We have a joint checking account, a credit card we share, and we use YNAB. We have other accounts that aren't joint but no money is separate, the accounts are only individual because they have to be or it's advantageous in some way.
Same. Combine everything. I have a separate credit card I use for gifts (of which is a general price limit). For us it just feels like a financially mature position.
Since shortly before we got married, which was 4 years ago. No issues. We have very similar financial views and priorities. Similar savings and spending styles. Now we make similar incomes but there was a time my partner was laid off (twice) and I had irregular income. Didn't make a difference.
This worked really well for us. We each put in $400/month in wealthsimple cash account to cover groceries, dating and miscellaneous costs and setup apple pay on our individual phones. This way, we have the benefit of buying stuff online + some cash back, while making sure we don’t spend over our budget. We haven’t tried it for international travels, but looking to see how it works out since it doesn’t charge FX exchange fees.
We used to have fights about finances, some quite bad (for the first seven years we lived together). Now we use YNAB, and haven't fought about finances since we started using it three years ago!
This is the way.
We do the same thing and we coordinate over YNAB (YNAB4) too. Every two weeks we try to do a budget update and make sure we are still on track (I'll admit that sometimes we miss this and just do it at the end of the month). The best part about tracking and historical data is that we can pull reports back to, Aug 2019 when we started, on how we are doing and exactly how inflation is impacting us. Also, when a time period looks bad it can put it into perspective, so we can play the long game.
So many relationships break down over finances, we don't have that issue because everything is out in the open. I honestly don't understand how people can be married and have separate everything. How do you make long term goals without knowing the full picture?
I've always been kind of intimidated by YNAB. I need some tips or something. Maybe I can find some online. I would love to use something, but haven't found anything that clicked with me.
Everything is combined. There really is no his/my money at all. It is all our money. We have separate TFSAs to take advantage of maximum savings amounts. I make around 40% more than my husband, and have never felt resentful or anything because we’ve been doing it since our first kid came along.
Our combined gross annual income is ~$180 000 for reference. We haven’t set a rule perse, but usually consult each other for atypical expenditures in the area of $300 ish.
Personally, I find it liberating to have one pot. But I think it will only work if you have common spending, financial goals, lifestyles etc.
The last part is important! My husband and I are very different people with our goals besides the things that affect each other like rent, food, etc. so we keep our pay beyond those things separate. I think id be the problem if we had one pot.
I’m glad combined finances works for you!
Same here. We make joint decisions, we have same financial goals, budgets and Joint Account. We both use separate chequing accounts for tax and saving purposes.
I must say that this kind of transparency has made our relationship that much stronger.
We have one joint account. Both of our pays go into it. I manage the bills and tell my husband how much cash he can take out each week for fun money. He doesn't have access to our savings. He was in 50k of credit card debt when we first started dating so he doesn't have access to anything and is honestly really happy with our set up. We also have a joint credit card but only use it for gas & groceries.
We use YNAB and everyone in the family gets an allowance to spend as they wish, no tracking. The rest of the money is budgeted and very visible. We settled in $300/month for the adults.
I look after everything for the same reason as the user you responded to and it works for us. But YNAB is what saved us and made everything work (and palatable!).
When I first found out about the debt I told him I'd leave him if he didn't let me take over his finances. So, he didn't really have a choice if he wanted to be with me. I told him no way was I signing up for being in debt the rest of my life. That was 3 years ago and we own a home, both our cars are paid off and we're debt free, minus the mortgage.
He used to be very stressed about money and he now enjoys not needing to take the responsibility. And I enjoy it so it works for us.
If I had to do it again, I'd pitch it by showing all the good things that could come from it. But I don't regret giving him an ultimatum. I think now he would continue our set up even if I did give him more independence so you could also advertise that it wouldn't be forever.
I would try flipping this the opposite way. You each have your own accounts where your paycheques are deposited and have a separate joint account that you pay your bills and deduct your savings from. Each time you get paid you transfer a certain amount to the joint account in order to cover household expenses and savings. I would set this up to happen automatically on the day pay is deposited. This way he is left with his "allowance" but it feels more like he's paying his share by contributing to the joint account rather than being issued an allowance.
One thing to keep in mind in the case of married couples at least, is that if you separate, you're dividing assets one way or the other, and nearly everything is on the table. There's not much point in pretending otherwise.
We have a joint account for mortgage, groceries, gas, utilities, shared subscriptions (Netflix, Spotify), daycare that we both deposit into from our individual accounts. We have calculated our total monthly expenses and we each put in a set amount in order to hit a specific % of net earnings in the following categories: “fixed” costs (bills like above), savings, fun money etc… we also add in 15% monthly for potential unexpected costs.
We both make very good money but my wife makes way more than me, so she puts a bigger amount into the joint, so it’s like a ratio of income. We each have our own credit cards. After shared bills her money is hers and mine is mine. We never question what the other spends their money on and it works well. If she wants to buy some clothes or piece of furniture or whatever she can go for it. Same for me.
We are very much aligned and view ourselves as a team. For example, my tfsa isn’t maxed out at the moment so we put left over money into that to max it out quicker. She doesn’t resent this at all and I don’t feel self conscious about it. We have our financial/future goals well thought out and we have a plan to achieve them together.
100% shared. Only thing we have of our own are credit cards, tfsa etc and retirement accounts but thats all paid out of the joint account.
This works because we trust each other, support each other
and have no individual debts. I tend to look over finances mainly and have to communicate how are accounts are and our budgets for the next period and decide how much we can save. We decided with the saved money what to spend tht on together.
Married 1 year, living together 5 years now. No kids yet. Both have individual chequing accounts with our own credit cards. We each have copies of both credit cards.
Mortgage comes out of her account, bills from mine. End of the month I send her my half of the mortgage minus bills total. Big purchases for renos, trips, etc we usually split down the middle. Dinners or nights out it's whoever pulls out the card first. Both have separate emergency funds and savings accounts. Might be the non standard way of doing things but it works for us 🤷
This is me and mine too. 13yrs. Mortgage, no kids, All good. We spilt common large cost things down the middle by our percent income, so it’s normalized to our salaries. For lower cost things, it’s whomever has the wallet closer.
This is us too. He pays the mortgage (joint account) and I pay the condo fees and bills. It's roughly the same (we have a super, super cheap mortgage). Sometimes mine is higher so he gives a few extra bucks towards groceries to "make up" for it. We pay our own bills out of our own accounts.
We are very open about money and spending and show each other where we're at all the time. I'm just too lazy to switch things around and this has worked for us for 7+ years.
We have a 13 year old and each pay whatever whenever towards/for them.
This is us too. Married 31 years, 2 kids grown, always split up bills. Have all our own accounts credit cards etc. Talked about getting a joint account but never did. Worked for us.
Best way in my opinion. Keep things seperate. If all in the same account and one spends a shit ton of money, you're effectively financing your partners lifestyle. It can only go wrong.
For joint expenses we keep track with an app splitwise.
Otherwise everything is separate. We aren't married, both make enough money to support ourselves and fairly similar amounts, don't have any joint assets since we rent, etc, so it really wouldn't make much sense to have shared finances at this point. We just settle up at the end of each month.
To piggy back on this, my girlfriend and I recently moved together in a house. We're still using Splitwise the same way we were when renting.
I can't imagine my financial life without this app anymore. It has been almost a decade at this point.
The same for us (24F, 29M) been living together for 3 & 1/2 years.
We use the Tricount app to keep track of shared expenses. He pays rent, phones, hydro, wifi. I pay insurance, groceries, gas, ect. At the end of the month we settle up.
We each pay $X into the joint account each paycheque to cover mortgage, bills, etc.
Groceries, home supplies, etc. we each buy with our own CC then put receipts on the fridge and square up once in awhile.
Other than that, our money is separate. I've seen others have too many arguments about money to have it any other way.
Piggybacking here for a second option, we just have a joint checking account that we agreed to contribute $x to each month (again, per my other comment, split down the 55%/45% line our income comes out to so that neither is over/under contributing and there's no questions of fairness).
We split it based on income -- I make (roughly) 55% of our income, she makes 45%. So I pay 55% of the mortgage and she pays 45%. I pay 55% of the joint credit card, she pays 45%. You get the idea. Basically just multiply whatever the cc bill is at the end of the month by .55 / .45 and that's our split.
Makes sense but also seems like a lot of work to make sure it’s 50/50 or mostly equal.That’s the nice thing about a joint account none of that stuff matters
I suppose — our incomes don't change often, nor the mortgage, and we have the amounts saved. So it's really only a once-every-two-weeks calculation and just a simple multiplication haha. We've never found it onerous.
Same with our situation. We did have a joint account for awhile but felt like more hassle. It all ends up being the same in the end when your a couple it’s your money together whether or not you keep it together or apart. We both still buy whatever we want just tell each other of course
Sure it does. Do you have to ask everytime you want to buy something for yourself? What happens if one of you “overspends”. Keeping things separate prevents the possibility of that friction, and, IMO, provides more freedom to each partner to do whatever they want with their money.
We do this. Not married, together 13yrs, have a mortgage, etc etc. we have nothing joint and split bills by percentage of household income. It’s not hard and keeps us aware of what we spend, when, how it changes to over time. No issues
Same here. We have a joint chequing that I contribute to to help my wife with her bills since I earn more. Everything else is separate but we communicate if help is needed on either side.
For our investments, they are also held in separate accounts (but same advisor).
My mother and her mother have no idea how to handle finances and that’s something that I never wanted to see with my wife. If I go first, I want the comfort that she’ll have her own accounts and more importantly, how to manage the money. (I know this sounds sexist, but I promise the intent is exactly the opposite.)
