Money and Marriage: Tackle Trouble BEFORE It Begins
Published on - October 29th, 2009 (by J.D. Roth) Ron Lieber writes the excellent “Your Money” column for The New York Times. Last week, he shared a list of four money talks to have before marriage. Lieber writes:
Divorce tends to be emotionally gut-wrenching for the people who go through it (not to mention those around them). But most couples don’t realize that divorce can also be among the most ruinous financial moves anyone can make.
This article struck home for me. No, Kris and I are in no danger of getting a divorce (I love my wife!), but we’re at that stage in life where the people around us are passing through rocky stages of their marriage. Some are even getting divorced.
On Monday I spoke with a friend — let’s call him Mike — whose marriage is floundering. Mike and his wife are wrestling with a variety of issues. The acute crisis was caused by infidelity, but the chronic crisis — the ongoing problem — involves a conflict over money.
Mike and Kathy
Mike and Kathy didn’t talk about money before they got married. They were young, both had jobs, and both spent most of what they made. After they married, they joined finances, as most people do. (For a discussion of this subject see: Which should you choose: Joint or separate accounts?)
Things were fine for a while. But then Mike noticed that Kathy seemed to have a problem. She was a shopaholic, a compulsive spender. Plus, their lifestyle expanded so that they were living paycheck-to-paycheck instead of having a bit of a surplus.
Time passed. Mike and Kathy bought a home. They had two children. Finances continued to be a sore spot — they fought about them often. They never seemed to have enough money to get ahead. It burned Mike up to open the bedroom closet and see Kathy’s wardrobe: dozens of expensive items, many still with the tags. Once, he opened the trunk of the car to discover more expensive items that Kathy hadn’t even bothered to carry into the house.
Slowly but surely, Mike and Kathy fell into debt. They got into trouble on their mortgage. Mike had always handled the couple’s finances, but to “teach Kathy a lesson”, he gave her the checkbook and asked her to pay the bills. It didn’t help. Indeed, their financial crisis accelerated. Their debt soared. Their home went into foreclosure. Creditors began to call. Earlier this year, they actually lost their home.
Things came to a head in September. Other cracks in the marriage forced Kathy to move out, leaving Mike to care for his two sons. “But you know what?” he told me on Monday. “Financially, this has been a real eye-opener. With Kathy gone, I’ve been doing the accounts again. I expected us to lose money, like we do every month. But we had a $1500 surplus last month. $1500!.”
Mike says maybe he shouldn’t have tried to teach Kathy a lesson. It backfired on him.
Four money talks
Mike and Kathy may or may not get a divorce. But one thing’s certain: Until they address their financial issues, they’re going to continue to have problems. But the real time to tackle these issues was before they tied the knot, not ten years into the marriage.
In Ron Lieber’s recent article, he lists four financial issues that ought to be discussed before marriage:
- Ancestry. What is your money blueprint like? What did your parents teach you about money? How your family models money plays an enormous role in your own relationship with the stuff.
- Credit. Even though it’s not romantic, some experts recommend that prospective partners pull their credit reports (and scores) together and discuss the results. On an earlier episode of The Personal Finance Hour, Andy shared that he asked his girlfriend to pull her credit score on their third date! (And as he’ll share in a guest post this afternoon, they also signed a prenuptial agreement.)
- Control. Before you get married, decide who is responsible for which portion of the household accounts. Decide the family financial structure. Know what your budget will be like, and how much each parter is allowed to spend freely.
- Affluence. Finally (and to my mind, most importantly), discuss your financial goals. How wealthy do you, as a couple, want to be? What are you willing to sacrifice to get there? For my upcoming book (Your Money: The Missing Manual), I interviewed my accountant. When they were first married, he and his wife lived like paupers for five years so that they could pay off all of their student loans and set up a solid financial base for the future. They worked together toward a shared financial goal.
Obviously, disagreements over money don’t always have to end in divorce. I spoke to another friend last week whose husband has always been something of a spendthrift. They don’t make a lot of money, but he certainly knows how to spend plenty of it. His bad money habits had caused cracks to form in the marriage. But with some guidance from a church pastor, he’s changed his ways. My friend is optimistic about their future — financial and otherwise.
For more on this subject, check out:
- Ask the readers: How can I get my wife to talk about money?
