes resist when my husband tries to communicate our financial situation to me. I'm planning to be more attentive in the future!
Well, that's one way to tackle the problem, I suppose! =P
It's funny you say that. I'm the accountant and my husband pays all the bills/keeps things up to date.
I did all the bills/record keeping the first two year we were married, using Quicken. Hubby didn't understand how the program worked very well, so I suggested he play around with it a little to see. He went & changed two years worth of transactions b/c he thought they were incorrect. I tried to fix it but it was so tangled it was impossible (or at least not worth the time) to fix. We had a big lovely argument & now he does the billpay/record keping.
It works better this way-since he does it, he understands exactly what's going on & is more comfortable with things.
Money is not a problem in our relationship in terms of communicating as we are both on the same page. We created our budget together, we work on it together and we both understand what our goals long and short-term are and want to achieve them together. We knew this before we were married and did while we were dating and talked about money as well. We spend an hour weekly to go over out expenses, fill in our excel budget spreadsheet that we designed and get it done!
I am a stay at home mama, and do most of our shopping. I moved into my husbands home after we got married, so he continues to pay all the bills as he was doing before marriage. He is very good with excel spreadsheets and loves to do all sorts of financial analysis. He created a spreadsheet for me with categories such as groceries/clothes/house decor etc. It is my job to keep all the receipts for the month, add them up and plug the #s into appropriate category. He has a different spreadsheet where he keeps track of $ coming into our bank account (his salary) and $ leaving the bank (bills, etc). This way we know where our money goes and how much money we have left at the end of the month.
I pay the bills and my husband knows how much the bill are and how much is in the bank. We talk at least once a week about what we are doing with our money. I stay at home with the kids and we homeschool and my husband works outside the home.
The main problem I have noticed my stay at home mom friends have that causes tension in their marriages over money is that they feel they have to ask permission to spend money, like the money is not theirs as well since they are not contributing in a depositing money way and they keep secrets when the do spend which causes a lot of grief. I try to tell them how much they do contribute by doing all the childcare and household stuff and suggest they sit down with their husbands every week and have a budget with some spending money that is allocated for each of them should a trip with the kids come up or even just to do something fun once in a while without there being a fight or financial secrets or being short on money. Plus there is nothing better than being able to go have coffee with a friend or buy something we need while knowing all the bills are paid and we don't owe anything plus have money saved up and no reason for anything to cause trouble in our marriage, which is so special and important.
We go over the budget together every month. But we each keep our own list of upcoming things we need to budget for (a friend's birthday gift, getting the car washed, etc.). By the time the next month comes around, together we decide what can be done with the money left from paying our bills. Some things we're able to pay for, some things have to wait, and others we just have to say no to.
The saying no part is hard but ultimately discipline is key to making your budget work. I don't buy a bunch of snacks when I grocery shop either as I find that the kids want to eat it all at one time. This has helped have a more creative two week menu as I can spend more on my dinner recipes!
Great tip about snacks which can be applied to other non essentials too 🙂
We all come into new relationships with our own "money baggage". Money can be "just numbers" for some, it can be stressful for other folks, or it can be a means for self-soothing for still others. It's like everything else in a relationship. A couple needs to figure their way through this baggage. Just as it's important to talk about the dollars and cents of what the household has, it's also important to at least once, acknowledge your own and each other's money baggage.
My husband is frugal, but also takes an ostrich stance. He prefers not to talk about money. It causes a great deal of stress for him to discuss the budget. These feelings are something that come from his past. I like to talk about our budget and goals. It gives me a feeling of control over our finances to talk it all out (there was a time when I had zero control over my own money).
I can't make him "get over" his money-stress. And he can't make me not need to discuss it all. So, we compromise. I take care of all financial matters, and only bring it up with him a few times a year. He deals with the stress on those occasions, knowing that I won't bring it up again for a while. And I get my "outlet" for discussion about budgeting through blogging and reading others' blogs. So far, 26 years of marriage and this seems to be working for us.
