Between my wife and I we have 4 checking accounts and 3 savings accounts. This is in addition to separate accounts for investments and retirement investments.

One checking and one savings is for managing our rental property. We have a joint checking that we both contribute to for paying monthly bills and mortgage, insurance etc. We are on all the accounts as joint owners, but do not use the other person's accounts.

It makes it a lot easier when each person has control over their own finances. That way no one has to ask the other "gee, do we have enough money in the account so I can get a haircut" or nails done or whatever.

We also have individual and joint credit cards.

I is sort of silly for one person to be in charge of all the finances. I have met people who have not written a check for 20 years. God help them if their partner died, they wouldn't know where to begin.

 

That is the way we do it. We each have a spending budget that can be used however we want. For larger purchases, we discuss it openly.

 

I manage the household budget and pay all the bills, but I do share the budget with my wife. She knows exactly where all the money goes and could easily pick up the budget and bill payment. We do have individual retirement accounts, but that is mainly because they are setup through work.

 

I'm guessing it is how comfortable you are with your spouse's financial traits and how your spouse feels about your traits. Wife and I have everything in joint account and both buy whatever we please, up to a number our common sense tells us to talk to the other first. I haven't hit that number in a long time. It's worked for 23+ years for us. The wife and I never even thought about it and even had the same arrangement when we lived together for 10+ years before we got married.

My mom has a separate account that my dad adds to since she stopped working 50+ years ago. He wanted her to have money to spend without having to justify it to him.

Like Scot I know several people that split everything and the one thing they all have in common is parents that split up at some point. Just lucky I guess

 

The magic word here is, "Interdependence."

Finances are, unfortunately, something that the Government Contract That Is Marriage governs. Thanks, but no thanks.

I have a draft co-habitation, will be getting a pre-nup (if it gets to that point), and pretty much plan on having 3+ accounts with full transparency.

Keep the legal contract of marriage contractual, let the love side of marriage free to be. (IMHO of course )

 

IRA's aside, your $, as well as all other aspects of your life should be combined when you get married. If you have any reservations about this before getting married, then don't. You'll just end up losing half your stuff, which is what you were worried about in the first place.

 

I think you are missing the point. It is easier (and healthier) to have separate accounts.

It is not a good idea to try to combine all aspects of your life when you get married. It is healthy to maintain some autonomy.

Marriages where that does not occur tend to end in bitter divorce, unless someone commits suicide or someone gets murdered first.

 

I don't know, keeping things separate seems really weird to me. Maybe it's different for me because my wife doesn't work so I'm earning all the money we're spending, but I don't mind.

 

I can respect people's choices to do things seperately..... it just seems odd to me.

Once in a while my wife does bitch at me about what I spend $ on, but in the end I win and pretty much buy whatever i want...even with our $ combined........

Two ladies I work with are BITCHES and have the seperate accounts. They both make more than their husbands... i view the seperate accounts thing as "don't go thinking you are going to be spending MY money"..... i could be wrong, but that is how i view it.

 

exxxxxxfreakinnnnnnactly!!!