Secret account

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why do you suspect this?

Right..Ick

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My husband and I both have “secret” accounts. It's not a big deal as long as the bills are paid, the credit report is good, and I have no reason to doubt him. If that changes, I'll get a forensic team to dig in.

This is weird unless you got married very late in life and never merged anything because of children. Why do you need secret accounts if you trust one another?

Secret does not mean separate.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:My husband and I both have “secret” accounts. It's not a big deal as long as the bills are paid, the credit report is good, and I have no reason to doubt him. If that changes, I'll get a forensic team to dig in.

This is weird unless you got married very late in life and never merged anything because of children. Why do you need secret accounts if you trust one another?

Secret does not mean separate.

In the context of this post it is secret from the spouse, not the govt or your ILs or whatever.

Your tax return (and w-2) is an easy way to check on income.

[Anonymous]

Do you file a joint tax return? An interest bearing account would generate a tax form.

[Anonymous]

Hire a discovery laywer.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Do you file a joint tax return? An interest bearing account would generate a tax form.

Ya, that's the easiest way to find out. Plus, you could figure out a pretty reasonable guestimate of the account balance based on how much interest was reported.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Why?

You know that while you’re married, your spouses money is not your money.

That's certainly true of my parents' marriage. My mom has no credit, no access to or knowledge of their investments, and no estate to pass on because everything is in my dad's name. She has a credit card with a super low balance and gets cash every month.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:If you know how much they make salary bonus commission etc you should be able to reverse engineer how much your deposits after taxes and after 401k and health plans be. If the numbers in your joint accounts fall short your spouse is siphoning money elsewhere. If you DONT know the exact salary and bonus dollars, this approach won’t work for you. I’m convinced my BIL has a secret account that my SIL doesn’t know about. She’s clueless though so probably would never suspect it.

And why be married to someone if their salary and bonus are a secret? Seriously how can you be a couple and not be open about finances. I get maybe you keep separate accounts (not my thing but I understand it works for some) but there Must be transparency about finances for. Relationship to work

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why?

You know that while you’re married, your spouses money is not your money.

That's certainly true of my parents' marriage. My mom has no credit, no access to or knowledge of their investments, and no estate to pass on because everything is in my dad's name. She has a credit card with a super low balance and gets cash every month.

seriously, why be married to someone who doesn't love you and wants to control you

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Why?

You know that while you’re married, your spouses money is not your money.

That's certainly true of my parents' marriage. My mom has no credit, no access to or knowledge of their investments, and no estate to pass on because everything is in my dad's name. She has a credit card with a super low balance and gets cash every month.

seriously, why be married to someone who doesn't love you and wants to control you

I've wondered that for 30 years. I don't know. Maybe in his marriage to my mom, he's a misogynist, but he raised my sister and me to be independent and career-minded, and we got a lot of great personal finance lessons growing up and in young adulthood. It's why I have a combination of shared and separate accounts in my marriage (401k, 529 plans, brokerage account are separate) - the idea of turning over financial control to my husband makes me sick. I can't become my mom.