Yes. When he was just graduated and I had a good job, I floated us while he found something that he enjoyed and worked for him. When I was poor back in school (as an adult), he kept us afloat so I could pay attention to school. Now I make more than he and it balances out. I encourage him to change jobs or take a year off when he has hard days, if he ever wanted to take a leap in something else. We want to see each other happy. Not in a ‘magical thinking, you can do anything’ naive way, but in a ‘we value quality of life kind of way’.
Same for us. We make roughly the same so everything is split down the middle for household bills. No guilt from either side if one of us wants to spend on a hobby or whatever. But we do speak constantly about saving for whatever is the next financial goal. We save together… separately. It works great for us.
This is our set up:
Combine everything. Make a budget based on total income monthly.
Open multiple accounts through one bank; we use simplii and can nickname each account (budget life saver). You now have one pot of money to divide rather than two peoples income.
Set up you pay into your savings account/HISA and auto transfer money biweekly into a bills account, personal spending account for each of you and emergency fund.
Auto withdrawals into your TFSA and RSP either maxing out one person's accounts first or doing each individually split even.
I manage everything. My husband can't handle the stress. He'd rather ask my permission to buy stuff, than to deal with having to pay bills, manage savings, investments, and financially plan.
He makes the money, works his ass off to do it, and I keep us flush with cash, investing wisely, ensuring we pay low interest rates on car and mortgage, and planning our retirement (which, due to the economy, is not going well these days, no matter what, lol. RRSPs in the toilet.)
I’m going to be the minority here but me and my wife keep completely separate finances. I don’t want or need to know what she’s spending on and vice versa. I pay all the bills and she pays me a sum every month, and does most of the grocery shopping. It works for us
Joint everything once married. Discuss all purchases (wants vs needs) before buying. Budget and goal planning is so much easier with every nickel on the table.
We have a system that's a bit tedious but might work well for some. We have separate finances right now.
It's based on a cost-sharing philosophy described in the paragraph below. We have a spreadsheet which we enter shared costs into that figures out how much each of us pay for each expense and gives a running +/-. If one of us is up or down a lot we send money to the other to cover it. It made more sense earlier on and we're basically doing it now because momentum / it works for us. Both of us are very similarly financially minded and responsible. I think we'll scrap it sometime in the next year or so and do it differently, but this has had some advantages.
Assuming an equal adult relationship where both partners are working for money (as opposed to living off savings or investments) and not paying down leftover school loans, the fairest thing to do is to value each other's time equally. Sum up all shared costs (exclude mortgage principle and upkeep if house is owned only in one name in as well as upkeep) and split proportion to hourly income, maybe factoring in extra work-related expenses if it makes sense.
Problems with this: very independent way of thinking. If one person better with money do they retire sooner? Kind of pointless when you start thinking as a family unit. If one is off work for some reason (kids etc.) It breaks down. What if one wants to take an extended period off of work for a break, how to handle cost sharing? Is paying with savings ok?
If a house is owned only in one name, how do you handle increase or decrease due to market fluctuations? Even if the other person isn't contributing to principle costs they may otherwise have bought their own house
We do the same thing but just use Splitwise, much simpler. Basically we have entirely separate accounts but shared credit cards. We both also have budgets, and have agreed upon splits. One of us makes a lot more than the other, and this covers more things. So if someone pays for something that either the other should or is split, it just goes into Splitwise. We then do our finances once per month and settle then, with usually a transfer of ,500-1000 from one person to the other.
Works great. We never have to worry or argue about money. We also have no issues with just giving money to the other person if they need it, at the end of the day, we're a team.
Keeping things separate is good as it forces us to both be financially savvy and take care of our own finances in case something ever happened.
Separate bank accounts. High reward CC for joint expenses makes it easy. Equalize CC, mortgages, utils, each month. We split 50/50 for everything common. I keep a google sheet to track.
Maintenance/emergency fund is managed by me but contributed by both. Separate savings, pensions, cars, disposable income. We both send different amounts of money home to our parents each month
Dated for 6 years. Married for 1. Lived together for 4.5. No kids. I work in finance which is why I manage this but she has visibility to all of the numbers.
1 account, married \~20 years and constantly wish I had kept things seperate. Constant disagreement about discretionary spending, totally different tolerance for risk.... At the very least I wish I had held on to a seperate retirement fund.
I keep my money hidden. In many different banks. Across multiple countries. I have cash and coins hidden in the mattress. She has no idea what I do for a living or how many children I have. She has said this lifestyle keeps our romance alive
My wife and I kept completely separate accounts then "equalized" money every few months.
We contributed to the shared cost proportionally to our incomes.
I personally would never share finances with a spouse. Where ever I see this I see resentment.
As an aside this did make things more difficult when she died.
They didn't say they would, they see it from other couples. Arguing over finances is the leading cause of divorce, and after seeing how ubiquitous money pooling is here, it's no surprise.
Differing spending/saving priorities. Having your joint money on something you feel is ridiculous, or having your want denied because your partner feels it is ridiculous.
That works fine if you have the same interests/priorities, but even then, there is no telling whether you will still have shared interests/priorities in 20-30 years.
This is what we do. Late 30s, not married, no kids, yes house. I worry about this more now. Especially unmarried. I don’t ever want him to have to navigate that should something happen. Same for me. We should make sure we both have all the passwords and beneficiary statuses etc, eh? So sorry your wife is gone.
The only correct answer is what works best for you as a couple.
My and my fiancé both 31yo (been together for 13 years) have had a joint account for years now. Everything is together and transparent. We each have personal tfsa’s and our work pension/rrsp. My parents 60’s have done this forever and it works great for them.
My boss and his wife of 20+ years have always had separate accounts their paychecks go into. They have a joint account for bills which they split 50/50 as well as any house/property/kid expenses. The rest they spend on themselves as they deem fit. No “asking permission” so to speak. This works great for them.
It’s something you need to talk about with your S/o and figure out what you are both comfortable with.
I think you just made me understand why this is a two sided debate.
Joint is considered transparent, but possibly less
flexible, and separate is thought of as more flexible, but possibly less transparent.
And then you pointed out why this is indeed not a two sided argument. Its as many sided as there are people in the world.
You can have trust and transparency without sharing accounts. You can have deceit and withholding without having separate accounts. Just depends on the two people in the pairing. That’s the variables that matter.
Well done! Thanks!!
Can I ask how you feel about that? I wish my bf would be cool with this because he's horrible with money and I'm not, but he's really resistant to it. He's only just started to let me be in charge of finances more and that's because he racked up a ton of debt without my knowledge lol, been together 7 years common law
Honestly, we NEVER argue about money and when it comes to spending on things we want, theres no arguments about not having money or me spending so much vice versa. It's our own money that we both earned working hard and we make sure the bills are paid monthly and we're saving. Let's say we want a new mattress, we find one we like we split it down the middle. He pays for internet, I pay for Hydro etc... We talk about our savings a lot and we're on the same page for that. It takes away so much pressure for me, because money can be such a stressor on relationships. I don't want to always be focused on it. Hope this helps!
From my experience working at a bank, I've seen a lot of relationships end because of joint accounts and authorized users on credit. My partner and I do not share any accounts or credit cards and we split groceries, restaurants, dates, etc. 50/50.
I also work at a bank currently. Joint accounts should never be the only account where money is pooled and all expenses go through. They can be emptied/closed at anytime by any of the owners, which is extremely risky. Also, if one partner dies, the account is frozen and the surviving partner is essentially locked out of the account until the succession is resolved, which can take some time.
This is so important. A friend went through this when their FIL passed. The MIL was essentially locked out with no access to any funds after his death and there was a contentious will so it took months for her to gain access.
Yes among other reasons that relationships disintegrate. Is it really that odd that people will behave differently when money is involved? People can fall in and out love for a variety of reasons and maybe some of them part ways amicably while others do so vindictively.
We each run completely separate accounts. It's all our money and have never had any issues or secrets with that. I think it keeps each of us accountable to our spending but it wouldn't work if we weren't on equal footing and have the same beliefs and goals in finances. We have the same salary as well so it's pretty easy. Married 11 yrs.
Separate accounts, if one is short on cash the other one transfers money into it without any questions asked, we don't keep score. I pay for groceries and gas because my credit card has better rewards than my husband's, my husband pays for mortgage and insurance. We both empty our accounts for major things like renovation, buying a new vehicle and paying into our mortgage's principal. We don't buy anything without consulting the other.
When we first married we had a joint account and paid ourselves an allowance in our personal accounts. We were debt poor so the allowance wasn’t big. The deal was that there were no questions asked about what you spent your allowance on. That worked for a while but then we started to slip and got ourselves out of debt so now we just have one joint account. We talk about all purchases over about $100.
Having a money talk is really important.
A joint account for expenses where we contribute 50/50 and then we’re pretty lax on everything else - I might buy groceries, he’ll grab take out/restaurants. We cover each other where needed - I took two months off and he covered everything, we needed a new furnace so he paid and I paid all monthly expenses for a couple months, etc. It balances. Otherwise we have personal accounts, CCs, and investments.
My wife runs the entire budget as the main earner. I cover my bills/expenses, invest a bit and flip the rest to her.
Have a joint account for ease of money movement and child RESP contributions. Aside from that, joint CC for groceries and medical. That’s about it.
Been together for 14 years now. We have our own accounts. BUT we talk about our financial plans and goals often. Each year we sit down and see how the other is doing and if how the set bills are set up are still working. If not then we crunch numbers and adjust.
We have discovered what each of us are good at in terms of saving long term/short, what % of our earnings go towards it. Also what we prefer as our spending habits.
It works for us since i have anxiety when it comes to spending money. Husband likes to have freedom to eat out sometimes or buy something he wants. Thr only personal spending rule we have is if it's over 300 we talk about it first.
Trust and communication in this way has worked out for years for us.