I am a huge fan of Dave Ramsey and have been for years. Dave's philosophy's saved our financial lives and really improved our marriage. I'm the money nerd and the saver so I happily take on the job of drafting up the budget report (I use Excel in a way that is similar to how Kristen uses Word-but I'm a spreadsheet geek so I can put together an annual expense report at the end of the year if I want to with it), balancing accounts and paying the bills. My husband works very long hours and often overtime due to his type of work. I'm a stay at home mom. So it's easier for me to find time in my day to handle it than it is for him. I'm happy to do it. However, my one insistence is that he sit down with me or discuss with me at every payday what our bills are, what our upcoming expenses are going to be (we keep a running list of expected expenses such as medical, educational/homeschool materials, budgeting in a new computer when one of them died, money for throwing birthday parties, budgeting Christmas, etc.). We stay on the same page about how often we eat out and why and we try to steer clear of unplanned money wasters. We try to keep a "mad money" amount in our budget so that neither of us feel like we have to ask permission of the other for having a cup of coffee out with a friend. I don't want to play money police and he doesn't want me to so this works great for us. Being a stay at home mom, at first I struggled with spending money "he" earned. But he and I both know how hard I work and that I'm not on vacation here as a homeschooling stay at home mom raising our children. "I" didn't choose this-WE did. And we are well aware of how expenses would actually increase if I were working outside the home while our chosen quality of life would decrease so while the name on the paycheck is his, it's OUR money and there is never any question of this. We are a team and work together at our finances just as we do in most every other aspect of our lives and marriage.
My boyfriend and I have been living together for 3 years now. He used to do all the budgeting and bill paying until we got so far behind on our bills that things were getting cut off. I took over on the budgeting and bill paying about 2 years ago and we are caught up and have started a savings account. This has taken allot of time because we were so far behind. My problem is that I keep asking him to sit down with me and go over our budget once a week but he just wont. This makes me feel like he just doesn't care. He says this is just as important to him and that he cares about it but his actions say different to me and it makes me feel like he doesn't care. I have told him my feelings towards this but it always turns into an argument. I get worried that if things continue this way we will split up as I feel all alone when it comes to the fiances of our future. Can anyone help me figure out a way that I can get him on the same page as me with this?
I would STRONGLY suggest that you take Dave Ramsey's Financial Peace University Course. Even if your boyfriend is not on board with doing the course with you, you will get SO MUCH out of it. In case you're unable or don't want to take the course, I will tell you this: Dave Ramsey always says, "Both parties better be present at the budget meeting. If one of you is not there, you do NOT get a say in the budget." Hope this helps!
You could try making a date out of it- plan to have dinner or coffee out & take it with you to discuss. Being in public causes both parties to behave since nobody wants to cause a scene & sometimes prevents things from turning into an argument.
Also, try explaining & asking questions. For example, we have xxx money after paying for rent & utilities and we have yyy debt. I think it'd be best to pay xxx amount on yyy bill for zzz reason. Do you agree or should we do something else with the money? Are there any expenses that I've missed/forgotten about? Are there any upcoming commitments?
Or instead of asking him to budget with you, see if he'd be willing to discuss goals/dreams (as in, where do you realisticly see yourself(s) being in a year or in five years?) Some people can really be intimidated by the idea of a budget (or are just big picture type people and don't do well with the day-today details), but if you talk about goals, then it gives you a better idea of how to budget. Then you can make a budget & go back & ask him if it is what he envisioned. Then maybe try talking about it again in a couple months or so to see if you're on track.
Good luck!
Maybe just change your tactic. Go for less frequency (once a month, once per pay period), set a very specific time limit and agenda (we're going to spend 10 minutes today talking about what we can do to decrease the water bill, e.g.), or, as others have suggested, try to re-frame the request so it's more appealing through coffee and cake. Ultimately, he needs to understand how important it is to you that finances are a team effort in your family.
My husband and I keep separate bank accounts and one shared savings account. I pay for my stuff, he pays for his and we split all of the joint stuff (including all of the expenses relating to our children) in half but we also have similar incomes. When we didn't have similar incomes we split everything proportionately. If there is something that I want him to contribute to financially, I do not make a decision without discussing it with him, and vice versa.
This method obviously wouldn't work for a single income family and a lot of people I tell think it's kind of weird but it creates an environment where we really have to compromise on our spending and we have NEVER had an argument about money.
Every so often we sit together at the computer and go through our joint bank account. We also have our own accounts, to do with as we like.
We sorted out beforehand how much we need to save per month for the annual bills (taxes) and that is automated into the joint savings account. Everything in the bills that can be automated is automated and between payday and the money flying into all its little pigeonholes are 3 days. What is left is spending/food money. Large purchases are discussed and may be topped up from individual savings.
