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Original poster

Can only marred couples answer please.

734 replies

Richesme · 26/09/2025 08:54

After my last posts about my husband wanting to go halves in paying bills rent etc when I start working full time, I’ve sat down with him and even though we had a disagreement about going halves, he eventually said, you can keep all your money to yourself and do your own spendings or savings from there.

He doesn’t believe that couples either put all their money in one pot or go halves in proportionate to their wages. His works in the bank therefore tells me that he has many customers come in to open joint accounts and they go halves.

I want to find out as married couples, how do you guys manage your money, bills, rent, mortgage, spendings, savings and investments?

OP posts:
SoftPillow · 26/09/2025 10:25

Two pots, with individual savings etc.

But, a joint account for household bills that we contribute roughly equally to. He covers the mortgage and school fees himself. I probably pay for more food and kids stuff. It works for us, mostly as we both have enough money and don’t need to worry about it.

When we had less we did a split based on % of income

Freudianflip · 26/09/2025 10:25

We pay money into a joint account for groceries, mortgage and bills, proportionate to our earnings. I pay 1/3 and he pays 2/3 - I'm a teacher, he's a lawyer! We also have joint savings for holidays. The rest of our money is our own for personal bills like phone and loan repayments, and he has two kids so he has a lot of other costs. Very happy with this arrangement!

Crikeyalmighty · 26/09/2025 10:25

We have a business we both work in so slightly different - income goes to business account- I pay H and me a salary - and that covers his personal spends, his car loan and expenses ( I don’t drive) and various bits of software he has to subscribe too for job- mine covers off my spends plus pension contribution, food etc - I then pay myself dividends to cover all domestic bills which come out my personal account , holidays etc.

Astrabees · 26/09/2025 10:25

Married 40 years. We have shared all income and expenditure jointly from day 1. All inheritances, pension lump sums etc are joint money. We don’t have a joint account so deal with it all by calculation and adjustment. We find this system gives us great peace of mind. I wouldn’t want to. Bemarried to anyone who didn’t view all money as joint money. For the first part of the marriage zI was highest earner and for the last few years DH was.

user1471538275 · 26/09/2025 10:26

We have separate current and savings accounts as well as a joint account.

We put amounts proportionate to our wages into the joint account - so 50% of our wages each - this covers all bills and joint costs for things like house maintenance.

From our own 50% we pay for individual costs - so own cars/health costs and own savings.

Has worked for nearly 30 years.

hididdlyho · 26/09/2025 10:26

DH covers a larger portion of the household bills, it's never been something we've sat down and discussed. We run a business together so all our income comes from the same pot. We're both on the same page in that we want to save and retire early, so neither of us have ever been frivolous spenders. I transfer about a third of my salary each month into the joint account for bills and he covers the rest. He's technically the higher earner on paper (he invests most of 'his salary' each month for our retirement).

ShoeCanRun · 26/09/2025 10:26

All in one pot. We do have our own savings accounts, just because we could only set them up that way, but both consider anything in them to be joint.

ShortColdandGrey · 26/09/2025 10:27

All money is family money and shared and I say that as the higher earner. It is very concerning the amount of woman on here that are married to men that are mean with money. I have a friend who's husband was like this when they were first married. He went on holiday with his dad instead of his wife because she couldn't afford her half of the holiday. If my husband had tried that he would have been back staying with his mum and single.

notthatoldchestnut · 26/09/2025 10:27

Married here
all earnings go into joint account
all bills and money into savings go out of joint account
surplus income is divided in 2 and we have a weekly amount each for spends that goes into individual accounts

I8toys · 26/09/2025 10:27

One pot. Been together for 34 years. There were years when he earned a lot more than me then I took over him and am the only one earning now. Would never dream of seperating finances and detailing everything as half and half. Who has the time? Its a partnership and through life things change. I can't imagine us even having the conversation - it seems so cold and calculating.

blobby10 · 26/09/2025 10:28

used to me married so hope this counts as it seems quite different to most replies.

We were married for 20 years and always had separate accounts. He paid mortgage, bills and car stuff although I did (eventually) ensure all bills were in both our names. I paid for food, cleaning stuff, children's clothes, all Christmas and birthday presents, extra curricular activities, school lunches and holidays. We each paid for our own clothes, haircuts and nights out of which he had many more than me! It worked out a pretty even split - we tried to put a small sum every month away in a savings account too.
I was always much better at budgeting than him so knew to a penny how much 'free' money was in my account so when he told me he was over £8k overdrawn it was a resigned realisation that after 20 years he hadn't changed and never would. Part of the reason I didn't protest when he said we ought to split up over other things.

OhCrumbsWhereNow · 26/09/2025 10:28

Together over 20 years - entirely separate finances.

Currently DH pays everything for the house, and I pay everything for DD (she does a LOT of music). I reckon he probably has the better deal!

mindutopia · 26/09/2025 10:28

Money paid into personal accounts and we transfer money proportionate to our income to a joint account for joint expenses.

Dh is self employed (director of a limited company), so has no regular monthly salary per se. So pooling money and then dividing out equal amounts wouldn’t work. He draws money out of the business as needed, but we work on the principle that he makes roughly twice as much as me, so I pay in 1/3 and he pays in 2/3. As his income is less finite than mine, if we need more for car repairs or a new boiler or holiday, he always pays that. If I needed any money for an unexpected personal expense, he pays for that too.

