How do you handle money for monthly child expenses?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I'm another one of those who fails to understand why married couples don't have joint checking accounts. If you don't want to share your money, why get married? Why not stay roomies? It will be so much easier and cheaper when you split.

Save all of your receipts and split the sum at the end of the month. How do you work groceries? From the sound of it, you do most of the shopping. Or, your roomie could give you a set amount of money per month for you spend as you wish on the child. I guess you could determine what a monthly child support payment would be for your roomie based on his monthly income.

Not the OP, but we don't have joint checking accounts because it seems like too much of a hassle to us. We're both grown ups who can handle our finances, and neither of us wants to have to constantly check in with the other or feel like we're nagging one another about money. We trust each other, and we do share money - just not a checkbook.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I beg to differ. Separate finances saved our marriage. I am one of the PPs and I like having my own account for my own salary. We share fully in all the bills and have a joint budget and savings account.

Yes, it worked for you because you clearly had a discussion and agreed about your finances regardless of where the money is coming from.

It sounds like OP hasn't done this yet and having a kid is breaking the dam open. Seems like the separate accounts idea was just a band aid to avoiding the discussion and agreeing on finances.

[Anonymous]

How you handle the money is not the issue. You need to reach common agreement on how you will support this child.

You can't do that by dividing up the world into who buys what items or by creating a standoff over warm clothes. It's not fixed by having an account that you both fund but cannot agree on how to spend. It's like religion. You get married and he has his religion and you have yours. But guess what? Once kids come into the picture, you have some things to figure out. This won't be the only area.

You need to both compromise and come up with an acceptable middle ground on an approach to spending on your child. Not how you will divide it, but what kinds of things you will buy.

[Anonymous]

Bingo, 9:58.
Though I think the compromise should cover what AND how.

[Anonymous]

OP, how do you guys handle groceries for meals at home?

Does DH buy his food and you buy your food, or do you pool together? If you value organic but he doesn't, do you have to buy it out of your own pot of money and you let him buy his food out of his?

The child expenses will only grow over time. You and your husband need to decide not just who will pay for your child's clothing, food, and later classes, clubs, activities and summer camps; you also need to decide what value you put on them.

A child can be clothes in $2 pants from a thrift store, or $0 pants as handme downs, or $12 pants from Target, or $50??? pants from a boutique store. A child can have 3 pants, or 7 pants, or 20 pants to match with every outfit. Only you and your husband know what you value (convenience, style, thrift) and you guys have to start working it out now.

The same with food. As the child gets older you'll be packing school lunchs and snacks, and buying meals for convenience, health, nutrition, or thrift.

I woudl suggest both of you contributing equal amounts to a joint checking account each paycheck period, enough to cover food for the whole family, medicine/vitamins/supplements for the whole family, clothing just for the child (because adults clothing is SUCH a personal thing); and child-related activities and toys, books, etc. Disucss with your husband how much clothes clost and what is important to you and what is important to him. Keep a record of what you guys spend out of this pot of money. Each month review where the money is going with each other and see if it meshes with your agreed upon values.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:How you handle the money is not the issue. You need to reach common agreement on how you will support this child.

You can't do that by dividing up the world into who buys what items or by creating a standoff over warm clothes. It's not fixed by having an account that you both fund but cannot agree on how to spend. It's like religion. You get married and he has his religion and you have yours. But guess what? Once kids come into the picture, you have some things to figure out. This won't be the only area.

You need to both compromise and come up with an acceptable middle ground on an approach to spending on your child. Not how you will divide it, but what kinds of things you will buy.

This is 100% correct. DH and I still maintain separate bank accounts, mostly because by the time we got married in our mid-30s, we were both very well-established financially and had accounting/tracking systems in place that we didn't want to change.

That said, we are completely on the same page when it comes to spending and we operate 100% as a team -- meaning, we don't second-guess or undermine each other's decisions. In terms of habits, I tend to pay for childcare out of my account, and most day-to-day expenses for DC and the family (clothes, food etc.) while DH tends to cover the big-ticket items (mortgage, insurance, vacations). But it's not a hard and fast rule, and I have no idea how it adds up in terms of "fairness" in the end, becasue we really don't look at it that way. Our goal is to get our family's needs met, both practically and financially (savings/investing etc.) so there's tremendous flexibility along the way -- sometimes I cover things that he usually handles, other times he covers things that I usually handle (Sams Club the other week, for example) and we've transferred money to supplement each other's investments and retirment accounts, too. The key is that we don't keep track, and we don't judge. It's all going to the same place, as we say.

That's where you and DH need to move, in my opinion. It's not the separate accounts that are the problem. It's the judgment, the second-guessing, the score-keeping and the defensiveness. If you can't operate together as a team when it comes to finances, I seriously think that marital counseling is in order here. This is not a small issue -- differences regarding spending and finances often drive couples apart, especially when communication is poor.

[Anonymous]

I don't live with my daughter's father and we receive a monthly support payment from him. Before he started paying support, I just kept track of everything I bought for her and he would occasionally write me a check. I'm not a big nickle-and-dime person and I make a decent salary, but he did recognize that I was spending a lot more than he was, since I did all the clothes-buying doctor's visits and fed her 5 days/week. Most stores give itemized receipts so I had an excel spreadsheet where I'd enter the amount spent with a brief description. I was doing this anyway for other expenses for budgeting/cost-cutting purposes so it didn't take long. It might work for you; you can periodically show him the spreadsheet and he can transfer money, or you can set up an auto-deposit every month.