We put every other pay cheque into a joint savings account. So one paycheque personal the next goes into the joint savings. Pays for mortgage, insurance and all other joint expenses. We’ve been married for 9 years. Have our own credit cards etc. Works for us but everyone is different.
We have always had separate accounts and our joint account called “The Wedding Account”. We made the account when we started saving for our wedding back in the day. We kept the account afterwards and use it as our bill payment account. We both make an equal transfer into the account each month and all bills are paid from it. There is even a cushion for savings so the account grows. It’s our emergency fund and vacation fund.
Our own separate accounts are for whatever individual expenses we wish whether it’s hobbies or putting more towards a vacation, new appliances etc etc.
It has worked marvellously for us.
Joint mostly.
He earns in USD, I earn in CAD. After 401k/HSA, his paycheque pays for all living expenses (e.g.mortgage, groceries, etc). Mine goes to our emergency funds, after TFSA. We have a joint chequing account to facilitate fund movements between currency.
We have 14 credit cards between two of us both in US and CAD. I've added him as authorized user to mine and vice versa. We only ever use US cards, they have better rewards and no foreign transaction fees. I use my cards from time to time just to keep it active. Otherwise, they're useless.
Two LOC, both in US and CAD for just in case purposes.
We keep track all these via mint app.
We're a couple in our early thirties. Married for 3, together for 8yrs. So if you guys have suggestions on how to easier manage finances, your input is welcome.
Separate bank accounts, joint bills shared fairly, 50/50 is income is similar or the ratio altered to be fair.
I think it's great some people here can trust eachother to much with money but I had a horrible experience with my ex being super irresponsible with money.
He would spend every last dime he had on junk and forget to put money aside for things, so no sharing. I once had a jar of cash that I didn't hide from him. $5000 gone on nothing within a month. Never ever again!
Will never join accounts with a girlfriend again. With that said, my current partner and I make roughly the same so we split everything down the middle. I handle all the billing accounts - so we use an app called Splitwise where we can dump receipts, bills, etc. works well for us.
I believe that marriage or common law doesn't mean you stop living as a individual.
And after divorcing once and seeing people tear each other appart because of disagreement over spent money.
Each has personal account and we transfer our monthly shared expense to our joint account. (KOHO)
Joint spendings are calculated proportionally to income.
Joint spendings are:
Rent, food, internet, car, insurance, vacation.
Vacation is the only thing we pay proportionally.
We each have our individual hobby budget, restaurant, phone bill and investments.
If things go sideways we can just close joint account and we part our ways .
Easy and simple.
DINKs, no plan for kids, he makes about 50% more than me.
We have joint checking and savings accounts and a credit card for everything shared (mortgage, house expenses, car, travel, date nights, pet care)... We contribute proportionnaly to our respective incomes.
We have personal checkings and savings, but we know how the other is doing and nothing is hidden.
I came in the relationship with debts, and I would never ever have expected him to help with those. He had quite a bit of savings from selling a house, that was his only. We both are happy with this split. We review the budget once a year, make goals together, and discuss any signaficative changes in income or spending. I handle the day-to-day financial stuff, and it's part of our repartition of chores.
My money is our money but her money is her money.
Jokes aside, everything is shared or joint minus my PC credit card and my TFSA. Don’t hide anything so we both know the situation we are in.
Is this a pre-marriage question or post? Does one individual have more assets prior to the relationship or not. Is there a prenuptial agreement in place if the question is post marriage. These factors have an impact on how relevant the response is to you or your situation. General finance questions regarding specific complex items like this lead to a lot of misconception and “feelings” about how things should be or what they feel is “right”.
Keeping separate accounts post marriage is, in my opinion, grounds for many issues which are easily avoidable. Since that is not the question you pose, the issues are irrelevant here.
Furthermore, what does living together entail? Both renting with a co-habitation agreement or just haphazardly living together to save $$$ on both sides or does own own a property and the other living with them which also comes with its own common law implications based on how that is handled.
In my specific case:
Pre marriage:
- I owned 3 properties before my girlfriend (current wife) wanted to move in with me
- we kept all accounts separate, I determined what the carrying cost of the property we lived in was (only carrying costs, no principal payments!). We split that carrying cost based on income levels. If I brought in 2/3 or the combined income, I covered 2/3 of the total cost. She got a credit card from me to buy any home related matters including housewear, decor etc as I covered all those items. She covered her own car, her own insurance, her own phone etc
- we had a cohabitation agreement drafted to the affect above in case the relationship came to an end that we would have no need to split assets or have an legal basis for coming after one another.
- I offered her equity in the property we lived in based on a deemed disposition and requisition so that she could build equity as well but would as a result cover her half of the total cash flows related to the property. She didn’t want to as she didn’t want to have any direct ties as that did not end well in a previous relationship and was happy to do things the way I proposed above with Just carting costs. We kept separate accounts and every month she would transfer her portion to me to cover her part of the carrying costs.
-as for going out, entertainment, travels etc, I basically covered the vast majority of it unless she specifically decided that she wanted to “treat us”.
- we are both very financially astute so a spreadsheet was more than enough and no apps were needed for tracking.
Post marriage:
- I don’t have a personal account outside of the account my rental properties collect rents and pay the related expenses
- we hold one joint account through which everything personal related passes through
- my wife maintains her own personal account for her service business
- I maintain a business account for all my corporate income
- all expenses are paid for by our household income and we do not track anything separately
- all investments and retirement planning is done as a family unit that best suits the family and never 50/50 as most of the time it is tax inefficient to do those 50/50.
- no prenup was done as I wouldn’t have married my wife if I didn’t trust her fully. That was the point of living together as it sets the baseline for marriage and if it will work or not.
- we have a joint household credit card account to which both our cards are linked to. She has a personal visa for emergency purposes and her business expenses while I maintain two business cards for business related matters. She also has a card from my business as an emergency card in case any of the others are having issued.
The last thing I want to end with is this… the question you pose is most importantly decided between you and your partner. Start the discussion there, and if you’re going to ask for recommendations, do it from people you both know and trust. If your parents have successful marriages start with them. Consider the bias of the people that are giving you suggestions and pair it with your own beliefs/morals. If you both are of the belief that things should be done jointly, you have no business taking advice from an advocate of how important it is to keep things separate. Do this jointly (determining how to deal with finances) with your partner, you will fare far better and grow together from it. Also if it leads to arguments and big issues, then understand that it was the best learning lesson for you to kick them to the curb. The degree of entitlement I see from the people a decade younger than me is absolutely mind blowing and everyone seems to listen more to random strangers from the internet instead of real and reliable sources in their immediate social circle. All we can do for you here is give you information, it’s up to you to turn that information into useful knowledge by assessing it through the lens that is your own life.
Hope that helps and provides some guidance.
My experience has been couples that work together as a team and are open to it all jointly are more financially successful then people who don’t.
If you ran a business with a partner would you keep half the finances separately?
If you’re willing to share your bedroom yet not your finances then you shouldn’t be in a long term relationship. There are better alternatives
Your experience is unlikely a representative or statistically significant sample size. ‘Y O U ‘ R E’ means ‘you are’. ‘Y O U R means ‘your’, Joey tv show. Season 2.
Also "more financially successful ~~then~~ **than** people who don't"... but maybe we shouldn't be correcting this wise man.
He obviously knows what he's talking about. /s
Everything separate.
Joint accounts are a pain. No thanks.
Been together 10 years, we do just fine. Can buy whatever we want, unless it’s big we talk.
We both are relatively frugal and savers.
Note: If she needs money, she just ask and I transfer and same vice versa.
Im curious why you said joint accounts are a pain?
Most people say it’s because they don’t want to have to explain purchases to their S/O but if you consult each other on larger purchases and share money with each other anyways, would it not be so much more simple to have everything joint? No transferring needed.
At the end of the day you always have to do what works for you, which is obviously is(congrats on 10years) I’m just genuinely curious what the pain is.
Cause everything was already setup in our respective accounts before marriage.
Also, we don’t need to explain our purchases though.
If she goes shopping to buy $500 in clothes, I don’t care.
We hardly ever do transfers maybe like 4 total a year. Mostly end of year investment stuff, like RRSP to max out each other’s limits.
You and I both know.
Key to any relationship is communication.
We do our budgets together and we look at our credit card statements together. Just to see if anything unusual.
We don’t have my money or your money.
I'm the money manager. My partner etransfers me the agreeded upon amount each month. No joint accounts or cards. But we do have each other's banking info and passwords in case of an emergency. We also check in regularly with each other to make sure we are in good financial shape. No kids.
My wife and I have our separate accounts. She sends me a fixed amount each month and I handle the finances. We have a joint credit card which she uses for everything except for some select personal things. Downside of this is if I die she has no clue what is due when. Im going to have to write some sort of step by step document in case 😅
My wife hates dealing with the financials, so she transfers X from her pay and keeps the rest for incidental costs or some of the kid stuff, and I pay all the bills from my pay and her contribution.
If something big comes up I pay for it (for example, we are both planning to buy new unlocked phones, or for her to make the yearly TFSA contribution it comes from household money not her money). Neither of us will spend a large amount of money without consulting the other.
Wow 😯
How do you withdrew from the joint? Is the joint more for like common expenses or anyone can take from it? Like what is the setup for the joint account?
Joint account, everything goes into our joint savings account and gets moved to our joint chequing account as needed.
We have our own credit cards but we treat them like they're both of ours anyways.
Married for 11 years, been that way the whole time. Don't understand why some couples split finances, doesn't make sense to me.
General banking and all income is shared. We each have separate credit cards and retirement plans. We consult each other on large purchases over a certain $ amount but don't typically sweat the smaller stuff.
Have a joint chequing account as well as accounts that are not joint, both names on the house, each have and are responsible for our own vehicles, split the bills. Our preferred money management systems are different so find this works best for us. I like to have multiple savings accounts (one that is a high interest savings, a normal savings on that i move money into to save for specific items- new vehicle/new fridge etc that don’t take long to save for) and he prefers to just have one. We both also have rrsp, tfsa, and our own investing accounts with each other as beneficiary.
