S/O: Do you and your spouse have separate accounts?

[Anonymous]

We have two separate checking accounts, one in his name only one in both of our names (but only I use that account, both names are on it so we could do it through his work credit union). Almost all of our savings are in my name only for tax reasons. House is in both our names, one car is in both names, one in just mine.

In short, we mix it up--because we are on the same page financially but also like some degree of independent money management. My parents fought so much over their joint checking account when I was a kid that both my sister and I feel strongly about having money that is only ours. I think that separate accounts preempts a lot of that tension.

[Anonymous]

We have separate accounts and one joint account. The joint account covers shared expenses (mortgage, bills, child care). I have no idea how he spends his money and vice versa. I didn't want to be annoyed that he spent $$$ on golf glubs while I spent $$$ on the spa, stock, or just put it away for a rainy day. Works for us. (We also have a prenup.)

[Anonymous]

a friend of mine has a joint account. we were on a golf weekend and his wife called at 9 am on a Saturday screaming at him that he blew $900 at a strip club the night before. lesson learned: have separate accounts.

[Anonymous]

Everything we have is joint, but none of us brought any pre-marital debt with us and our salaries are withing 10% of each other. We have similar spending habits, so it evens out, and we really only discuss purchases over $500.

The only separate account is DH's "gambling" account, which was created as a wedding gift and was started with $1,000 that he's allowed to use for sports betting, poker games, etc. All winnings go back into this account to be used as his fun money for purchases I wouldn't approve of or surprises for me. (Like the purchase of 3 large TV's for his sports viewing room or anniversary trip to the Caribbean).

[Anonymous]

We have joint accounts- I've always made more than DH and he had loans when we got married, but that doesn't factor into our view of our finances- we just view it as ours.

We don't always discuss purchases, but we seem to both be on the same page spending / saving wise, so I feel like we don't really need to.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:No joint accounts. We married late in life and I was just too lazy to bother with all the paperwork. We have never fought over money at all -- not for 7 years. So it seems to work well for us.

Same here. Married in our mid-30s about five years ago. We both individually managed our money before we met, and neither of us felt the need to merge accounts.

Happily, we've never argued about money. After moving in, we quickly fell into a pattern of who pays what bills, and either of us will put household things on our cc's as we go and just pay for them from our individual accounts. No keeping score, no conversations about "turns" or fairness. It all seems to work out fine.

BTW, our individual checking, brokerage and 401(k) accounts are all through the same financial services company, and we have linked the accounts so everything shows up on a joint statement and a joint page on-line. This helps us both keep an eye on cash flow and overall holdings.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:No joint accounts. We married late in life and I was just too lazy to bother with all the paperwork. We have never fought over money at all -- not for 7 years. So it seems to work well for us.

Same for us, too. While we do have some money stress, it has nothing to do with joint vs. separate accounts and everything to do with the cost of daycare!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Everything shared here also. Only been married 4 years though, but it works so far.

Credit cards are shared, checking acct shared, both names on the house, etc.

this. been married 6.5 yrs.

[Anonymous]

Everything for us is shared, although we've each got our own primary checking account. Both paychecks go into the first checking account, which I pay all the bills from. Each payday, I transfer a previously agreed upon amount into the second checking account, which DH uses for everything -- gas, groceries, lunches, random Target trips, etc. We jokingly refer to it as his allowance, but the reason we set it up that way was so he would know exactly how much spending money he had at any given time (i.e. he would not be wondering whether more bills still needed to be paid) and would not continually resort to his credit card. We generally check in with each other on expenses over $300, and I generally expect that he will not outspend his "allowance" without talking to me about it (just like I would not outspend the post-bill leftovers in the first account without talking to him about it). We really never fight about money -- we both came into the relationship almost 10 years ago with an equivalent amount of debt, and we make exactly the same amount. Although I am undoubtedly more organized and on top of what we are doing with our money, and what we should be doing with our money, I always run that stuff by DH and I can't really think of a time when we haven't been on the same page or very close to it.

[Anonymous]

Everything is joint, except that we each maintain an independent credit card (but we have everything linked into mint.com--so I can see his if I want to and he pays the credit card bills so he can see mine). We mainly have them so we can buy Christmas/birthday presents as a surprise or if there's a problem with our main card. He had really minimal student loans that were paid off quickly, and we had a car loan for a bit that was also paid off early. Now it's just the mortgage which we acquired together.

When money was tighter, we each got a "cash allowance" every week that was our money to do what we wanted with and the other person couldn't complain or mock spending choices. (If he'd spent his on hookers and blow, I would have complained, but you know what I mean.)

Now we're at a point where we have enough discretionary money that we don't have to worry about it. He's gotten a little more frugal over the years, and I've gotten a little more laid back about some things I consider a little frivolous. We've never had a serious argument about money, largely because we have pretty much the same values about it

When we married, I had the higher income and more savings (although they were both small in the grand scheme of things). Now he makes more, and I'll have some unpaid time for maternity leave--so things seem to have a way of balancing out.

[Anonymous]

13:26 Here again

I forgot that we do have separate ING savings accounts set up just so that we each have some emergency money that would be absolutely free and clear in a worst case scenario. But we contribute to and pull from those accounts evenly as needed and consider the balances to be "our" money--not mine or his.

[Anonymous]

Everything separate. We fell into a pattern of who pays what when we both worked. Now that spouse is SAH, I transfer set amount into spouses account per month. Spouse has total freedom w my ATM card and cc but all spending is tracked every few weeks. We never argue about money.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:We have a joint checking account into which we deposit three quarters of our take home pay each. We pay home expenses and daycare out of this account, mostly through a common credit card.

The rest of the money goes into separate checking and savings accounts, we are free to spend and save as we desire from these accounts.

we do this. we each put a certain amount into the jpint account that we pay family bills from.

We also do this and it works well for us.

[Anonymous]

Everything is joint. Joint CCs, joint checking and savings accounts...only things that are separate are our IRAs and retirement accounts (obviously).

We've been married for 10 years and have had joint accounts since we started living together (12 years ago). Honestly, I can't imagine having separate accounts, but that is just me. Whatever works for your family...

[Anonymous]

T"he only separate account is DH's "gambling" account, which was created as a wedding gift and was started with $1,000 that he's allowed to use for sports betting, poker games, etc. All winnings go back into this account to be used as his fun money for purchases I wouldn't approve of or surprises for me. (Like the purchase of 3 large TV's for his sports viewing room or anniversary trip to the Caribbean). "

Which were which?