I’d never have just a joint account with pooled money. I like having my own money and not having to ask Dh if I can make a big purchase, which I’d need to do if we had one pot for everything. Neither of us has any idea what the other spends money on and I like it like that.

Offloadontome · 26/09/2025 10:29

Married nearly 10 years, have 2 kids.
We both have our own account, and we get our wages paid into our own accounts.
We then have a joint account, and we each pay an agreed amount into it (basically the amount means we both have roughly an equal amount left over as personal spend. DH earns more so contributes more. I earn less so I contribute less. It's not a % of our wages. But as an example, I earn 1k and I put in 500 so I'm left with 500. He earns 1.5k so he puts in 1k so he's left with 500.)

From the joint account we pay all bills, mortgage, childcare, food shopping, kids stuff, petrol etc. and any family days out or meals out.

We are then pretty flexible if we need to put extra in the joint account for an extra expense, one or both of us will top it up, or we'll just pay out of our own accounts for stuff.

I've also looked into having "one pot" of money and it just being "our" money, but DH isn't on board with that and the current way works for us, so we've left it as it is for now. We're married so whatever is his is mine and vice versa anyway, and if I can't afford something I want he might offer to pay, and vice versa.

I'm very passionate about being recognised for the non monetary contributions I bring to the household and that's why we try to make spend equal. For example if I didn't work part time and do most of the child care and drop offs, DH wouldn't be able to work away and earn more than me.

Didshejustsaythatoutloud · 26/09/2025 10:29

Separate bank acc, joint bills acc, joint savings acc and separate savings acc.
Works well for us

saywhatdidhesay · 26/09/2025 10:29

Same as @flev I earn double DH and some. What we have to save and spend is equal as we consider ourselves partners. In the past it has been him earning more, so it all goes in the pot and we have the same ‘spending money’

EmeraldDreams73 · 26/09/2025 10:30

Everything goes into our joint account. That's our main everyday account for spending and bills. We both have a separate account (mine is used for my self employed work, but everything is swept across to joint once tax is squirrelled away). Dh's other account is from before he met me but his wages go into the joint one (as did a cheque from his parents a few months ago), so I don't think there's much at all in that one.

As far as we're concerned, we're a team and it's all family money. Especially relevant as I have two late teen/young adult DDs and he has no kids of his own, this is a second marriage. He could easily have kept everything separate but hasn't.

Heylittlesongbird · 26/09/2025 10:30

Everything is “ours”. We pay salaries into the joint account. Our credit cards are paid from there too. We each have a credit card in our own name, but have the other as a cardholder on it.

At the moment DH is by far the higher earner, but it’s swapped around over the years.

More savings are technically in my name, but we consider them as ours irrespective of whose name they’re in.

But we have the same mindset about finances, saving and spending so it works for us.

RosesAndHellebores · 26/09/2025 10:31

We have been married for 34 years and have never had a joint account. In the early days, when everything was in my name because I had my own house, dh wrote me a cheque for half. I had a prenup.

When I gave up work for 7 years he wrote all the cheques and settled up with me at the end of the month for food and family spends.

When I went back to work I started to buy the dc's clothes and some of their activities and he paid me housekeeping for food.

Mostly he outearned me by a factor of at least ten. In the last ten years, it's evened up and I pay for my car, and someone the food.

Most things are still in my name. Some for tax efficiency.

We run our finances separately and it works for us. We know where details of each others' accounts and certificates are. We buy what we want independently and would discuss a car or kitchen. Not curtains or a golf club subscription. About 15 years ago he brought home a very expensive sports car, which I christened the wank mobile. There was no consultation, as there wasn't real consultation when he bought our home in France or a doer upper for me to renovate (never lived in it).

It works for us because we are both sensible with money, have enough and he isn't a stingy arsehole.

pizzaHeart · 26/09/2025 10:31

Everything into joint account.
Each has ISA and a saving account, money divided equally between them.
Biggish spendings are discussed.
None of us has expensive hobbies by the way.

ACR7 · 26/09/2025 10:32

Everything into joint account. We then each get allocated a certain amount of money for our own spend. Based on what we have spare that month. We always get the same spends as each other to do with what we please.

Getoffofmyland · 26/09/2025 10:32

My husband always earned more than me, but when we married we had a joint account straight away and everything goes in there and comes out if there. Both spend as we like, big purchases discussed… helps that we are both very similar in our attitudes to money and our spending habits

PenCreed · 26/09/2025 10:32

No kids. Joint account for bills, DH works out what we both owe and have spent each month and so what needs to go into the joint account. He earns more than me (especially as I’m currently PT although not for long) so he covers more of it. He does the budget and it includes money for frivolous spending as well as eg house stuff or holidays. We agree larger spending between us.

It will get a budget shake up next year when my salary goes back up and the mortgage is paid off. We might get round to getting some work done on the house as a reward!

TwoBlueFish · 26/09/2025 10:32

Before kids we each had separate accounts and paid equal amounts into a joint account for bills. DH earned about 10% than me but we were both in well payed jobs.

After kids we switched to just using the joint account and everything was just household money.

thismummyslife · 26/09/2025 10:33

After we got married, all our money goes into the one point and everything is joint. We started off with me being the higher earner and now my husband is, but it’s always consider our money. We are lucky in a
sense that our outlook about spending and saving is very well matched

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