Hi, me & my fiancé get married this year. We have been together for 10 years, have 4 children between us. We have never had joint accounts, but I’ve suggested we set one up as I’m terrible with finances/ planning. We both have a decent income, which is pretty similar. We currently half all bills as fair as we can. I’d like the account for all of our bills, food, holidays, childcare etc so that we can tf a set amount each month and the rest is our personal spending/ saving money. This way I will know what I have left over to spend/ save and I feel it will be fair in that we are dividing everything equally. Currently I find hard to keep track of what we have each paid. All the bills come out of my account and he pays me a set amount each month. This is stressful for me as working 6 days a week with 4 kids you can imagine things can slip my mind! I also have dyslexia and suffer with anxiety and depression so find the finances a lot to deal with.
When I’ve broached this subject, my fiancé says he’s happy to set up a joint account, but that any of my “personal financial” outgoings should be kept to my personal account. I understand he does not feel responsible for my debts, but I feel the “family car” should be paid for jointly. I have another 1.5 years to pay on the finance agreement (out of 5) and we have been together 10 years in which I have always paid for the family cars. He has work vehicles which me or the kids never use. If we go anywhere we use the “family car” he also uses it for short journeys on his own! I take the kids to school etc in it too. I also feel my petrol, tax, insurance etc should come out of the joint account but he argues that he wouldn’t put his work vehicles through. My argument is the “family” doesn’t use his work vans, we all use the car, even for food shopping etc!
Then we get to my credit cards/ loan/ store card. This is debt I have accumulated in the 10 years we have been together and as I’m self employed, I had to live on credit for my last maternity leave (where I still paid my half of the bills). I don’t spend excessively or live lavishly, any credit I’ve used has been for the family or household, so to me I think he should be ok paying half, especially since we are getting married and he’s happy to spend on my credit accounts!
I feel I’ve been a bit of a push over in the past and tried to keep things “fair” but to the detriment of my own financial and mental health.
Interested to hear others thoughts and what they do for their household finances thanks!