I track my and our savings and net worth in a simple spreadsheet. To be updated about once every six months.
It is essentially the way my mother taught me. She did it on paper though and my grandmother used the same system but used actual jars and a booklet way back when. It was kinda alien to my husband when we met, but he loves it how something simple can make life so easy.
I love reading about how people track their finances monthly. This is how we do ours: I have kept an excel spreadsheet for approximately 10 years in which I track expenditures in several categories with a total and the difference between the total and a budget. Then at the bottom of the sheet I track the account balances in each of our accounts, positive and negative as well as a networth. Then on separate sheets I keep some visual aid charts to fit my fancy. DH and I discuss the totals and the differences in the spending categories over breakfast or something usually. We regularly talk about our goals so that we are both comfortable with where the surpluses are going. We are currently working on paying off our car loan before our second baby arrives in April. That is where we sent his Christmas bonus and will soon send our tax refund and my annual bonus. We also have a car fund savings account I can take the money out of, but I'd rather keep that there for repairs on our other car should it need it.
On days like today though we occasionally have set backs. I had him bring the cat to the vet and apparently she needs to have a tooth extracted and a cleaning done, to the tune of $700! That will probably make it a little harder for us to pay off the car by our goal, but we'll see.
Money is a terrible subject in our house. We have such different backgrounds, and that makes a difference from the get go. His family would never steal from him, and their whole goal in making money is to make as much as possible to have as comfortable a retirement as possible. In my family, things were vastly different with my parents confiscating my paycheck. They made more than enough. I know that now. But we were told that we cost too much money and we needed to help even it out. My parents were HORRIBLE with money. They never followed a budget, and they'd fight whenever they had budgeting talks. I never learned how to handle money myself till my grandpa taught me in college.
Now, in our marriage, these things come into play. For him, saving every little scrap of money is of prime importance. To me, my kids having what they need and some of the things they want is of prime importance. We're working on meeting in the middle, but he is constantly having to fight against himself when I pick up fast food for dinner or have coffee from a coffee place (even when it's in the budget). Or even coffee in general, as water will do just fine for him. He fights to remember that a little bit of money here and there for the general sanity of the house is better than a broken house. And for me, I struggle hard to stay within the numbers he gives me to stay in. Sometimes I don't succeed, but I'm getting better at it. And we're learning how to talk to each other about it without sparks flying. We do this by reminding each other that we can stop talking at any time if it gets to stressful, and talk about it another time. But that it cannot just be ignored. We've agreed to do the Dave Ramsey method, and it's making a huge difference already. The biggest thing for me is paying in cash. If I don't pay in cash, I go over my budget. Every time.
My husband and I also grew up without really being taught how to budget. As soon as we were married, we took the Dave Ramsey course. I cannot say enough good things about it! We never argue about money, we are always on the same page with our budget, and we know what's expected of ourselves and each other. Keep it up! It's tough to start out, but once you get going, it's AMAZING what can be accomplished!
This is fascinating reading all the different money relationships and methods. I have a little bit of a different story. When my husband and I got married 12 years ago I was debt free and he had a ton of debt (school loans, car loan, credit cards). I took over the finances/paying the bills and we lived frugally and while raising the kids I worked part time in the evenings when he was home with them. All the money I made went to pay off the debt. It took 6 years to pay off 100k. Then we saved up for a downpayment to buy a house and moved to another state where housing was more affordable. Six months after we bought our dream house my husband had a mental breakdown and stopped working. I had to go back to work full time so we wouldnt lose the house. Its been almost 5 years we have had a complete role reversal with me working and and him staying home with the kids unable to work outside the home. I still do the bills and write the checks and make sure everything gets paid on time, but it has definitely been a shift in our relationship and on his ego for me to be making the money and working so hard and he isnt contributing financially. As far as technically how do we manage the money I used to do it with computer software, but now I just check my checking account balance religiously and write everything down on my daytimer so I know when bills are due and when checks are being cashed. I do have part time side jobs in addition to my 40 hour workweek so there is a constant flow of income which helps with the bill paying schedule.
Its interesting to talk and read others stories about money because it can be so taboo in society to speak openly about our money struggles and triumphs...but we can learn so much from each other if we opened up and talked about it.