- Investing as a couple: Draw on your differences
- Ask the readers: What can I do if my girlfriend isn’t serious about money?
- Daily links: Money and relationships (that’s the first time I’ve ever pointed back to a daily links post from a real article!)
More than usual, I’m curious to hear the experiences of GRS readers. Did you and your partner discuss money before making things permanent? How do you handle your finances? Is it effective? Have you been through a divorce? How has it changed your outlook on money — especially when it comes to shared household finances?
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This is sooo true! And I have gotten burned twice by marrying men without thinking about these issues (I’ve also been divorced twice….ooof).
In both marriages, I was an idiot about the financial implications of the guys I was marrying. I assumed both times that since me and my ex-husbands made the same amount of money and worked in the same industry/had the same jobs as I did, that we would have similar attitudes towards money! Also neither I nor my ex-husbands were from wealthy families, so I figured they would be as frugal and careful with the $ as I was. I didn’t see how it could be otherwise.
However, I learned that differences in money attitudes can cause big problems. Both guys I married liked to spend big to show off– it actually seemed to be necessary to support their egos and so they could “hold their head up” or somehting like that. They also loved luxury–for example, they always wanted to stay at the finest hotel instead of the cheapest, or they wanted to buy the most expensive guitar (handmade!) instead of just something standard, etc. To compensate for this overspending, they both avoided spending money on “normal stuff” –they frequently paid utility bills late, bummed loans or tools off friends and never paid them back, didn’t maintain or clean cars or apartments, sold plasma, existed on cold cereal or handouts for weeks instead of buying food, and so on. This was when they were single–it was my mistake to think all they needed was someone (me!) to help organize their domestic life (and I viewed this as a normal thing for a wife to do anyway). It was a shock to me when we got married and started living together and they continued living the same way. It led to a lot of arguments and stress (mine) as well as prevented our joint financial stability of course.
The marriages foundered on infidelity not money issues, but the money problems were extremely hard to take. I swear next time I will 1) live with the man first (to see what he’s really like, and 2) never get married if he’s irresponsible with money! So I totally agree with this post.
Oh & it totally didn’t matter if we had joint accounts or not. In my first marriage all our finances were merged & I was in charge—but it’s hard not to susceptible to your DH when he whines about being on “an allowance” or that his brother needs to borrow some money, or why can’t he take that vacation? In my 2nd marriage we kept our finances separate, which was great only in the sense that when we divorced I wasn’t liable for all his credit card bills, and my credit rating was fine despite all his problems. I ended up paying for everything in our life together because he just wouldn’t, or he wouldn’t pay the bills on time, or etc. We discussed it and our deal was that he would do the saving & investing with his paycheck, while I used my paycheck to pay for the day-to-day things that required the attention to detail that he couldn’t deal with. Of course, when we split it turned out that he had spent everything he had and more.
Transparency is essential.
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My fiancé and I are getting married next May. Finances are one of the things we’ve really made a point to communicate about. We show each other our monthly reports in Quicken (we’re both kind of nerdy — we like the graphs), we discuss our credit reports, and we’ve had many conversations about our respective savings and spending plans. We keep each other updated on our retirement investments.
We’ve been together 8 years and counting, and we’ve gotten to know our differences in money style and decide whether they’re compatible. (Honestly — I know this can be controversial — but I think money management is a very good argument *for* a couple living together before marriage. Sharing a household and bills has taught us a lot.) The main thing is that we are both interested in money management and planning, and we are totally open about discussing our plans and situations with each other.
We’ve lived together for about 4 years. Right now we maintain separate finances, split the bills and write each other checks.
At this point we think a system with one joint “household” account and two individual accounts will work best for us when we get married. Take out savings/investments and pay bills — mortgage, utilities, Netflix, groceries — out of the joint account. Then each person gets equal amounts of fun money automatically transferred to their individual account each month, to spend on whatever they want without having to ask the other person.
We already have records on what we spend as a household on bills vs. fun stuff, so we’ll be able to start with a realistic budget.
We absolutely do not want a situation where one has to ask the other’s permission to buy something — like he should not have to ask my permission to buy a video game. That would build resentment and could lead to impulse purchases as a way to rebel or get back at the other person.