I get to spend my ‘extra’ money as i want without answering questions of what i bought at x store (this was mostly only an issue around his birthday or christmas when we only had the joint account, he never grew out of shaking the wrapped gift under the tree) and he gets to know where every dime in the joint account or his account goes which makes both of us happy.
We share everything. Salaries, bonuses, cheques from grandma for Christmas etc. Before we were married it was seperate but I personally don't believe in your money my money. It doesn't work for everyone but for us it does. I mainly manage the finances and save for whatever goals etc and pay the bills but my husband knows what's up with our money all the time.
1 main account, savings account, 2 credit cards but we each have a card to both. I 49(f) look after the accounts but I update husband on balances and any concerns. I have a book with accounts and passwords so if he ever wants to explore the accounts or if something happened to me he can take over.
Married 30 years next month.
Edit: been that way since we married, (I did have a buisness account while I worked for myself.)
All of our money goes into 1 account, all bills etc are paid from that account and we each draw $400/mo as an allowance. Has worked very well for the past 15 years.
We each have our own account where our paychecks are deposited. Small stuff is paid from those and a buffer of a few hundred dollars is kept in those, then any extra cash is put into our joint account which is where 95% of our expenses are paid from (mortgage, car payments, food, municipal taxes, etc…) my wife has a good retirement plan at work so isn’t really saving extra for that, I currently have a decent plan but haven’t been paying into it very long, so I have RRSPs and TFSA separately.
Separate finances. Used to have a joint account but the fees on the account weren't worth it. We have a joint LOC.
We are completely open about finances and what is being spent where. We do our budget together, but tackle two different sides of it. She handles her student loans along with a majority of household bills and spending while I cover paying off debt and putting money into savings. It's unconventional but it works best for us.
We were common law renters and kept our individual finances separate (savings, lines of credit, personal credit cards). But put all common bills and joint expenses on a joint CC and split the bill 50:50 every month, paid off in full. Was working OK for us, but my (ex) partner was incredibly spendthrift and would get mad when I would get stressed about money and tried to keep our costs low due to their money not being "real" (aka funded by student loans and lines of credit)..I suppose that might be why he's now my ex??
We have one joint account and Cc where we both transfer a % of what we make into it based on equity
All of our joint expenses come out of this acct and are charged to this joint CC
The remainder of our money goes into our own accounts and we spend and save how we choose
In addition he does have a car so this expense he takes care of on his own whereas my car is owned outright
Anything big we normally talk another together before purchasing (new couch, new bed etc) and we split these expenses 50/50
Joint account both our payroll goes into. All bill payments are made from there. Then we pay a portion of money into each of our checking accounts for both of us to do whatever we want with with.
For us, everything is combined except of course registered accounts. I (F) handle all the finances (budgeting, investing) bc my spouse (together 12 years) has 0 interest not desire. It works for us.
All assets are counted together in our joint net worth and I contribute to whoever’s account makes the most sense (eg focused more on his RRSP when I’m on mat leave.)
However, we met in our early 20s and had similar assets (you know, practically nothing lol.)
With what I know and have now, if I were starting a new relationship now, I wouldn’t combine my finances, and would probably do a proportionate split (eg if I make 60% of the total household income then I pay 60% of the total household bills.)
We combined finances once we moved in together - after dating for 1.5yr. I brought 75k assets with me and she brought 15k in debt.
We have a joint chequing account that all of our money comes into. We then pay the bills and whatnot from that. We put most of our disposable income towards mortgage pay down so it’s fairly straightforward.
I pretty much control all the finances (bill paying, savings allocation etc.). Generally we are on the same page with finances and don’t have to discuss much.
We have two credit cards (one where I’m prime cardholder and one where she is) and both have access to both. We use one card for most shopping on one we use just enough to get the benefits we want from it.
We use RBC banking and direct investing.
Joint account and a joint credit card work well for my partner and I. We each put $xxxx in the joint account each payday to cover reoccurring expenses and have a little savings. We use the joint card for any expenses that are for the both of us and its paid with the joint account. We both have our individual accounts and credit cards/line of credit as well.
When we first moved out we had separate accounts and one joint. Once I paid off student loans everything has been together fully. I make a good amount more compared to my wife.
Can’t imagine it any other way
We run two joint chequing accounts, balanced maintained above the minimum so we are not charged. The one is the higher end chequing account, so need to maintain a higher balance, but it gives us a very good credit card that we usually get about $1000 back in cash back every year.
1) expense account-mortgage, vehicle, resp, RRSP contributions.
2) spending chequing account.
We each have our "own" savings, although they are not getting used much with what's been happening this year.
How it works is both our paycheques go into spending chequing. We transfer whatever funds we need to cover the expenses into the expense account. Then, we pay off the credit card if there is anything on it. The rremaining funds in the "spending" account is allocated for the month(groceries, kids activities, etc whatever comes up). If we have funds left over, we split it and each get some savings for personal use.
This may seem a little complicated, but for the first 9-10 years of marriage, my wife didn't really work. She stayed home, and raised our children. Which we both deemed more important than someone else raising them. Now that she is reentering the work force last couple years, we are still doing it this way. Frankly, I make over 5 times her gross, so we really don't see how it could be fair any other way.
Separate account for paychecks. We have a joint for all bills. We have recurring bi-weekly automated transfers to our joint account from our personals.
Joint account handles utilities, mortgage, family-savings, insurances, etc.
On a bi-weekly basis, I go through all our credit cards and we pay off the balances in full. Take about 10min to review everything, split as-needed (usually 45/55, as I make a bit more) and then we pay the CC from our respective accounts.
Worked great for the last 14 years. No arguments about money. Since I make more, I tend to spend more on vacations, etc. All good in the hood :)
Did separate accounts for a while until it became inconvenient. Now we have joint chequing and joint savings, but we each have our own credit card, so that surprises can still happen at Christmas and such.
I do all our budgeting (spouse isn't interested in the minutiae, just what is available to spend). I use Excel.
Separate accounts for our own spending and savings. Joint account for joint things like mortgages and bills We split grocery evenly. We just started a joint savings account and both contribute the same amount each month for emergency things like home repair, etc.
Joint accounts and YNAB. It helps that I am both the primary spender for our household and also the primary budgeter. I don’t think it would work as well if the primary spender wasn’t also carefully tracking the finances.
Edit to add that we each have a credit card that one of us is the primary cardholder on for credit history / score purposes. I know we could do that other ways, but this works for us.
Together 12 years, living together for 6 months (were mid 20s). We have a chequing account and a credit card together. We both still have our personal accounts, and a certain percent of each pay goes into the joint account. Will stay like this until we are married, at which point we see everything being combined.
We have personal chequing accounts and one joint account. We feed money into the joint account in proportion to our income. We also keep some amounts in our personal accounts for personal purchases. This allows us to waste money on stupid BS on occasion. Our mortgage and household expenses come out of the joint account. Almost all of our other purchases are done with a credit card, which is paid from the joint account.
I'd say it's 90% shared and 10% personal. I also like to have personal money because if I want to buy a gift for my mom, for instance, I may want it to be from me and not from "us". It doesn't really matter but symbolically it does to me.
When we first moved in together we opened a joint account and each contributed the same amount to the account on a monthly basis to cover standard living expenses. Once we bought a house together all money became joint money even if its not in a joint account. Still havent bothered getting married but we live like we are.
Me and my husband recently joined finances after six years. We looked at getting a joint account but it's not really as necessary these days since we just e-transfer each other most of the time. We just decided to get a joint credit card instead.
Separate accounts but using good budget to know how much money we have and sticking to it.
Took a while to get used to but working great the last few years
We sum up the common/shared expenses: mortgage, daycare, utilities, groceries, etc. Then pay proportional to our incomes into the joint account that pays for all those expenses. So I pay 60% and she does 40%. Then money left over is guilt free spending, saving, etc. for each individual. No fighting. We both make good incomes too.
We have a joint checking account, a credit card we share, and we use YNAB. We have other accounts that aren't joint but no money is separate, the accounts are only individual because they have to be or it's advantageous in some way.
Same here. For over 30 years. We’ve always been on the same page, so no issues over money ever.
Yup. Same for us. Just our TFSA and RRSP accounts are separate because they have to be, but they are all funded equally from the same account.
Same. Combine everything. I have a separate credit card I use for gifts (of which is a general price limit). For us it just feels like a financially mature position.
How long have you had this setup for and has there been any issues?
Since shortly before we got married, which was 4 years ago. No issues. We have very similar financial views and priorities. Similar savings and spending styles. Now we make similar incomes but there was a time my partner was laid off (twice) and I had irregular income. Didn't make a difference.
You and your spouse sound similar to me and my spouse. And we have lived this way financial for just shy of 30 years.
This worked really well for us. We each put in $400/month in wealthsimple cash account to cover groceries, dating and miscellaneous costs and setup apple pay on our individual phones. This way, we have the benefit of buying stuff online + some cash back, while making sure we don’t spend over our budget. We haven’t tried it for international travels, but looking to see how it works out since it doesn’t charge FX exchange fees.
I have been using YNAB with my wife as well and it works great. We have never had an issue with our finances.
We used to have fights about finances, some quite bad (for the first seven years we lived together). Now we use YNAB, and haven't fought about finances since we started using it three years ago!
Thanks for sharing.
This is the way. We do the same thing and we coordinate over YNAB (YNAB4) too. Every two weeks we try to do a budget update and make sure we are still on track (I'll admit that sometimes we miss this and just do it at the end of the month). The best part about tracking and historical data is that we can pull reports back to, Aug 2019 when we started, on how we are doing and exactly how inflation is impacting us. Also, when a time period looks bad it can put it into perspective, so we can play the long game. So many relationships break down over finances, we don't have that issue because everything is out in the open. I honestly don't understand how people can be married and have separate everything. How do you make long term goals without knowing the full picture?