YOU NEED A BUDGET
But seriously, that is the awesome budgeting software that keeps nerdo me and my free-spirited husband on the same financial page in our one income household. (I'm the income earner and he's the stay-at-home-dad-not that it matters at all).
We have a monthly meeting (less than 10 minutes) where we make our budget for the month and put money into categories. Then the YNAB software is on our phones and as we spend money we both enter it into the app and the category balances are updated in real time (so when I'm eating out at work I can check our Restaurants category and see that hubby must have taken the kiddos out to Sonic earlier that day).
I had complex excel spreadsheets in the past, but only I could use them. YNAB has simplified my life so much and really helped my husband get involved in our finances.
My husband and I have been married for a little over a year and in that time have started combining our accounts - we now have joint checking/savings as well as a joint credit card. I take care of all the budgeting and bill paying and that works for us since I like to be in control of it and he could care less! We are pretty different with money - I am frugal and afraid of turning into my parents (with money matters, that is, every other aspect they are awesome!) who are in a ton of debt and terrible at budgeting. I would say hubby is mostly indifferent - he doesn't go crazy when he has more money and does not stress when he has less. He does like to buy more than I do and I like to save more than he does. So far, what we have done is split the bills and expenses down the middle and then maintain our own pots of money for individual bills (ie I have student loans) and things we want to buy that aren't related to us as a couple. This works pretty well and I think as the years go on, we will get even more integrated.
Our money talks were really easy when we both had plenty of money, but when he got laid off, it was more stressful. He is working again, and that has alleviated a lot of the tension!
What a great and timely subject for me. I actually am working on our FPU (Finanacial Peace University) story for my blog. I think it is time to really put out there where we started and were we are. Honestly, it is embarassing to admit.
We were married nearly 13 years ago - a second marriage for each of us. We came together with one child each and have since had one child together. Anyone who has tried to blend a family will attest it is difficult, but then add in money. It was hard!
I paid the bills alone and my hubby spent. We always seemed to make our minimal payments so what was the harm?? We were drowning and didn't even realize it. Fast forward 9 years....and we decided on a fluke to take Financial Peace University at our church. Thank you, God for leading us there!
We started with 95,000 in credit card and student loan debt. This the first time I have admitted that, I have been so embarassed by the truth. We now are such a great team and our marriage all the stronger for it. We have a weekly budget meeting every Saturday and pay our bills together every week. We name ever dollar and celebrate our financial victories together. Being Debt Free is now a possiblity and not just a pipe dream.
The biggest change for us is we are in it together and communicate about everything. Generally we even agree as we now have shared goals and dreams. We encourage all newlyweds to find a FPU class to take together.
Our oldest recently got married and it has been amamzing to see him and his wife start their marriage out like this. They paid cash for most of their wedding and enjoy a lifestyle not overwhelmed with debt. Though I wish my hubby and I started out like that, we are showing our children how to handle money in a relationship and changing our family tree!!
Jen, that is great! Congratulations to you and your husband. I'm very impressed. Making a change like that is really difficult, and you have done it for yourself and your family. Fantastic!
I am the "handler" of our marriage, he is the "earner". I use a specific colored 3 ring binder. The first page is our budget. It shows all of the bills that we have to pay that month and amounts, or budgeted amounts. For example, my house payment is the same every month, but I have a budgeted amount for electric, water, etc. The second page is broke down into 4 weeks of the month. Hubs gets paid weekly. On this page I designate which week the bills get paid on, since there are different due dates. Last page is check book, savings register. We sit down one night and discuss what is due for the month, most months are pretty much the same, then we discuss any goals for the month. I also keep all bills as they come in, in the binder, so everything is located in one spot. I actually do all the bill paying and checkwriting, but if I were to get sick, hubs would know where everything is and the due dates.
We keep a binder like that as well....very helpful!
Every conversation about money or budgeting during the first 4 months of our marriage, ended in tears, harsh words, or one of us just leaving. It wasn't pretty. But now, nearly 2 years later, we have a very good grasp on where our money is going. What changed? The only thing that explains the turn around is God working on our hearts. I am a penny pincher to the point of stinginess. My husband is a spender. And we both had to compromise to make money management work. We use Dave Ramsey's budget planning form (which I have now personalized for our specific circumstances) to plan how we manage our regular income. At first we used envelopes to keep us honest in how much we were spending, and we recorded every expenditure we made. Envelopes allowed me not to fear that we were spending outside the budget (if money is there it can be used), and it helped my husband exercise a bit more restraint. The beauty of the envelopes for us was that I wasn't the one telling my husband he couldn't spend money. The budget we created together was telling him that no more money was available to spend, and that just makes living with each other much easier because it doesn't make it look like I'm trying to be controlling.