We also don’t want a situation where one partner has a lot more fun money than the other because they earn more. When we marry, we feel, our incomes will be a common pool and benefit us equally.
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Love this post. Such an important topic. My husband and I didn’t really discuss money in the beginning, but as we went along we got more comfortable with that and everything turned out okay. But many of my clients don’t talk about money with their spouses, and it is a huge sticking point. I’ve studied John Gottman’s work on relationships, and often the money conversation is one of those areas where couples get gridlocked and can’t make headway. The most interesting thing I’ve learned is that conflicting desires and beliefs about anything, money included, can be worked through when partners identify the dream and value underneath the desire. Unfortunately, couples often wait years to seek help with this, and the story has an unhappy ending, like Mike and Kathy.
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I’ve dated people like Kathy..and being around them is like putting a black hole in your wallet.
The person I married has similar financial values to myself. Any discussions about money are fairly easy.
People talk about how it’s shallow to judge people based on their financial siuation. However, after dating several spendaholics, it just stressed me out too much to envision being married to one. In my eyes it was no different than an alcoholic, gambler or drug addict (my dad being all 3). These compulsions ruin people’s lives..buying stuff til you don’t have a roof over your head or food to feed your kids.
That being said, I’m truly inspired by recovering xxxx-aholics…and the families/friends that support their efforts.
A loose translation of one of my mom’s sayings. “it’s better to have one mule pulling the cart forward, than two mules..one pulling forward and the other in reverse.”
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My ex-husband and I didn’t discuss money before we got married and it certainly caused problems. That isn’t what led to the divorce, though.
He was very good at saving and had a better paying job than me when we got married, so he had about $10k in the bank. I had very little savings and about $2k in credit card debt and another $3k in student load debt when we married. But I always paid my bills and had great credit. We didn’t establish any joint accounts, but he did figure out an “equitable” way to split expenses based on our incomes.
During our first year of marriage I entered a national service program as part of my strategy to change careers and that introduced a lot more strain on us. I was making very little money and had some medical bills that weren’t covered by the insurance. One day I asked him to pay a medical bill and his reaction was rather withering. He first told me to dip into my savings to pay for it; when I told him I had no savings left because I had been paying the previous doctor bills from it, he still refused and said he wasn’t liable for my debts. (This for a medical bill, not a shopping spree.)
Well, that nearly broke up the marriage right there but after much talk he finally came around and paid the bill. It showed me his feelings about money very vividly, though.
We didn’t have a joint account until we had been married 5 years and had bought a house together. [Previous to that we bought a condo and he held the mortgage and title himself for a bunch of reasons that seemed to make sense at the time.] By that time I was established in my new career and really doing well financially, as was he. We saved and saved and saved.
Every once in a while I asked what we were saving for. At first, it was for an emergency fund. When that was fully funded, there didn’t seem to be any specific answer other than “saving is good.”
When we finally started divorce proceedings after 11 years of marriage I (somewhat) joked that I now know what we were saving for: a divorce. There was enough cash on hand that the asset split basically worked out that I got the house and he got a big wad of cash.
At least I didn’t have to finance a buy-out. And I did learn from him that there can be some joy in saving and being (nearly) debt-free (my mortgage is the exception.) I now have my emergency account funded and have set up separate accounts for home maintenance expenses and vacation.
I’ll never forget that shocking incident around the doctor bill, though.
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When my friend decided to get married, she and her intended decided they would approach the marriage as the merging of two corporations. The conversation pretty much went like this:
Him: Okay, I’ll marry you, but I get to be CEO.
She: Done. And I get to be CFO.
Him: D’oh!
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My husband and I discussed how we would handle our finances during our engagement. We joined all our money together during our engagement. Since he earns substantially more than I do, we use his salary for all expenses while my salary is completely saved. This way, we can be sure that we are 1) saving money 2) learning to live on one salary in case I cannot work when we have children.
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To answer your some of your questions in the post:
Did you and your partner discuss money before making things permanent? No.
How do you handle your finances? After a few years of marriage we split the finances between two accounts (my idea). We pay bills as per agreement but are flexible if one of us need help.
Is it effective? Very. We are out of debt and have substantial savings.
Have you been through a divorce? Neither of us have. Married 29 years.