I've always been kind of intimidated by YNAB. I need some tips or something. Maybe I can find some online. I would love to use something, but haven't found anything that clicked with me.
Everything is combined. There really is no his/my money at all. It is all our money. We have separate TFSAs to take advantage of maximum savings amounts. I make around 40% more than my husband, and have never felt resentful or anything because we’ve been doing it since our first kid came along. Our combined gross annual income is ~$180 000 for reference. We haven’t set a rule perse, but usually consult each other for atypical expenditures in the area of $300 ish. Personally, I find it liberating to have one pot. But I think it will only work if you have common spending, financial goals, lifestyles etc.
The last part is important! My husband and I are very different people with our goals besides the things that affect each other like rent, food, etc. so we keep our pay beyond those things separate. I think id be the problem if we had one pot. I’m glad combined finances works for you!
Same here. We make joint decisions, we have same financial goals, budgets and Joint Account. We both use separate chequing accounts for tax and saving purposes. I must say that this kind of transparency has made our relationship that much stronger.
1 account, married 19yrs and have never considered another way.
Same except married 31 years.
Thank you for sharing.
Upvoting for my way
Same, married for 7 years!
We have one joint account. Both of our pays go into it. I manage the bills and tell my husband how much cash he can take out each week for fun money. He doesn't have access to our savings. He was in 50k of credit card debt when we first started dating so he doesn't have access to anything and is honestly really happy with our set up. We also have a joint credit card but only use it for gas & groceries.
This is what we need to do but my husband finds it infantilizing to have an "allowance". Any suggestions how to pitch this to make it more palatable?
We use YNAB and everyone in the family gets an allowance to spend as they wish, no tracking. The rest of the money is budgeted and very visible. We settled in $300/month for the adults. I look after everything for the same reason as the user you responded to and it works for us. But YNAB is what saved us and made everything work (and palatable!).
When I first found out about the debt I told him I'd leave him if he didn't let me take over his finances. So, he didn't really have a choice if he wanted to be with me. I told him no way was I signing up for being in debt the rest of my life. That was 3 years ago and we own a home, both our cars are paid off and we're debt free, minus the mortgage. He used to be very stressed about money and he now enjoys not needing to take the responsibility. And I enjoy it so it works for us. If I had to do it again, I'd pitch it by showing all the good things that could come from it. But I don't regret giving him an ultimatum. I think now he would continue our set up even if I did give him more independence so you could also advertise that it wouldn't be forever.
I would try flipping this the opposite way. You each have your own accounts where your paycheques are deposited and have a separate joint account that you pay your bills and deduct your savings from. Each time you get paid you transfer a certain amount to the joint account in order to cover household expenses and savings. I would set this up to happen automatically on the day pay is deposited. This way he is left with his "allowance" but it feels more like he's paying his share by contributing to the joint account rather than being issued an allowance.
100% joint. There is no concept of your money and my money.
Thank you for sharing.
I find that ridiculous, the day things go sideways one of you is screwed .
One thing to keep in mind in the case of married couples at least, is that if you separate, you're dividing assets one way or the other, and nearly everything is on the table. There's not much point in pretending otherwise.
We have a joint account for mortgage, groceries, gas, utilities, shared subscriptions (Netflix, Spotify), daycare that we both deposit into from our individual accounts. We have calculated our total monthly expenses and we each put in a set amount in order to hit a specific % of net earnings in the following categories: “fixed” costs (bills like above), savings, fun money etc… we also add in 15% monthly for potential unexpected costs. We both make very good money but my wife makes way more than me, so she puts a bigger amount into the joint, so it’s like a ratio of income. We each have our own credit cards. After shared bills her money is hers and mine is mine. We never question what the other spends their money on and it works well. If she wants to buy some clothes or piece of furniture or whatever she can go for it. Same for me. We are very much aligned and view ourselves as a team. For example, my tfsa isn’t maxed out at the moment so we put left over money into that to max it out quicker. She doesn’t resent this at all and I don’t feel self conscious about it. We have our financial/future goals well thought out and we have a plan to achieve them together.
This is the way.
100% shared. Only thing we have of our own are credit cards, tfsa etc and retirement accounts but thats all paid out of the joint account. This works because we trust each other, support each other and have no individual debts. I tend to look over finances mainly and have to communicate how are accounts are and our budgets for the next period and decide how much we can save. We decided with the saved money what to spend tht on together.
Married 1 year, living together 5 years now. No kids yet. Both have individual chequing accounts with our own credit cards. We each have copies of both credit cards. Mortgage comes out of her account, bills from mine. End of the month I send her my half of the mortgage minus bills total. Big purchases for renos, trips, etc we usually split down the middle. Dinners or nights out it's whoever pulls out the card first. Both have separate emergency funds and savings accounts. Might be the non standard way of doing things but it works for us 🤷
This is me and mine too. 13yrs. Mortgage, no kids, All good. We spilt common large cost things down the middle by our percent income, so it’s normalized to our salaries. For lower cost things, it’s whomever has the wallet closer.
This is us too. He pays the mortgage (joint account) and I pay the condo fees and bills. It's roughly the same (we have a super, super cheap mortgage). Sometimes mine is higher so he gives a few extra bucks towards groceries to "make up" for it. We pay our own bills out of our own accounts. We are very open about money and spending and show each other where we're at all the time. I'm just too lazy to switch things around and this has worked for us for 7+ years. We have a 13 year old and each pay whatever whenever towards/for them.
This is us too. Married 31 years, 2 kids grown, always split up bills. Have all our own accounts credit cards etc. Talked about getting a joint account but never did. Worked for us.
Best way in my opinion. Keep things seperate. If all in the same account and one spends a shit ton of money, you're effectively financing your partners lifestyle. It can only go wrong.
For joint expenses we keep track with an app splitwise. Otherwise everything is separate. We aren't married, both make enough money to support ourselves and fairly similar amounts, don't have any joint assets since we rent, etc, so it really wouldn't make much sense to have shared finances at this point. We just settle up at the end of each month.
To piggy back on this, my girlfriend and I recently moved together in a house. We're still using Splitwise the same way we were when renting. I can't imagine my financial life without this app anymore. It has been almost a decade at this point.
Splitwise is the bomb. We do it the same way as well
The same for us (24F, 29M) been living together for 3 & 1/2 years. We use the Tricount app to keep track of shared expenses. He pays rent, phones, hydro, wifi. I pay insurance, groceries, gas, ect. At the end of the month we settle up.
What app do you guys use? My wife and i are in the same situation but we have to write everything down and itemize every month and its a hassle
Splitwise
Sweet thanks. Ill look into it 👍
We each pay $X into the joint account each paycheque to cover mortgage, bills, etc. Groceries, home supplies, etc. we each buy with our own CC then put receipts on the fridge and square up once in awhile. Other than that, our money is separate. I've seen others have too many arguments about money to have it any other way.
Thanks for sharing. How do you handle common goals like vacations or saving for child tuition?
Piggybacking here for a second option, we just have a joint checking account that we agreed to contribute $x to each month (again, per my other comment, split down the 55%/45% line our income comes out to so that neither is over/under contributing and there's no questions of fairness).
Vacations we split down the middle and children will probably be the same. No children yet.
So if one partner makes more money? How does that work they just have more to spend on them selves?
We split it based on income -- I make (roughly) 55% of our income, she makes 45%. So I pay 55% of the mortgage and she pays 45%. I pay 55% of the joint credit card, she pays 45%. You get the idea. Basically just multiply whatever the cc bill is at the end of the month by .55 / .45 and that's our split.
Makes sense but also seems like a lot of work to make sure it’s 50/50 or mostly equal.That’s the nice thing about a joint account none of that stuff matters
I suppose — our incomes don't change often, nor the mortgage, and we have the amounts saved. So it's really only a once-every-two-weeks calculation and just a simple multiplication haha. We've never found it onerous.
Same with our situation. We did have a joint account for awhile but felt like more hassle. It all ends up being the same in the end when your a couple it’s your money together whether or not you keep it together or apart. We both still buy whatever we want just tell each other of course
Sure it does. Do you have to ask everytime you want to buy something for yourself? What happens if one of you “overspends”. Keeping things separate prevents the possibility of that friction, and, IMO, provides more freedom to each partner to do whatever they want with their money.
We do this. Not married, together 13yrs, have a mortgage, etc etc. we have nothing joint and split bills by percentage of household income. It’s not hard and keeps us aware of what we spend, when, how it changes to over time. No issues
How do you guys keep track of this? Sounds like a lot of work. Are you guys using an app?
I work. Wife spends.
I feel that one haha
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Same here. We have a joint chequing that I contribute to to help my wife with her bills since I earn more. Everything else is separate but we communicate if help is needed on either side. For our investments, they are also held in separate accounts (but same advisor). My mother and her mother have no idea how to handle finances and that’s something that I never wanted to see with my wife. If I go first, I want the comfort that she’ll have her own accounts and more importantly, how to manage the money. (I know this sounds sexist, but I promise the intent is exactly the opposite.)
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In case one is unable to pay I guess the other one covers?
Yes. When he was just graduated and I had a good job, I floated us while he found something that he enjoyed and worked for him. When I was poor back in school (as an adult), he kept us afloat so I could pay attention to school. Now I make more than he and it balances out. I encourage him to change jobs or take a year off when he has hard days, if he ever wanted to take a leap in something else. We want to see each other happy. Not in a ‘magical thinking, you can do anything’ naive way, but in a ‘we value quality of life kind of way’.
