How do you organise your finances?

[bebesequin]

Dh and I both have well paid jobs and since we got together have had a joint account-we both earn almost the same -however we seem to constantly argue about money!

I think he is excessive with grocery shopping he's a bit of a foodie and in my opinion spends far too much on that-whereas he thinks my clothes an hairdressing bills are excessive- we have had another 'discussion' today- his quite modest car is due replacing and he is set on buying a gas guzzling 4x4 as he does a lot of fishing and shooting- I have a nice company car and feel he should be happy with a smaller car- how do other people organise their finances?seperate accounts and joint one for the house?

DH and I have one joint account into which all income is paid, all bills come out of this too. We've never divvied up who earns what or spends what (atm I'm earning more than dh)but we are saving quite hard atm, despite (because of) a big drop in income. We each have our own savings accounts ("running away"/emergency funds). Neither of us are spendaholics - far from it, works for us.
Thirdisbest and Reality - that man sounds like a real piece of work . Hope 2010 works out so much better for you .

Dh and I have separate accounts and one savings account which we both put equal amounts into each month. The savings account is for things like holidays, unexpected expenses and at the moment is used to save up for IUI.

We are paid at different times, me at the begining of the month and him at the end so most bills go from my account and he then pays me half the mortgage and bills money when he gets paid which puts me back into credit for 2 weeks until I get paid again.

It works for us but the food shopping thing is always a bit of a pain. When I shop (at the begining of the month) I tend to plan meals out, buy good food and not buy things we don't need. When he shops we en up with lots of snacks and other stuff I might not usually buy. I try to do my shops without him so that I can make sure we get good food and that the freezer is stocked. When he is paying we go together and I try to encourage him to buy 'good' stuff. He tends to buy a lot of tak-aways too.

All other money is our own to do with what we want. If we need to buy something unexpected then we try to both pay equally for it.

We have a bill account, bills split in relation to our income and we pay a set amount plus 10%.

Money gets paid into savings account from each of us.

We live on what is left, we have seperate bank accounts but see the money as "ours" as a family

that should have been 'me in the middle of the month'!

What we do - Dh gives me most of his salary each month. The Sky comes out of his account for TV phone and tinterweb.

Everything else comes out of my account, child benefit and tax credit comes to me as well. Any money he keeps back is for 'spends'

I have everything except credit cards on Direct debit and I pay into an ISA and a savings acc each month by standing order.

Works for us, as DH is useless not very organised and I would worry if if wasn't al sorted.

I inform him of any large expenses I am going to incur as a courtesy but do not ask.

If he needs to give me less money one month he tells me why and that is fine.

Reality you are quite angry arent you?? I didnt realise that I wasnt allowed to write on Mumsnet.

I write the odd thing on facebook mainly asking you to leave us alone - because although I have blocked you you still seem to know everything about my life because you write it on here.

Its not the time or the place to have personal arguements on a public forum. But it does make me angry when you slag me off here on an almost daily basis and I cant do anything to defend myself. Mumsnet allows you to be who you want to be when you want to be it and whether its truthful or not is by the by.

My husband pays CSA based on what he earns. I dont make the rules the CSA do but I just follow them. Its funny because you never paid a penny to his first two children when you were married yet I am the evil person for making him make the effort - all be it a small amount.

Obviously if you have issues feel free to take them up with me personally and as I dont want to embarrass you with a list of all of your lies on a forum where you are quite well thought of.

"My husband pays CSA based on what he earns."

Don't you agree that, your DH needs to find a full time better paid job, if his current salary only covers a child support order of £1.50 for his children to live on. That level of 'support' wouldn't keep a goldfish alive

Should your husband not be working full time to support his children. Men who use the rules to get out of supporting their children really irk me.

I am not a fanatical ex wife either wanting to bleed her ex dry, I don't take any money from my ex.

Is this still going? I want to see the list too

Er, I don't think the list should be on here, but I don't think the rest of this should be on here either.

thirdisbest - you obviously love your DH and think he is telling the truth. But if he has been married twice before be aware that he might not be accurately representing things. And if he thinks he can only afford £1.50 a week to help support his children he's clearly not exactly a genius with regards to money.

Oh, and to answer the question we have a joint account into which x% of each of our salaries go. This pays for rents, bills, and we each have debit-card access to it for food and other household expenditure. The rest we can spend/save as we like. Bigger household spends are discussed and split 50/50.

We earn similar amounts BTW, if one of us was working significantly less due to childcare issues we would probably split to to have equal spending money, rather than as a %.

DH pays for everything as he's the main breadwinner so all his wages going into his own bank account. We pay for all groceries and luxuries on the credit card and this gets cleared in full every month. Best way to earn cash-back.

The joint account we use for the CB and CTC payments and I use this for top-up shopping during the week.

Very different from the majority on this thread

I don't think it is worth arguing about money so took steps to organise finances in such a way that arguments became redundant. Namely - we put money into a joint account for household bills and food. Then we each have a separate account and I can overspend on cars and hair and clothes and books and DH can overspend on ... well nothing actually.

Sloppyseconds - Unless I'm missing something and you are one of the posters involved then I think thats a very childish and mean spirited post given that things seemed to have died down hours ago.

Blimey, have just read this thread and will leave alone henceforth.

Hope you are okay Reality. The really good thing is that you are not married to him anymore. A good chum of mine had to pay a fortune in a divorce settlement to her exhusband (who was a lazy layabout who never worked). She views it as money extremely well-spent ...

I didn't mean it like that, JV- I was trying to make Reality laugh. She knows who I am.

Ah right. Thought you were being a big old stirrer!

Hi,
'Snigger's' suggestion of 3 accounts is a really workable idea. They can be labelled 'his' 'hers' and 'ours' with all the essential expenses in 'ours' covering household bills and a contribution towards holidays and extras etc. Then what he does with 'his' is really up to him and there shouldn't be any gripes.At least you can do what you want with 'yours'!
I did lots of research on this for my book www.sheconomics.com and lots of couples said this method works. Good luck