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Did you and your partner discuss money before making things permanent? Yes. We lived together for 8 months before we got married, and DH was very open about an unfortunate financial past, involving credit cards, an ex-wife, and collections. We spent time talking about what kind of lifestyles we wanted to achieve before, during, and after raising kids, and in retirement.
How do you handle your finances? We joined everything immediately, and take out a certain amount of money weekly for private expenses. We’ve each earned between $0 and $60,000+/year over the past 15 years (layoffs, school, stay-at-home-parenthood), so it works for us to have a communal money pot. “We” have money, not “I” have money as the wage-earner. I manage the day-to-day bills and expenses, and MBA DH manages the investments. We consult each other and share financial information every day.
Is it effective? Yes. We are roughly where we want to be, thanks to talking about financial and lifestyle goals. And we’re working towards where we want to be, together.
Have you been through a divorce? DH was.
I wonder if the issue of having separate finances after marriage is more important if you are NOT in a community property state? California and Wisconsin generally both split most property and money gained during the marriage down the middle (except things like inheritances and gifts).
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My wife and I have been married for almost 8 years. We did not discuss money before marriage. I was a student at the time and she was a working attorney, so we were living in different worlds in terms of income. I felt we were both pretty “normal” with money.
Since that time we have found that our perspectives on money are similar. We both try to spend within our means but still set aside money for things that we both enjoy. I manage the long term monetary planning and all of our investments. She manages the day to day logistics and takes care of all of the bills. As of now, we are a one income family as my wife is now a stay at home mom. One thing we do with our personal spending is that we have agreed to allocate $100 per month into each others’ separate accounts that we can spend on anything we want, guilt free. If there is a big ticket item that one of us wants, and the other disagrees on the need, then it comes out of the personal fund.
I think we lucked out because we ended up being on the same page with money. We don’t fight much about it and when we do have a disagreement, we just refer to the personal fund.
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My financial ancestry is a father who was an alcoholic spendthrift, and a mother who is ultra frugal, probably because Dad never gave her any money for housekeeping, and later from having to raise me on a pension.
When my husband and I first got together I was in a lot of debt. Like Anne KD @14, the hardest thing I ever did was tell him about it, and it took several goes before I stopped hinting and told him how much. We moved in together 6 months into our relationship, partly to save money (we were spending GBP 2000 a MONTH on rent separately and rented a place from friends that cost GBP 800 a month) and by then I was committed to paying off my debt.
At that point we just split the bills, he paid the rent and I paid groceries, bills, insurance, entertainment, everything else. At first he balked at this because the bills weren’t always the same amount as the rent, but I explained how I used the envelope method to put the same amount aside each month and he soon got comfortable (he’s an accountant). We also put similar amounts aside each month for travelling, and the rest of our money was ours to spend as we liked.
It took me about 18 months to pay off my debt and we moved back to Australia with enough money to pay cash for a car, appliances, and a fat downpayment for a house.
Now we have joint accounts for everything. He gives me his pay minus a generous ‘allowance’ which is his to spend how he likes, and I handle the finances. To be honest at first this took an adjustment but I think it was more about him adjusting to going from earning consulting rates in the UK and being able to buy whatever he liked, to a normal salary with a mortgage and all the other responsibilities. He’s got used to it now though, and we still enjoy a reasonable disposable income. It helps that when he talked to friends over here about finances they always sounded amazed at how much spending money he had. This is good because we’ve just bought a new house and have a baby on the way, so we’ve agreed the budget is getting tighter for a while now.
Also, I insisted on joint accounts so I’d have accountability for the money. Not because I didn’t trust myself not to overspend, but so he would always be able to know he could trust me. Not that there was ever a chance he wouldn’t be able to trust me – I’m firmly back following my mother’s example now.
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My financial ancestry is a father who was an alcoholic spendthrift, and a mother who is ultra frugal, probably because Dad never gave her any money for housekeeping, and later from having to raise me on a pension.
When my husband and I first got together I was in a lot of debt. Like Anne KD @14, the hardest thing I ever did was tell him about it, and it took several goes before I stopped hinting and told him how much. We moved in together 6 months into our relationship, partly to save money (we were spending GBP 2000 a MONTH on rent separately and rented a place from friends that cost GBP 800 a month) and by then I was committed to paying off my debt.