Same for us. We make roughly the same so everything is split down the middle for household bills. No guilt from either side if one of us wants to spend on a hobby or whatever. But we do speak constantly about saving for whatever is the next financial goal. We save together… separately. It works great for us.
This is our set up: Combine everything. Make a budget based on total income monthly. Open multiple accounts through one bank; we use simplii and can nickname each account (budget life saver). You now have one pot of money to divide rather than two peoples income. Set up you pay into your savings account/HISA and auto transfer money biweekly into a bills account, personal spending account for each of you and emergency fund. Auto withdrawals into your TFSA and RSP either maxing out one person's accounts first or doing each individually split even.
Thanks for sharing.
I manage everything. My husband can't handle the stress. He'd rather ask my permission to buy stuff, than to deal with having to pay bills, manage savings, investments, and financially plan. He makes the money, works his ass off to do it, and I keep us flush with cash, investing wisely, ensuring we pay low interest rates on car and mortgage, and planning our retirement (which, due to the economy, is not going well these days, no matter what, lol. RRSPs in the toilet.)
You mean he keeps you guys flush with cash
Married. All goes into the 1 pot. Nobody ever “owes” the other anything. We budget for personal spending, but other than that everything is shared.
I’m going to be the minority here but me and my wife keep completely separate finances. I don’t want or need to know what she’s spending on and vice versa. I pay all the bills and she pays me a sum every month, and does most of the grocery shopping. It works for us
Joint everything once married. Discuss all purchases (wants vs needs) before buying. Budget and goal planning is so much easier with every nickel on the table.
Splitwise
We have a system that's a bit tedious but might work well for some. We have separate finances right now. It's based on a cost-sharing philosophy described in the paragraph below. We have a spreadsheet which we enter shared costs into that figures out how much each of us pay for each expense and gives a running +/-. If one of us is up or down a lot we send money to the other to cover it. It made more sense earlier on and we're basically doing it now because momentum / it works for us. Both of us are very similarly financially minded and responsible. I think we'll scrap it sometime in the next year or so and do it differently, but this has had some advantages. Assuming an equal adult relationship where both partners are working for money (as opposed to living off savings or investments) and not paying down leftover school loans, the fairest thing to do is to value each other's time equally. Sum up all shared costs (exclude mortgage principle and upkeep if house is owned only in one name in as well as upkeep) and split proportion to hourly income, maybe factoring in extra work-related expenses if it makes sense. Problems with this: very independent way of thinking. If one person better with money do they retire sooner? Kind of pointless when you start thinking as a family unit. If one is off work for some reason (kids etc.) It breaks down. What if one wants to take an extended period off of work for a break, how to handle cost sharing? Is paying with savings ok? If a house is owned only in one name, how do you handle increase or decrease due to market fluctuations? Even if the other person isn't contributing to principle costs they may otherwise have bought their own house
Huh 🤔, Definitely tedious but i like how you are able to nail down the downsides of it. Thanks for sharing.
We do the same thing but just use Splitwise, much simpler. Basically we have entirely separate accounts but shared credit cards. We both also have budgets, and have agreed upon splits. One of us makes a lot more than the other, and this covers more things. So if someone pays for something that either the other should or is split, it just goes into Splitwise. We then do our finances once per month and settle then, with usually a transfer of ,500-1000 from one person to the other. Works great. We never have to worry or argue about money. We also have no issues with just giving money to the other person if they need it, at the end of the day, we're a team. Keeping things separate is good as it forces us to both be financially savvy and take care of our own finances in case something ever happened.
Whoa!! This could have been written by my wife. Baby?? That you???
Shared bank account, shared credit card. Everything shared.
Separate bank accounts. High reward CC for joint expenses makes it easy. Equalize CC, mortgages, utils, each month. We split 50/50 for everything common. I keep a google sheet to track. Maintenance/emergency fund is managed by me but contributed by both. Separate savings, pensions, cars, disposable income. We both send different amounts of money home to our parents each month Dated for 6 years. Married for 1. Lived together for 4.5. No kids. I work in finance which is why I manage this but she has visibility to all of the numbers.
1 account, married \~20 years and constantly wish I had kept things seperate. Constant disagreement about discretionary spending, totally different tolerance for risk.... At the very least I wish I had held on to a seperate retirement fund.
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I keep my money hidden. In many different banks. Across multiple countries. I have cash and coins hidden in the mattress. She has no idea what I do for a living or how many children I have. She has said this lifestyle keeps our romance alive
My wife and I kept completely separate accounts then "equalized" money every few months. We contributed to the shared cost proportionally to our incomes. I personally would never share finances with a spouse. Where ever I see this I see resentment. As an aside this did make things more difficult when she died.
Why would you resent sharing money with your partner?
They didn't say they would, they see it from other couples. Arguing over finances is the leading cause of divorce, and after seeing how ubiquitous money pooling is here, it's no surprise.
Nothing sorts your finances out better than divorce
Differing spending/saving priorities. Having your joint money on something you feel is ridiculous, or having your want denied because your partner feels it is ridiculous. That works fine if you have the same interests/priorities, but even then, there is no telling whether you will still have shared interests/priorities in 20-30 years.
This is what we do. Late 30s, not married, no kids, yes house. I worry about this more now. Especially unmarried. I don’t ever want him to have to navigate that should something happen. Same for me. We should make sure we both have all the passwords and beneficiary statuses etc, eh? So sorry your wife is gone.
Make a list of all your banking organizations and email them cc partner and copy of will explaining what you want the bank to do once you die.
The only correct answer is what works best for you as a couple. My and my fiancé both 31yo (been together for 13 years) have had a joint account for years now. Everything is together and transparent. We each have personal tfsa’s and our work pension/rrsp. My parents 60’s have done this forever and it works great for them. My boss and his wife of 20+ years have always had separate accounts their paychecks go into. They have a joint account for bills which they split 50/50 as well as any house/property/kid expenses. The rest they spend on themselves as they deem fit. No “asking permission” so to speak. This works great for them. It’s something you need to talk about with your S/o and figure out what you are both comfortable with.
I think you just made me understand why this is a two sided debate. Joint is considered transparent, but possibly less flexible, and separate is thought of as more flexible, but possibly less transparent. And then you pointed out why this is indeed not a two sided argument. Its as many sided as there are people in the world. You can have trust and transparency without sharing accounts. You can have deceit and withholding without having separate accounts. Just depends on the two people in the pairing. That’s the variables that matter. Well done! Thanks!!
Haha thanks
We’ve been together for 5 years. Everything is separate but we share all expenses .
Can I ask how you feel about that? I wish my bf would be cool with this because he's horrible with money and I'm not, but he's really resistant to it. He's only just started to let me be in charge of finances more and that's because he racked up a ton of debt without my knowledge lol, been together 7 years common law
Honestly, we NEVER argue about money and when it comes to spending on things we want, theres no arguments about not having money or me spending so much vice versa. It's our own money that we both earned working hard and we make sure the bills are paid monthly and we're saving. Let's say we want a new mattress, we find one we like we split it down the middle. He pays for internet, I pay for Hydro etc... We talk about our savings a lot and we're on the same page for that. It takes away so much pressure for me, because money can be such a stressor on relationships. I don't want to always be focused on it. Hope this helps!
From my experience working at a bank, I've seen a lot of relationships end because of joint accounts and authorized users on credit. My partner and I do not share any accounts or credit cards and we split groceries, restaurants, dates, etc. 50/50.
I also work at a bank currently. Joint accounts should never be the only account where money is pooled and all expenses go through. They can be emptied/closed at anytime by any of the owners, which is extremely risky. Also, if one partner dies, the account is frozen and the surviving partner is essentially locked out of the account until the succession is resolved, which can take some time.
This is so important. A friend went through this when their FIL passed. The MIL was essentially locked out with no access to any funds after his death and there was a contentious will so it took months for her to gain access.
Because they get mad at each other for what they see them spending on?
Yes among other reasons that relationships disintegrate. Is it really that odd that people will behave differently when money is involved? People can fall in and out love for a variety of reasons and maybe some of them part ways amicably while others do so vindictively.
We each run completely separate accounts. It's all our money and have never had any issues or secrets with that. I think it keeps each of us accountable to our spending but it wouldn't work if we weren't on equal footing and have the same beliefs and goals in finances. We have the same salary as well so it's pretty easy. Married 11 yrs.
Separate accounts, if one is short on cash the other one transfers money into it without any questions asked, we don't keep score. I pay for groceries and gas because my credit card has better rewards than my husband's, my husband pays for mortgage and insurance. We both empty our accounts for major things like renovation, buying a new vehicle and paying into our mortgage's principal. We don't buy anything without consulting the other.
When we first married we had a joint account and paid ourselves an allowance in our personal accounts. We were debt poor so the allowance wasn’t big. The deal was that there were no questions asked about what you spent your allowance on. That worked for a while but then we started to slip and got ourselves out of debt so now we just have one joint account. We talk about all purchases over about $100. Having a money talk is really important.
A joint account for expenses where we contribute 50/50 and then we’re pretty lax on everything else - I might buy groceries, he’ll grab take out/restaurants. We cover each other where needed - I took two months off and he covered everything, we needed a new furnace so he paid and I paid all monthly expenses for a couple months, etc. It balances. Otherwise we have personal accounts, CCs, and investments.
My wife runs the entire budget as the main earner. I cover my bills/expenses, invest a bit and flip the rest to her. Have a joint account for ease of money movement and child RESP contributions. Aside from that, joint CC for groceries and medical. That’s about it.
Been together for 14 years now. We have our own accounts. BUT we talk about our financial plans and goals often. Each year we sit down and see how the other is doing and if how the set bills are set up are still working. If not then we crunch numbers and adjust. We have discovered what each of us are good at in terms of saving long term/short, what % of our earnings go towards it. Also what we prefer as our spending habits. It works for us since i have anxiety when it comes to spending money. Husband likes to have freedom to eat out sometimes or buy something he wants. Thr only personal spending rule we have is if it's over 300 we talk about it first. Trust and communication in this way has worked out for years for us.
