To ask about sharing bank accounts…

[stripeysquirrel]

Married last year and have our first baby on the way

I pay the utility bills and DH pays the rent, that’s how it’s always been. We are buying our first house and so will likely have the mortgage come out of our joint account instead.

Just wondering how others do it normally. Do you pay all your wages into the same bank account and just spend from that, or keep it separate?

We both earn similar amounts but obviously I’ll earn a bit less on maternity leave. Is it easier just to pool all money together or in doing so do you lose all your financial independence?

We don't have a shared account, but it's all one pot and we don't owe each other money or take turns paying. It's easier from an admin pov to have our own accounts (each of us has multiple accounts). DH earns a lot more than me. Salaries go into our own accounts, bills mostly go out of DH's account, and he transfers money into one of mine and one of his accounts for spending. It's not a set amount per month, it just gets topped up when it runs low. I do most of our spending on a credit card which is paid off from DH's main account. He transfers a chunk every year to top up my pension and ISA.

I pay for most gifts on the credit card. Neither of us are big on surprises so it doesn't matter if he sees the transaction, though it's often a fairly generic retailer (Amazon, John Lewis) so that doesn't give much away. Neither of us is bothered about what the other spends, and we don't check if it's OK to spend a certain amount.

DH and I together 35 years. We have a joint bank account that we each put in an agreed amount each month, and all joint bills come out of. The key is to agreeing the amounts, they will differ.

We have a joint account but my wages don't go in just because I don't set them too. But I could.

I think it's safer in terms of banks going to down to have wages into 2 seperate places. Each month I pay into joint act for various pots.

I pay food and pay dh and he pays me 😂.
All money is viewed pooled however.

I have savings and inheritance and view it all as pooled. We both also put money into monzo for Xmas, holiday and we pots for the kids and so on but it's all joint.

I suspect what works for some couples doesn't work for others. My husband and I have separate accounts and a joint account for mortgage/bills that we both pay equally into. Anything left over from that we're individually free to spend or save as we choose. I'd never have everything going into one pot, but that's personal preference. I just don't think I'd want to justify spending x amount on something for me, him or our children. Equally, I'm sure he's happy he doesn't need to check that he's ok to spend whatever he wants to on his hobbies, clothing etc. I don't question what he spends his money on at all, so long as I know we're covering our bills. Not would I expect comments about my purchases.

In a family you pool your resources together.

All money into one account and all bills paid from that. You share the rest.

Use your credit card

Married 36 years and we’ve always had a joint account, my children and their partners now do the same,

both salaries into the joint account, we paid mortgage bills etc anything that was needed at the end of the month anything left got split 50/50 and went into our separate accounts. Some months we would decide to put it all into joint savings account some months there was very little left, but what was in our account was our own. Now retired and still do more or less the same, but we always split 50/50 anything extra, or put it into the joint account. I wouldn’t say it’s a perfect way of doing things but it works for us and our children’s families. It’s just a case of it’s all joint, even fir the couple of years I didn’t work, it was still all ours not his and mine

We also have our own personal accounts and the a joint account for bills. We have a master spreadsheet that includes what comes out of the joint account and then other family outgoings from our own accounts (eg I pay for all the food on my personal credit card). Based on our incomes, this is then split between us and we revisit it on a regular basis. At the moment, I only pay a very small amount into the joint account as most of my contribution is the one that comes from my own account. When I was on maternity leave, he think he paid me for a while. We don't have 'equal' fun money but then DH puts most of his salary into savings which we use for holidays, doing up the house etc. He has also started muttering something about pension allowances and putting money in mine but I'm letting him sort it.

In truth, I think the main reason this works for us is that we both have fairly decent incomes.

All wages in to one account; that pays all bills, but we have equal amounts for discretionary spending taken from that into separate personal accounts.

We mostly put everything into one central account.

almost everything we spend money on first goes on a credit card. Then we pay that bill in full once a month. We have assorted cards to maximize rewards and perks.

if we are buying a gift it just goes on a credit card and gets paid off. It’s relatively easy to hide if you need to hide it. You
can just be sure to be the person who reviews that cards bill that month.

We do joint account - everything in and all bills and child related spending come from that.

Then a set amount (equal amount) into personal accounts that’s ours. We spend differently - DH is the type to buy a coffee every day, a magazine most days, a gadget every week: lots of little and often spending whereas I’m more likely to have a lunch out or buy something bigger every now and again so we do it that way to keep it fair (DH felt he was spending way more than me and it wasn’t fair to me before we did this).