We now use debit cards and still record all of our expenditures, but it requires a lot more diligence. Additionally, I pull together reports now and again identifying areas of concern, or changes in income, and I use numbers (often my report is as boring to read as it would be to watch paint dry). If my concerns are valid, the numbers will demonstrate that, and I know that my husband will respond to the numbers much better than he will respond to my panicking or crying or other emotions. (Not that my husband isn't responsive to me. No. It's just that I can be a bit melodramatic. Especially with money.)
My husband and I check in monthly like you do. We save strategic planning and blue-skying for bike rides and car rides. It is something about zooming forward sitting side by side that makes you creative.
We're currently working up to our wedding in a few months, but I pretty much kept bugging her until she got on board. It wasn't that she was necessarily uninterested in being good with money (she had taken Dave Ramsey's FPU previously), but she was in that unmotivated "it's so broken that it can't be fixed" mindset.
I found that Mint.com suited her very well. She doesn't like to geek out with the spreadsheets and calculate the budget down to the penny, but she'll read the weekly summaries from Mint, and follow up with me. It's really nice to have a fiancee who is on the same page already, both with our regular budget and with our wedding budget.
One thing that I found really helpful was the 2:1 method (i don't know if that's a real thing, but that's what i call it). We have 2 months of strict budgeting and no excuses followed by 1 month where the budget is a bit relaxed. This gives us the ability to let our hair down a few times a year and spend money on fun stuff that we couldn't afford through the strict budget.
I haven't read all the other comments, so I am not sure if someone said this. But before my husband and I ever got married, we talked in depth about finances and how we managed our money. We have such similar views on money that I let him have the responsibility of keeping us on track. He lets me know what bills came in and if our expenses were too high or too short. We contribute to savings regularly and have accounts set aside for a couple of different things.
We still have some work to do on it, but my point is that being in a relationship with someone who has such similar values makes it easy to manage money, especially since we have the same goals in mind. I don't think every couple has to be in that situation but when you know all the details of their philosophy and how they want to spend or save, it makes it easier to manage and communicate about finances without it getting in the way of your relationship.
My husband and I are also newlyweds (less than 3 years married), and we make it work by communicating (often) about everything money-related. He is actually the one who manages our finances/pays bills, because it doesn't stress him out the way it stresses me out. Every pay period, he immediately pays all the bills that will be due in the next two weeks, transfers money to savings, and we talk about any big savings goals that may be coming up.
Since we have been together, he has figured out plans to aggressively pay off our debt, save substantially, and raise our credit scores so we could qualify for a good rate when we applied for a mortgage. Now that we have been together for a while, I realize how lucky I am to have a spouse that is not only willing to "do his part" but actively works to keep us saving money where we can. I shop at Aldi and do lots of things around the house to minimize our spending, even though we end up living well below our means, compared to our peers. We both feel more secure knowing that we are spending more on our lifestyle than we actually make, and that we would be okay in the short-term if either of us lost our jobs. I am incredibly thankful we see eye to eye on money issues!
Oooops I absolutely meant to say that we are spending LESS on our lifestyle than we actually make/could afford!
Fascinating subject! Good on you for making it a discussion point! We're not bad at communication with regard to finances. I do all the financial side of things and update my husband regularly. I've used financing software for about 14 years, first Quicken then MS Money and now YNAB! YNAB has made a huge difference in our financial situation as it uses the 'envelop' system but then electronically so instead of reconciling your bank account in arrears (with Quicken and MS Money) it gives 'money/income' a job so that you can see what is left over at the end of the coming month! Very helpful to us especially now as we are in the USA on a student visa for three years being sponsored by our home church New Zealand. We get 'funded' about 3 times a year with a big lumpsum. We would be in all sorts of trouble if I couldn't budget and spend our money within the first month! Also our sponsors back home required regular updates of our spending. Money takes on a different meaning when you are spending someone else's money!