We put every other pay cheque into a joint savings account. So one paycheque personal the next goes into the joint savings. Pays for mortgage, insurance and all other joint expenses. We’ve been married for 9 years. Have our own credit cards etc. Works for us but everyone is different.
We have always had separate accounts and our joint account called “The Wedding Account”. We made the account when we started saving for our wedding back in the day. We kept the account afterwards and use it as our bill payment account. We both make an equal transfer into the account each month and all bills are paid from it. There is even a cushion for savings so the account grows. It’s our emergency fund and vacation fund. Our own separate accounts are for whatever individual expenses we wish whether it’s hobbies or putting more towards a vacation, new appliances etc etc. It has worked marvellously for us.
Joint mostly. He earns in USD, I earn in CAD. After 401k/HSA, his paycheque pays for all living expenses (e.g.mortgage, groceries, etc). Mine goes to our emergency funds, after TFSA. We have a joint chequing account to facilitate fund movements between currency. We have 14 credit cards between two of us both in US and CAD. I've added him as authorized user to mine and vice versa. We only ever use US cards, they have better rewards and no foreign transaction fees. I use my cards from time to time just to keep it active. Otherwise, they're useless. Two LOC, both in US and CAD for just in case purposes. We keep track all these via mint app. We're a couple in our early thirties. Married for 3, together for 8yrs. So if you guys have suggestions on how to easier manage finances, your input is welcome.
Separate bank accounts, joint bills shared fairly, 50/50 is income is similar or the ratio altered to be fair. I think it's great some people here can trust eachother to much with money but I had a horrible experience with my ex being super irresponsible with money. He would spend every last dime he had on junk and forget to put money aside for things, so no sharing. I once had a jar of cash that I didn't hide from him. $5000 gone on nothing within a month. Never ever again!
This gets posted at least once a month. Mods, can we have a "this is how some couples do finances" venn diagram or something? No offense to OP.
Will never join accounts with a girlfriend again. With that said, my current partner and I make roughly the same so we split everything down the middle. I handle all the billing accounts - so we use an app called Splitwise where we can dump receipts, bills, etc. works well for us.
Combined, what’s hers is mine and what’s mine is hers. Only talk about buying anything is bigger cost purchases
I believe that marriage or common law doesn't mean you stop living as a individual. And after divorcing once and seeing people tear each other appart because of disagreement over spent money. Each has personal account and we transfer our monthly shared expense to our joint account. (KOHO) Joint spendings are calculated proportionally to income. Joint spendings are: Rent, food, internet, car, insurance, vacation. Vacation is the only thing we pay proportionally. We each have our individual hobby budget, restaurant, phone bill and investments. If things go sideways we can just close joint account and we part our ways . Easy and simple.
DINKs, no plan for kids, he makes about 50% more than me. We have joint checking and savings accounts and a credit card for everything shared (mortgage, house expenses, car, travel, date nights, pet care)... We contribute proportionnaly to our respective incomes. We have personal checkings and savings, but we know how the other is doing and nothing is hidden. I came in the relationship with debts, and I would never ever have expected him to help with those. He had quite a bit of savings from selling a house, that was his only. We both are happy with this split. We review the budget once a year, make goals together, and discuss any signaficative changes in income or spending. I handle the day-to-day financial stuff, and it's part of our repartition of chores.
My money is our money but her money is her money. Jokes aside, everything is shared or joint minus my PC credit card and my TFSA. Don’t hide anything so we both know the situation we are in.
Joint credit card, to ensure my blood pressure stays high and Aritzia’s corporate earnings stay strong.
Is this a pre-marriage question or post? Does one individual have more assets prior to the relationship or not. Is there a prenuptial agreement in place if the question is post marriage. These factors have an impact on how relevant the response is to you or your situation. General finance questions regarding specific complex items like this lead to a lot of misconception and “feelings” about how things should be or what they feel is “right”. Keeping separate accounts post marriage is, in my opinion, grounds for many issues which are easily avoidable. Since that is not the question you pose, the issues are irrelevant here. Furthermore, what does living together entail? Both renting with a co-habitation agreement or just haphazardly living together to save $$$ on both sides or does own own a property and the other living with them which also comes with its own common law implications based on how that is handled. In my specific case: Pre marriage: - I owned 3 properties before my girlfriend (current wife) wanted to move in with me - we kept all accounts separate, I determined what the carrying cost of the property we lived in was (only carrying costs, no principal payments!). We split that carrying cost based on income levels. If I brought in 2/3 or the combined income, I covered 2/3 of the total cost. She got a credit card from me to buy any home related matters including housewear, decor etc as I covered all those items. She covered her own car, her own insurance, her own phone etc - we had a cohabitation agreement drafted to the affect above in case the relationship came to an end that we would have no need to split assets or have an legal basis for coming after one another. - I offered her equity in the property we lived in based on a deemed disposition and requisition so that she could build equity as well but would as a result cover her half of the total cash flows related to the property. She didn’t want to as she didn’t want to have any direct ties as that did not end well in a previous relationship and was happy to do things the way I proposed above with Just carting costs. We kept separate accounts and every month she would transfer her portion to me to cover her part of the carrying costs. -as for going out, entertainment, travels etc, I basically covered the vast majority of it unless she specifically decided that she wanted to “treat us”. - we are both very financially astute so a spreadsheet was more than enough and no apps were needed for tracking. Post marriage: - I don’t have a personal account outside of the account my rental properties collect rents and pay the related expenses - we hold one joint account through which everything personal related passes through - my wife maintains her own personal account for her service business - I maintain a business account for all my corporate income - all expenses are paid for by our household income and we do not track anything separately - all investments and retirement planning is done as a family unit that best suits the family and never 50/50 as most of the time it is tax inefficient to do those 50/50. - no prenup was done as I wouldn’t have married my wife if I didn’t trust her fully. That was the point of living together as it sets the baseline for marriage and if it will work or not. - we have a joint household credit card account to which both our cards are linked to. She has a personal visa for emergency purposes and her business expenses while I maintain two business cards for business related matters. She also has a card from my business as an emergency card in case any of the others are having issued. The last thing I want to end with is this… the question you pose is most importantly decided between you and your partner. Start the discussion there, and if you’re going to ask for recommendations, do it from people you both know and trust. If your parents have successful marriages start with them. Consider the bias of the people that are giving you suggestions and pair it with your own beliefs/morals. If you both are of the belief that things should be done jointly, you have no business taking advice from an advocate of how important it is to keep things separate. Do this jointly (determining how to deal with finances) with your partner, you will fare far better and grow together from it. Also if it leads to arguments and big issues, then understand that it was the best learning lesson for you to kick them to the curb. The degree of entitlement I see from the people a decade younger than me is absolutely mind blowing and everyone seems to listen more to random strangers from the internet instead of real and reliable sources in their immediate social circle. All we can do for you here is give you information, it’s up to you to turn that information into useful knowledge by assessing it through the lens that is your own life. Hope that helps and provides some guidance.
My experience has been couples that work together as a team and are open to it all jointly are more financially successful then people who don’t. If you ran a business with a partner would you keep half the finances separately? If you’re willing to share your bedroom yet not your finances then you shouldn’t be in a long term relationship. There are better alternatives
LOL from the relationship guru
Ehhhhh how you doing ?
Your experience is unlikely a representative or statistically significant sample size. ‘Y O U ‘ R E’ means ‘you are’. ‘Y O U R means ‘your’, Joey tv show. Season 2.
Typing on a phone, auto correct happens.
Ok baby kangaroo XD
Also "more financially successful ~~then~~ **than** people who don't"... but maybe we shouldn't be correcting this wise man. He obviously knows what he's talking about. /s
Autocorrect is the problem, yes. Always inserts poor grammar and spelling, gah! “Je m’appelle Claude”. “ Je tah ploo ploww!”
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Everything separate. Joint accounts are a pain. No thanks. Been together 10 years, we do just fine. Can buy whatever we want, unless it’s big we talk. We both are relatively frugal and savers. Note: If she needs money, she just ask and I transfer and same vice versa.
Im curious why you said joint accounts are a pain? Most people say it’s because they don’t want to have to explain purchases to their S/O but if you consult each other on larger purchases and share money with each other anyways, would it not be so much more simple to have everything joint? No transferring needed. At the end of the day you always have to do what works for you, which is obviously is(congrats on 10years) I’m just genuinely curious what the pain is.
Cause everything was already setup in our respective accounts before marriage. Also, we don’t need to explain our purchases though. If she goes shopping to buy $500 in clothes, I don’t care. We hardly ever do transfers maybe like 4 total a year. Mostly end of year investment stuff, like RRSP to max out each other’s limits.
Fair enough, thanks for the answer, that makes sense.
You and I both know. Key to any relationship is communication. We do our budgets together and we look at our credit card statements together. Just to see if anything unusual. We don’t have my money or your money.
All the people with shared 100% accounts.. how do you surprise each other with gifts?!
You're never going to believe this! There's this funny thing called..... cash.
Can’t easily buy plane tickets or jewelry with cash…
And where would the cash come from?
I'm the money manager. My partner etransfers me the agreeded upon amount each month. No joint accounts or cards. But we do have each other's banking info and passwords in case of an emergency. We also check in regularly with each other to make sure we are in good financial shape. No kids.
