How much do you share the bills?

[akaJamiesMum]

Just wondering.

I work and bring in about £1000 on a good month. DH is self employed and income varies but usually works out about £600 a month (sometimes more and sometimes less). Out of that he has to pay any business related expenses - mileage costs etc.

My salary pays all the bills - rent, council tax, electricity, phone, car insurance etc - it all comes to around £950 a month. DH is supposed to do everything else - food shopping (not always as income is not always there)car tax when due etc.

Problem is that I find it hard asking him for money as there's always that resigned annoyed "humph" when I do. It's really pissing me off TBH. We agreed a few months back that when income was good he would at least give me half the rent (which would be £300) so that I wouldn't have to ask him for money all the time. This hasn't really happened because he has not had a good month for a while BUT just wondered how you all divide the bills at home. Feeling a bit frazzled at the moment and feeling that the bills need to be divided more equally.

Everything is shared. There are no 'his or her' bills.

what jalopy said

We have separate accounts, pay goes into those. My take-home is about half of DH's. Then each month a sum (standing order) comes out of those accounts into a joint account (my sum is a little over half his). Out of that account comes: mortgage, utility bills, TV licence, telephone/internet bill, council tax, insurances (car and house, not life which comes out of own accounts) and grocery shopping. All except the last are on direct debits or standing orders. We tend to have a little bit of a cushion in there as well so can afford to pay further car expenses out of it.

What is left in our own accounts is ours to do what we want with - he saves, I spend, I then reclaim back about half of what I spend cos most of it is spent on DD! Works really well for us, but then we do have the luxury of two 100% reliable incomes.

also joint account here, so whatever goes in goes out eventually,regardless of where it came from!

We run a system where everything that is a joint responsibility - bills, childcare, food, mortgage etc - comes from a joint account to which we both contribute a fixed amount each month.

I earn a bit less than DH so we contribute in proportion to our earnings, if that makes sense?

If one of you has lumpy cashflow that can make things difficult obviously, but is there anyway you can get DH to build a fighting fund of say 2x his normal contribution? Then you could move to a situation where you could work out the average amount he should be contributing each month, and take it out of the fighting fund. Any month he has income, he can pay into it and try to keep it topped up.

Still, not an easy situation, particularly as there is male pride involved

we've always had a joint account - we're a partnership - we don't do his and hers (otherwise I'd be broke ).

we both have our wages paid into one account, where all the bills come out of, we share everything, otherwise i would be always end up with no money. my car insurance is higher than his for example. also i use more petrol because i do the school run/shopping and lots of running around with after school clubs.

Thanks for this folks. It's helpful hearing what other people do. Looks like a joint account is the best way to go then.

We have both our incomes paid into a joint account (mine is salary, dh's is rental income from a property he owns - well, we own, but we treat it as his salary as he can't work). Everything comes out of here; our situation is unusual in that dh has virtually no ability to spend any money on his own, he almost never leaves the house without me, so I give him the occasional twenty quid and that's it. He also can't manage shopping online so I have to do all that too.

Once we have our budgets sorted out (just moved house), what is left over will go into savings - probably split evenly to take advantage of the ISA allowance etc.

i do not work but pay the council tax,water,2 catolgue bills,school clubs etc plus bit of rent out of tax credits/child benefit.sometimes we get to eat too!
dh works and pays phone bill/internet,electric,car insurance.
we dont have joint account and im glad as a few months ago my tw*t of a dh stopped paying the rent!we owed something like £3500 which IM gradually paying off!idiot!so i wouldnt trust him if we had joint account!

Everything is shared in our house, and always have been since DH and I moved in together. That means joint accounts for money, and joint bills, the lot.

we used to split things by each paying the same amount into joint account then all bills went out of that. but that was when we both earned the same amount each month, before i had dd and went back to work part time. now dh pays all the bills inc. mortgage plus things like take aways, big purchases like new tv we just got etc etc. what i earn goes on food shopping, nursery fees and stuff for dd. we each pay our own mobile bills and our own car costs.

We just have a joint account.

All our money is pooled. We have a joint account and I have an account (am just sat here wondering why I still have my own), but whatever is in either of them is "our" money.

We also have a Tesco Clubcard Plus account and pay a regular amount into that each month, and I use that to do the food shopping and it will pay for petrol.

We have one account into which dh's salary and my pay (self employed) goes into and everything comes out of. That's it really. Nobody asks anybody for money - all the money that goes in belongs to both of us, regardless of who earned what, and we both spend from it as we like.

DH earn £1200 (before tax) a month - plus any bonus (also taxed obviously) and he gets paid his expenses for petrol (in arrears)- my income (including CB, TC's and Organ Pay) is currently about £750

I pay the Credit Card, Gas, Electric, Phone/TV/Broadband, Home Insurance, Child Sponsorship, TV Licence, Water, and repayment left over from the business (nearly paid off now) and buy the the bulk of the shopping.

He pays for the mortgage, car HP, loan, and council tax. He also tends to buy any of the "extras" we get (clothes for him and DS's etc etc) and frequently sends money to family in Zimbabwe.

So although he pays "fewer" than me - it works out pretty fairly as he pays the bigger bills and I pay the smaller ones. When I was at work (currently on SMP) it did mean that I had a bigger disposable income to "myself" each month - but if things are particularly tight for either of us we often ask the other for a bit to help out (although this month we're both skint so no chance of either of us helping the other out LOL).

I play the organ at church so get a small amount of income each month from that (plus occasional weddings and funerals which I get extra for)

All our money is joint, goes into joint accounts, and all the bills and expenses are shared.

I couldn't be doing with the hassle of his and her stuff especially regarding money.

Ooops - just realised this is an old thread and I had already previously contributed anyway!