Re losing independence if all money goes into joint account. It’s actually the opposite if you are about to go on maternity leave, then potentially part time or SAHM because what you will both want and need is access to funds. Otherwise all household stuff is going to involve this possibility of it coming out of your own smaller pot of earned money

Use our own savings account. Sometimes one of us would be short for something we wanted, a gift or clothes or whatever, and we would discuss it, maybe give a loan or take a little extra from the 50/50 split. Ie if I needed a coat or shoes or whatever then he would agree to a smaller split for him. We worked it out somehow without to many disagreements

We have separate finances and bills such as the mortgage, nursery fees etc are 50/50.

Having my own money is incredibly important to me, as is not having to ask permission if I want to buy something.

We never had anything but a joint account, everything went in and came out and we spent what we wanted out of it. Fortunatley we were on the same page with spending levels and stayed within our means.

We had friends, a couple, who had nine accounts. A joint current account, his and hers. A joint Mastercard account, his and hers. Joint Visa, his and hers. We went round to theirs for 7.30 one evening. We were supposed to be going out for dinner. By the time they'd debated which of the nine accounts should pay for it, it was honestly too late to go out, and she ended up putting something together at home. We had no such problems.

Funny in the supermarket, he tended to pay while I put stuff back in the trolley. Surprising how many checkout operators thought it was worth commenting on the fact that 'he' paid for the shopping.

We have separate accounts but have equal access to each other’s. We use contactless on the phones and then carry each card. For the first 15 or so years he earned substantially more than me so he paid the bills and the money I got was for treats/extras for the family. (Now we earn a similar amount so the bills are paid by both of us.)

Completely joint finances. All bills come out of a joint account, and our salaries are paid into there too. We felt paying percentages in was unfair as pension contributions and car lease mean it's not a straightforward calculation.

We do have both joint and individual savings accounts to maximise tax benefits but we both know how much is in each account. We also have personal current accounts which family use if they are paying us cash for anything.

We each have credit card accounts where we do a lot of general spending (also paid out of joint account) so hiding gifts is easy.

We’ve been married 30 years and have never had a joint account. When I worked most of the bills came out of my account and my husband paid the mortgage and a few other bits. I haven’t worked for about 18 years so now he just transfers money into my account every month. That pays a few bills, pet insurance etc. All big house purchases, food etc he pays.

I don’t think I would feel it’s necessary to ask permission. Way back when the mortgage payments were a sizeable proportion of our joint income we just cut our cloth according to our means. At times when finances were not tight and savings were steady then if I want something I buy it, within reason. Once one has a family then I would have found it unrealistic to have his and hers finances.

Everything goes in and out of one account, just makes life easier for us ! I don’t really get the birthday thing - we get presents for each other every year so it’s not a surprise when you get a surprise if that makes sense?! Also you’re about to have a child, the amount of surprises will go down because you’ll have to plan childcare before that spontaneous weekend away!

We’ve always just had a joint account for most things. I don’t feel like it’s meant we lost our financial independence but some people would. I don’t ask before I buy things all the time but would if getting something big/expensive as anything above a few hundred pounds we’d always discuss first and agree on if we should go ahead with the purchase. We do have savings in both names but they are all shared really. I have a Monzo account I shove money across to in order to buy birthday/Christmas gifts & OH uses the joint credit card (I just don’t look at the statements).

It depends on if you have similar spending/saving habits, what you feel is fair in terms of sharing costs/income and likely a lot what your general relationship is like. It could be a nightmare in a relationship with someone who is controlling or if you are a saver and partner wants to spend everything. There is no one right way to do it so you’ll have to figure out what’s best for you.

We have 3 children and it still works incredibly well for us but then I was never going to be a SAHM or have lengthy maternity leaves.

Having your own money fair enough, but having a joint account doesn’t mean you need to ask before buying something. I’m currently Sahm taking career break, all of my husbands income is “our” money so no one has to ask permission to spend it!

We have own accounts and joint account that we both sent a standing order to each month to pay the bills. My husband works full time and I'm part time- currently on mat leave, so he does pay in more than me.

I'm more thinking about expensive purchases. Most people on posts such as these tend to talk about having discussions over a certain amount, they can buy what they like within reason etc.

That wouldn't work for me. After bills and other joint essentials such as food etc are paid, DH doesn't have any say over what I spend my money on.