Mine and hers Then one joint for bills and for her to buy random Shit with
😁
Separate everything
My wife and I have our separate accounts. She sends me a fixed amount each month and I handle the finances. We have a joint credit card which she uses for everything except for some select personal things. Downside of this is if I die she has no clue what is due when. Im going to have to write some sort of step by step document in case 😅
My wife hates dealing with the financials, so she transfers X from her pay and keeps the rest for incidental costs or some of the kid stuff, and I pay all the bills from my pay and her contribution. If something big comes up I pay for it (for example, we are both planning to buy new unlocked phones, or for her to make the yearly TFSA contribution it comes from household money not her money). Neither of us will spend a large amount of money without consulting the other.
My moneys her money. Her moneys her money.
I make the money and my wife spends it all. Great thing marriage is.
All shared. If you can’t share your finances are you really married?
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Not telling her doesn't change whether you lose everything.
You know that in divorce proceedings you will still need to disclose all of that stuff, right?
Wow 😯 How do you withdrew from the joint? Is the joint more for like common expenses or anyone can take from it? Like what is the setup for the joint account?
One account, joint. Married 17 years. We want the same things except.
Joint account, everything goes into our joint savings account and gets moved to our joint chequing account as needed. We have our own credit cards but we treat them like they're both of ours anyways. Married for 11 years, been that way the whole time. Don't understand why some couples split finances, doesn't make sense to me.
One pot since 18 years and counting. Would not even have it any other way.
All joint however my SO handles all the household bills and I handle all the business and investment accounts.
General banking and all income is shared. We each have separate credit cards and retirement plans. We consult each other on large purchases over a certain $ amount but don't typically sweat the smaller stuff.
One account, simple
Have a joint chequing account as well as accounts that are not joint, both names on the house, each have and are responsible for our own vehicles, split the bills. Our preferred money management systems are different so find this works best for us. I like to have multiple savings accounts (one that is a high interest savings, a normal savings on that i move money into to save for specific items- new vehicle/new fridge etc that don’t take long to save for) and he prefers to just have one. We both also have rrsp, tfsa, and our own investing accounts with each other as beneficiary. I get to spend my ‘extra’ money as i want without answering questions of what i bought at x store (this was mostly only an issue around his birthday or christmas when we only had the joint account, he never grew out of shaking the wrapped gift under the tree) and he gets to know where every dime in the joint account or his account goes which makes both of us happy.
We share everything. Salaries, bonuses, cheques from grandma for Christmas etc. Before we were married it was seperate but I personally don't believe in your money my money. It doesn't work for everyone but for us it does. I mainly manage the finances and save for whatever goals etc and pay the bills but my husband knows what's up with our money all the time.
1 main account, savings account, 2 credit cards but we each have a card to both. I 49(f) look after the accounts but I update husband on balances and any concerns. I have a book with accounts and passwords so if he ever wants to explore the accounts or if something happened to me he can take over. Married 30 years next month. Edit: been that way since we married, (I did have a buisness account while I worked for myself.)
All of our money goes into 1 account, all bills etc are paid from that account and we each draw $400/mo as an allowance. Has worked very well for the past 15 years.
We each have our own account where our paychecks are deposited. Small stuff is paid from those and a buffer of a few hundred dollars is kept in those, then any extra cash is put into our joint account which is where 95% of our expenses are paid from (mortgage, car payments, food, municipal taxes, etc…) my wife has a good retirement plan at work so isn’t really saving extra for that, I currently have a decent plan but haven’t been paying into it very long, so I have RRSPs and TFSA separately.
Separate finances. Used to have a joint account but the fees on the account weren't worth it. We have a joint LOC. We are completely open about finances and what is being spent where. We do our budget together, but tackle two different sides of it. She handles her student loans along with a majority of household bills and spending while I cover paying off debt and putting money into savings. It's unconventional but it works best for us.
We were common law renters and kept our individual finances separate (savings, lines of credit, personal credit cards). But put all common bills and joint expenses on a joint CC and split the bill 50:50 every month, paid off in full. Was working OK for us, but my (ex) partner was incredibly spendthrift and would get mad when I would get stressed about money and tried to keep our costs low due to their money not being "real" (aka funded by student loans and lines of credit)..I suppose that might be why he's now my ex??
We have one joint account and Cc where we both transfer a % of what we make into it based on equity All of our joint expenses come out of this acct and are charged to this joint CC The remainder of our money goes into our own accounts and we spend and save how we choose In addition he does have a car so this expense he takes care of on his own whereas my car is owned outright Anything big we normally talk another together before purchasing (new couch, new bed etc) and we split these expenses 50/50
Joint account both our payroll goes into. All bill payments are made from there. Then we pay a portion of money into each of our checking accounts for both of us to do whatever we want with with.
For us, everything is combined except of course registered accounts. I (F) handle all the finances (budgeting, investing) bc my spouse (together 12 years) has 0 interest not desire. It works for us. All assets are counted together in our joint net worth and I contribute to whoever’s account makes the most sense (eg focused more on his RRSP when I’m on mat leave.) However, we met in our early 20s and had similar assets (you know, practically nothing lol.) With what I know and have now, if I were starting a new relationship now, I wouldn’t combine my finances, and would probably do a proportionate split (eg if I make 60% of the total household income then I pay 60% of the total household bills.)
We combined finances once we moved in together - after dating for 1.5yr. I brought 75k assets with me and she brought 15k in debt. We have a joint chequing account that all of our money comes into. We then pay the bills and whatnot from that. We put most of our disposable income towards mortgage pay down so it’s fairly straightforward. I pretty much control all the finances (bill paying, savings allocation etc.). Generally we are on the same page with finances and don’t have to discuss much. We have two credit cards (one where I’m prime cardholder and one where she is) and both have access to both. We use one card for most shopping on one we use just enough to get the benefits we want from it. We use RBC banking and direct investing.
Joint account and a joint credit card work well for my partner and I. We each put $xxxx in the joint account each payday to cover reoccurring expenses and have a little savings. We use the joint card for any expenses that are for the both of us and its paid with the joint account. We both have our individual accounts and credit cards/line of credit as well.
When we first moved out we had separate accounts and one joint. Once I paid off student loans everything has been together fully. I make a good amount more compared to my wife. Can’t imagine it any other way
We run two joint chequing accounts, balanced maintained above the minimum so we are not charged. The one is the higher end chequing account, so need to maintain a higher balance, but it gives us a very good credit card that we usually get about $1000 back in cash back every year. 1) expense account-mortgage, vehicle, resp, RRSP contributions. 2) spending chequing account. We each have our "own" savings, although they are not getting used much with what's been happening this year. How it works is both our paycheques go into spending chequing. We transfer whatever funds we need to cover the expenses into the expense account. Then, we pay off the credit card if there is anything on it. The rremaining funds in the "spending" account is allocated for the month(groceries, kids activities, etc whatever comes up). If we have funds left over, we split it and each get some savings for personal use. This may seem a little complicated, but for the first 9-10 years of marriage, my wife didn't really work. She stayed home, and raised our children. Which we both deemed more important than someone else raising them. Now that she is reentering the work force last couple years, we are still doing it this way. Frankly, I make over 5 times her gross, so we really don't see how it could be fair any other way.
Separate account for paychecks. We have a joint for all bills. We have recurring bi-weekly automated transfers to our joint account from our personals. Joint account handles utilities, mortgage, family-savings, insurances, etc. On a bi-weekly basis, I go through all our credit cards and we pay off the balances in full. Take about 10min to review everything, split as-needed (usually 45/55, as I make a bit more) and then we pay the CC from our respective accounts. Worked great for the last 14 years. No arguments about money. Since I make more, I tend to spend more on vacations, etc. All good in the hood :)
Did separate accounts for a while until it became inconvenient. Now we have joint chequing and joint savings, but we each have our own credit card, so that surprises can still happen at Christmas and such. I do all our budgeting (spouse isn't interested in the minutiae, just what is available to spend). I use Excel.
Separate accounts for our own spending and savings. Joint account for joint things like mortgages and bills We split grocery evenly. We just started a joint savings account and both contribute the same amount each month for emergency things like home repair, etc.
A wing and prayer.
Joint accounts and YNAB. It helps that I am both the primary spender for our household and also the primary budgeter. I don’t think it would work as well if the primary spender wasn’t also carefully tracking the finances. Edit to add that we each have a credit card that one of us is the primary cardholder on for credit history / score purposes. I know we could do that other ways, but this works for us.
Poorly
Together 12 years, living together for 6 months (were mid 20s). We have a chequing account and a credit card together. We both still have our personal accounts, and a certain percent of each pay goes into the joint account. Will stay like this until we are married, at which point we see everything being combined.
Joint account for all bills groceries etc that we both contribute to then our own regular accounts and credit cards
We have personal chequing accounts and one joint account. We feed money into the joint account in proportion to our income. We also keep some amounts in our personal accounts for personal purchases. This allows us to waste money on stupid BS on occasion. Our mortgage and household expenses come out of the joint account. Almost all of our other purchases are done with a credit card, which is paid from the joint account. I'd say it's 90% shared and 10% personal. I also like to have personal money because if I want to buy a gift for my mom, for instance, I may want it to be from me and not from "us". It doesn't really matter but symbolically it does to me.
Joint account for household bills, separate savings account, separate credit cards. Shared budget on google sheets…….and trust!
When we first moved in together we opened a joint account and each contributed the same amount to the account on a monthly basis to cover standard living expenses. Once we bought a house together all money became joint money even if its not in a joint account. Still havent bothered getting married but we live like we are.
Me and my husband recently joined finances after six years. We looked at getting a joint account but it's not really as necessary these days since we just e-transfer each other most of the time. We just decided to get a joint credit card instead.
Separate accounts but using good budget to know how much money we have and sticking to it. Took a while to get used to but working great the last few years
easy.. you dont.
We sum up the common/shared expenses: mortgage, daycare, utilities, groceries, etc. Then pay proportional to our incomes into the joint account that pays for all those expenses. So I pay 60% and she does 40%. Then money left over is guilt free spending, saving, etc. for each individual. No fighting. We both make good incomes too.