At that point we just split the bills, he paid the rent and I paid groceries, bills, insurance, entertainment, everything else. At first he balked at this because the bills weren’t always the same amount as the rent, but I explained how I used the envelope method to put the same amount aside each month and he soon got comfortable (he’s an accountant). We also put similar amounts aside each month for travelling, and the rest of our money was ours to spend as we liked.
It took me about 18 months to pay off my debt and we moved back to Australia with enough money to pay cash for a car, appliances, and a fat downpayment for a house.
Now we have joint accounts for everything. He gives me his pay minus a generous ‘allowance’ which is his to spend how he likes, and I handle the finances. To be honest at first this took an adjustment but I think it was more about him adjusting to going from earning consulting rates in the UK and being able to buy whatever he liked, to a normal salary with a mortgage and all the other responsibilities. He’s got used to it now though, and we still enjoy a reasonable disposable income. It helps that when he talked to friends over here about finances they always sounded amazed at how much spending money he had. This is good because we’ve just bought a new house and have a baby on the way, so we’ve agreed the budget is getting tighter for a while now.
Also, I insisted on joint accounts so I’d have accountability for the money. Not because I didn’t trust myself not to overspend, but so he would always be able to know he could trust me. Not that there was ever a chance he wouldn’t be able to trust me – I’m firmly back following my mother’s example now.
P.S. – Sorry, forgot to tell you great post!
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In some cases divorce can be a *good* financial decision!
Obviously, nobody would get divorced for a financial reason alone.
My own finances have improved considerably since my divorce since my ex-husband who had problems handling money. It’s nice to not have to worry about money and finally be able to save! (oh, and BTW, we split everything 50:50 and I don’t receive alimony–just child support for our 2 children).
Meanwhile, my ex “purchased” a house that cost 3 times what my house cost, he’s takes at least 2 international/carribean resort vacations every year, and he bought a luxury car. I know he doesn’t have the money so I’m expecting some crisis soon.
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Moving to Mexico for a year with my girlfriend did it for us. Our paychecks were so meagre that we had to pool resources and get organized in order to have any fun. In this way I had the opportunity to explain some of my money-organizing techniques (many learned here) with proper context. We’ve been back home for two years, now engaged, and we have a detailed financial system and plan in place that we revisit every few months.
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My husband and I learned how to handle money together. We talked a lot about our goals of having enough money saved and invested that we would only be working part time, and then, in our second year of marriage, we realized why we were so frustrated: we were spending too much money to ever reach our goals. We spent a year and a half working with and tweaking our budget AND our spending habits (he had to cut down on eating out, I cut down on books.)
Eventually we decided to have separate accounts we put an ‘allowance’ into each month, and that’s our entertainment funds. Now, neither of us feel stretched, nor do we feel like the other is watching every penny we spend, but we still save a lot AND money is easier to talk about.
Also, I’m an accountant, so I originally took care of our finances. Now, my husband does, because a big part of our communication issue was that he didn’t know how to manage money. So I taught him, and he pays the bills, and then we look at finances together frequently. It was tough at first, and there were a lot of mistakes that cost us money when he took over, but we saw it as the cost of education.
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My husband and I did not discuss money as much as we should have before getting married. Over the past six years we’ve learned that our money personalities are woefully similar: we both like to ignore our finances, spend too much on family stuff and work for love rather than money.
We’ve had good money talks now, and are learning to break those habits. We’d probAbly have less debt if we’d had these talks sooner, but i don’t think our marriage us worse for it.
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My partner and I danced around the money issue for the first few years we dated. I was terrible about keeping up with bills and a balanced checkbook, and she secretly thought that we probably wouldn’t stay together if my financial capabilities represented my ability to take care of myself!
Luckily, I got tired of owing money and bouncing checks, and she decided to learn more about being smart with money (savings, credit scores, etc.) around the same time, so we ended up reading the same books and discussing the concepts together. That eased us into discussing money more openly and sharing details about where we each were at financially. She was able to help me get on track, and I was able to provide ideas and support on budgeting strategies for us both.
Ancestry-wise, we both have strong emotions tied to money and how it was used in our families. So when we need to discuss a change in our finances or maybe a conflict, we both try to set aside a specific time instead of catching the other offguard with an emotionally charged subject.