Admittedly, I'm more or less the banker in the house. That said, whenever I do anything, I consult my wife and we discuss the merits of it. Sometimes I have to use my veto power and occasionally she will as well but it works for us.
This is quit an interesting discussion. One of the primary reasons my Ex and I split up was because we fought over money constantly. I was forever trying to come up with budgets and systems, and he was always saying "I don't understand why it can't just be share and share alike." The problem was, he was spending money like it was going out of style - racking up thousands in debt on my credit cards, meanwhile I was depleting my savings to keep his child fed, clothed and housed (I say "his" because it was his daughter from a previous marriage.)
His first wife dealt with it by maintaining complete and total control over the finances - the only money he had access to was a small monthly "allowance." Of course, that system also ended in bitterness and failure.
Anyhow, I guess my advice would be that whatever system you use, both parties have to be on board and feel good about it.
we've learned having one person do it all is bad, because we're both bad at saying no to each other. so I pay bills and make most of the routine purchases. he enters all my purchases into the budgeting spreadsheet, usually while I'm in the room, sometimes while I'm looking over his shoulder. then he balances the checkbook. when he's done we both go over what's left in each category. we each have an allowance, it's been as low as $10 each for the month, right now it's $20 each. our budget sheet has quite a few micro categories because that makes hubby happy, i personally would lump several things together, but what ever!
When we married, I had a huge amount of debt (as in $90,000 including grad school loans) and pretty much blew all my money and paid only the minimums on credit cards. My husband was hyper-responsible and the first time he answered the phone with a bill collector at the other end, I thought he was going to have a stroke. He had no idea how bad it was. Luckily, neither one of us is a yeller or crier, so it was pretty easy once he sat down and told me how stressful it was for him to even contemplate our debt load. He designed a program to keep track of everything (on paper and eventually on computer), and also note what is tax deductible at the same time so tax time is a breeze. Then he asked me i I wanted him to run the money or me to run the money. I could not believe he trusted me, but I took everything over and have never done anything to betray that trust. Once a month we sit down and talk over where we are, what is coming up both bill and goal wise (like a vacation or having a certain amount in our contingency fund). We consult each other on all expenditures and have a very small allowance each ($15 a week) for things like a lunch with workmates. Thirty years later and we now own our home and vehicles outright, have a contingency fund of over $100,000, fully funded retirement accounts, and in June we will both be retiring---in our 50s. I shudder to think where I would have been without my husband's good communication skills, practical help like the computer program, and trust. (Obviously it helps that we both have advanced degrees and each have always earned six figure incomes. When people complain about student debt I think about how they would spend $20,000 or more on a car that lasts 5 or maybe 10 years, but don't want to put that out for a doctoral degree.)
Wow, what a financial inspiration (as a ton of these comments are)... go you!!
Hi There! My husband and I are recommitting to our get out of debt and get our financial house in order plan. He's the spender and I'm the saver. We were going pretty gung-ho for a while there and then we had our first child and... well... we haven't done a budget in 9 months. I have continued to pay all the bills, socking a little extra at the smallest one when we can. We're having our first budget meeting of the year this weekend to reassess our spending now that the baby is here and we've acclimated to life as parents. I'm looking forward to tracking this journey and seeing how frugal we can get. When we're on track we have two budget meetings a month: One at the end of the month to try to plan for the following month and one about mid-month for a "state of the union" meeting of sorts (that one is usually the interesting one). I'm not one to spend money on myself and my husband is the exact opposite. I'm very quick to tell myself no, but I cave into his wants and often that's where our excess money goes instead of to debt. Ugh! So, I'm going to learn how to say no and stick to it. 🙂
Interesting. We rarely discuss money. I suppose this is because we have always been fortunate in having "enough" and are also on the same page in terms of spending habits. My husband is also not remotely interested in money in general. I manage our finances on a 'needs actioning' basis and occasionally I'll approach my husband if I notice something atpyical on a credit card statement. We're fairly frugal and sensible financially; I have never gone overdrawn or had debt in my life (mortgage aside), neither has he besides a student loan. I review major bills annually to make sure we're getting good value, but just get on with it as part of my 'to do' list at the time.
together we make a shared google doc at the beginning of every month that tells where our money will go. we each enter our spendings as we go and can keep track of it TOGETHER. Equal ownership has been huge for us since we took Financial Peace last fall.