It might also help to give him some idea of what you buy for your son regularly. I basically told my ex, "I usually buy 15-20 outfits for her, at around $12 per outfit, twice a year. Plus pajamas, shoes, coats and a halloween costume, and a dress or two for occasions. So assume we're spending $X per year on clothing." He willingly paid for half of my estimate and I picked up the rest.

How do you guys handle stuff like groceries? This is similar, I think.

[Anonymous]

OP here --- I am so grateful for the good advice!

I am printing this out and will use it as a starting point to a tough discussion that we should have had a long time ago.

Thanks for keeping it productive. I appreciate the strategies, and comments on the underlying thinking that goes into how we spend.

[Anonymous]

It sounds like you guys need to sit down and have a serious discussion about finances and spending habits. This is one of the few "big" discussions that every couple should have before they get married (along with the "kids" and "religion" discussion).

[Anonymous]

Keeping finances separate is fine if it works for you--there are ways to do it, but it takes communication. These kinds of issues will only grow over time so hammer it out now. I would start by sitting down on your own and tallying up truly what you have spent on DC. Maybe some of it wasn't strictly necessary but that's fine, too. There has to be some discretionary amount for fun things, convenience items, cute clothes, etc. Then sit down with DH and show him what you documented. Decide what you want--do you want him to give you half of what you already spent? If so, ask for it. If he starts to nickel and dime and say he wouldn't have bought specific things, I’d say that you're both paying the price for not having worked this stuff out in advance and that's what you're trying to do now but the reality is that you spent this money already on DC, plus you were the one actually doing the labor of the shopping and getting clothes, etc., that has to count for something, too. If he disagreed with how much you pay for a healthy frozen meal but he's not the one there taking care of DC and making a meal for scratch, I don't think I'd find his arguments too persuasive. You offer a healthy option and you should be commended.

Then use the spending data as a starting point for setting a prospective budget, including a discretionary amount for fun stuff that he might disagree with but can live with.

Frankly, the biggest pitfall of this stuff that I personally can see is how do you keep things separate and not end up monetizing your time and intangibles, not to mention the division of labor? For instance, say he disagrees with how much you spend on clothing. Your time has to count for something—you’re doing all the work and he’s benefiting from it when he reaches for the pants to put on DC that you selected. If he thinks spending money on Dr. P frozen food isn’t ok, I’d be pretty annoyed and offer for him to take off work or whatever to be there to fix something better himself.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Good luck with the divorce.

ditto this. I can't fathom, FATHOM arguing over who pays for our kid's food and clothing. What you have is a business relationship.

[Anonymous]

OP, as you say that your husband is very frugal, and you are no spendthirft yourself, I wonder if you might not find this book a useful one for both of you to read through and use together? "Your Money or Your Life"


There's a summary here:

http://yourmoneyoryourlife.info/resources/detailed-summary-of-your-money-or-your-life

And a sample chapter here:

http://yourmoneyoryourlife.info/resources/oldies-but-goodies/chapter-6-from-original-1992-edition

But what I particularly remember finding useful for both me and my husband to do together was to write down every purchase for a month or two, and ask ourselves -- how much of our life energy did we give up for that purchase? And did we derive value from that purchase? How much enjoyment did we get from it? Was the purchase in keeping with our stated values and goals?

I like the book's approach to "no shame, no blame" -- just that people need to discuss what is important to them, as a couple, and figure out how they will spend their money.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Good luck with the divorce.

ditto this. I can't fathom, FATHOM arguing over who pays for our kid's food and clothing. What you have is a business relationship.

The baby sounds pretty young -- this is probably a new issue in the marriage.

Generally people don't argue about money as long as they have plenty of wiggle room in their budget, but when something new happens and suddenly someone finds herself running low on cash at the end of the pay period, that's when people realize that the system they have isn't working.

[Anonymous]

How about a joint credit card that you pay off each month?

DH and I used to have separate accounts and a joint account. After 6 years of marriage, we consolidated everything (although I still keep my ow card so I can buy things and surprise him). I actually like having everything combined. It's really helped us to better understand how much $$ we have and make a better saving strategy. One issue we don't have is fighting over what was spent. Maybe you and DH need a rule that purchases over $XX need to be discussed first.

[Anonymous]

We kept separate accounts while living togethor and even without a kid - it can create more friction of costs then when you have a joint one. Do you split groceries in half or do you divy up who eats what. That type of thing.

It definetly sounds like you and your DH disagree about paying for convenience. You don't need to buy expensive Whole Foods food. You don't need to buy individual sized formula. Clothing can be bought second-hand or on good sales. But all of this takes more work (and I know I am often willing to pay for convenience) And it sounds like your DH isn't contibuting or offering to help find cheaper alternatives.

I think you need to sit down and talk about expenses and what you both are willing to spend. And if he thinks your family should be more frugal, then talk about how he can help you be frugal. IF he says no expensive Whole Foods frozen food, then ask him if he is willing to prepare some meals and freeze them. If he wants to spend less on clothes, then have him help you find cheaper clothes.

If you don't want a joint account, maybe you could use a credit card that is only for kid expenses (although it may get tricky) and then split the cost down the middle.