Sipping on a glass of wine while discussing finances certainly doesn’t hurt either! When we planned our commitment ceremony and figured out all of the costs and savings needed, we always went over the money details at a nice wine bar to help lower the stress and reward ourselves for our diligence.
PS – JD, I’ve only been reading your blog for the last few weeks, but already appreciate the insight and great topics covered here. I read you daily to keep on task and remember my goals. Keep it up!
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Of course, it was a different time, but over 60 years ago the preacher told my grandfather that he had to give something, even if it was a dollar a month (which wasn’t much, even back then) to his wife-to-be, that she could spend freely, without permission, without consulting or discussing it with him. He generally managed all the finances durring their entire merriage, but she always had a spiral notebook that she kept balanced with her share of the family money. She finally stopped updating that notebook only a month or two before she died. That’s what worked for them.
My mother in law works at a bank, and obviously knows how to balance a checkbook. My father in law was self-employed (now works retail), not so much. They have one account, and she manages all the money, including the house, bills, even gas for the cars. He gets an envelope every week with his allowance — he can spend it on ebay trinkets, or go out to lunch every day, or whatever, he can spend it however he wants, or save it for a rainy day (or a trip to visit the new grandkids, hah). That’s what works for them…
My wife and I have adopted our arrangement from my dad and my step-mom. I make more, and I pay most of the bills. She makes less, and pays a few of the bills. Anything small, we don’t need permission from the other, but anything long term or “durrable” must be discussed. That’s what works for us…
Sensing a theme? JD says it best… DO WHAT WORKS FOR YOU. The problem comes when, as the article points out, you don’t discuss these matters. It’s a team effort, and that includes finances… That simple. If you can talk openly about matters of finance, in my opinion, well……
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My husband and I did a fair amount of talking before we got married (12 years ago now). We share 95% of our money (we each have “fun money” accounts that are our own), even though I officially make only a small portion of our income. But, I work very hard here at home (at least as hard as my husband does at work, if not harder), and my husband and I both feel that we are partners and that we should share our money.
In 12 years, I don’t think we’ve had one argument about money, and I am so grateful for that!
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Enough about marriage! How about articles for us single people who face enormous challenges (personal and financial)? Aren’t there more of us, now that so many marriages fail due to fighting over money?
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I’m late to this discussion, but I find it interesting how baby-boomer women presumed the men they married would handle their finances.
One wonders if educating _women_, specifically, on financial management and communication about money wouldn’t help keep some of these marriages together.
As a woman in my mid-20s, I’m the primary financial manager for our household – though paying bills is something we both do – and I would never have presumed that my husband would be the sole person in charge of our money.
Also, I agree it’s important to talk about money before you commit to each other, but it’s equally crucial to keep those lines of communication open throughout the relationship. In three years our financial situation has changed several times, and I’m sure it will just keep changing… that’s why we got comfortable talking about our money with each other, and keep doing so regularly.
The glass of wine suggestion above is a good one – these are chats that should happen in a comfortable space with plenty of time and no hard feelings.
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I’m late joining the party, too, but I hope y’all will forgive me.
I got married just over a month ago. My husband hates paying bills, but he’s also highly allergic to debt. He paid off his $20k student loan and $10k truck loan before we even met, even though he was working at a $30k/year job. (He lived with his parents, had a second job at a pizza shop, and refused to spend over $50 unless he had double that amount in cash in the bank). However, paying the monthly bills stresses him out and makes him angry.
I had to learn about personal finance the hard way, after I moved to California for a job that I thought was awesome, but turned out to be absolutely terrible. So I take care of the daily money-management tasks, and give him a weekly update of what’s where and why.
I would really like for Husband to set some financial goals for retirement with me, but he is extremely reluctant to talk about it. We actually need to go see his accountant before the end of the month for year-end tax advice, since we got married and bought a house, but it’s like pulling teeth to get him to commit to even calling her to see when she’s available.
To be fair, my own retirement-related financial goals are “Have enough money so we don’t have to live on cat food,” so that needs work, too. I know that whatever we decide, we’ll need to decide it together.
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My wife is excellent with money. She is very frugal and saves for everything we need. I am horrible with money, I at one time made almost twice what our family of four now makes and struggled paying my rent.
It was obvious when we talked about money when we got married that my wife should handle the finances. While I am trying, I am on this website after all, this has been the best solution for us.
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