If you had different financial standing when you got together

[Anonymous]

How did it turn out for you? I’m talking more than just ‘he’s a saver, she’s a spender’ — one of you had big time student loans, one of you had a fantastic salary, etc. How did you navigate that? What were some obvious and less than obvious challenges ?

[Anonymous]

I was just finishing college and he was 5 years into a good career. He had a 401K, healthy savings, and budget for a vacation every year. I had a checking account with $400 in it.

Honestly, we just kept separate finances for the first few years. I didn't want to lean on him, financially speaking. Once I was on my own feet and doing as well as he was, we combined finances.

It wasn't too hard because I knew it was temporary. The awkward times were when he wanted to do something together, and I just had to be like "sorry, can't afford it ... You can go by yourself or buy me a ticket if you really want to" (he generally wanted to more often than I was comfortable with).

[Anonymous]

Like 14:05, we were in very different places. My husband had spent a year overseas in the contracting world, making high 6 figures and I was making at $422 paycheck every week. He picked most things up when we started dating. When we moved in together, he paid the mortgage and bills, I paid for groceries. When we got married (2 years later), I was making $40k to his $150 and we combined finances. 10 years later, I'm making $150k to his $200k (plus big bonuses, dependent on year), and it's a non-issue. It really never seemed to be a big thing once we got married. We aren't one of those couples who "you cover the mortgage, I got daycare" or who have separate accounts for things. Any purchase (for self/kids/house/etc) over $250 is discussed before purchase.

[Anonymous]

Navigate that? She was living under the poverty line when we met. After we married, my paycheck determined our zip code, and she almost but never quite bumped us into another tax bracket. We lived on _our_ income.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:I was just finishing college and he was 5 years into a good career. He had a 401K, healthy savings, and budget for a vacation every year. I had a checking account with $400 in it.

Honestly, we just kept separate finances for the first few years. I didn't want to lean on him, financially speaking. Once I was on my own feet and doing as well as he was, we combined finances.

It wasn't too hard because I knew it was temporary. The awkward times were when he wanted to do something together, and I just had to be like "sorry, can't afford it ... You can go by yourself or buy me a ticket if you really want to" (he generally wanted to more often than I was comfortable with).

This whole mentality is so foreign to me. You were MARRIED. You're leaning on each other no matter what. Keeping separate accounts is ultimately a fiction.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:I was just finishing college and he was 5 years into a good career. He had a 401K, healthy savings, and budget for a vacation every year. I had a checking account with $400 in it.

Honestly, we just kept separate finances for the first few years. I didn't want to lean on him, financially speaking. Once I was on my own feet and doing as well as he was, we combined finances.

It wasn't too hard because I knew it was temporary. The awkward times were when he wanted to do something together, and I just had to be like "sorry, can't afford it ... You can go by yourself or buy me a ticket if you really want to" (he generally wanted to more often than I was comfortable with).

This whole mentality is so foreign to me. You were MARRIED. You're leaning on each other no matter what. Keeping separate accounts is ultimately a fiction.

No, sorry, I wasn't clear. The question was about when we "got together". I interpreted that as serious dating, eventually living together. We didn't get married until we were much closer to an even split on anything, and that's when we combined finances. I didn't want to lean on a serious boyfriend, even if I THOUGHT we were headed for marriage, nor did I want to commingle our accounts until we were legally married.

[Anonymous]

When I got engaged my now DH and I were both making the same income but he had been a big saver and I had been a big spender. When we needed to come up with a downpayment on a house he discovered that I only had about $500 to my name. He was very calm about it but he did ask where it had all gone and I pointed to my jewelry. I quickly adopted his savings approach because I knew it was better then mine (non existent!) and in the many years we've been married he's never questioned my spending because he knows I'm a bargain hunter. I buy a ton of my clothes at higher end consignment shops because, to me, its a sport despite the fact we are extremely well off.