Division of money with huge discrepancy in earnings

[CC2021]

I'm a student so my take home (student loan and a bursary) is 7x less than DH's. We currently put everything into a joint account and pay for everything out of there. However we would like to start putting a monthly amount into our own accounts. Long story short DH feels self conscious buying anything so would feel more comfortable if he had a set amount in his own account. He's got no issues with me spending from joint account but I really struggle with budgeting and would feel a lot better if I had a set amount in my account and once it's gone, it's gone.

So, how do we do this? I hate that I take home so much less than him and feel so guilty for being a student and therefore not bringing much into the household pot. I feel really guilty with the idea of taking the same amount as him. How much is a reasonable amount?

I don't think you should feel guilty for earning less - the point of being married is that you're a joint unit who share your earthly and other goods

In terms of how much it should be, I think it depends what this individual monthly amount is for.

Is it 'disposable' income that is for nice-to-have but unecessary things you want e.g. new clothes, coffees with friends etc. ?
Or is it to cover any individual necessities e.g. basic toiletries, running your car?

Either way, I definitely think it makes sense for you to have a set amount if you have any problems at all with budgeting. If your DH is more sensible with money AND he is the financial breadwinner, it's hard to see how resentment wouldn't build up if you started spending frivolously.

Personally I would pay for all individual necessities from the joint account so you both have your needs taken care of, but the separate set amount is for any individual nice-to-have spending and must not be exceeded. Best to have an open discussion with him about the amounts that feel comfortable for you both. I would tot up my typical nice to have spending (excluding anything especially expensive) and use that as a guide, but obviously if you're someone who tends to overspend already on unnecessary things e.g. lots of meals out instead of sometimes taking a packed lunch, this is an opportunity to start reining your spending in.

Thank you for your reply @LilyWater. The separate account money would be for any nice to haves. Also individual necessities will continue to be from joint account. My worry is without reigning it in, he will resent me. He says he doesn't but for how much longer...

Is £100 a month reasonable? It's what he's suggested for his own account so I wasn't sure if it was reasonable to suggest the same? If I really think about it, it seems a lot (for me personally) but then I guess it really isn't considering how much I have been spending up until this point.

Work out how much you have left after all bills and food is paid for and then go from there.
My DH earns more than 50 times what I earn. All household expenses are paid from our joint account. I then take £600 per month for my own personal expenses, I also keep my own wages. My DH doesn’t take out a set amount but just buys stuff from time to time. He spends less than me.

My first question would be: what is he upto?🤔
Why the sudden change? What does he not want you to see?

I've never had a joint account with husband or partners so it's not that I feel the need to see what the money is spent on. But this change would make me Very uncomfortable.

I was the higher earner for 15 years - we had a joint account that wages were paid in to then transferred the same amount each into our own accounts for spends. Very fair as we think of all money as family money.

@CC2021

Thank you for your reply *@LilyWater*. The separate account money would be for any nice to haves. Also individual necessities will continue to be from joint account. My worry is without reigning it in, he will resent me. He says he doesn't but for how much longer...

Is £100 a month reasonable? It's what he's suggested for his own account so I wasn't sure if it was reasonable to suggest the same? If I really think about it, it seems a lot (for me personally) but then I guess it really isn't considering how much I have been spending up until this point.

I think your DH's self-consciousness is not uncommon. When it comes to joint finances it definitely can make you feel guilty when you decide to spend £80 on new trainers or a bigger spend on a hobby after several months of frugality.

£100 a month sounds reasonable if that's his suggestion. From what you've said he sounds like a sensible man and I don't think he will begrudge you wanting the same amount. You can both spend that as you wish on treats for yourselves.

Joint account for everything else. And I assume you regularly move money from joint accounts into joint savings?

Thanks all. To answer the questions:

@willsa I wouldn't really call it a sudden change. He's barely bought anything over the last year. He sees everything in the joint account as our money and feels guilty spending what he sees as our money and would just feel more comfortable with having money he can call his own. We used to have our own accounts and then everything got combined a few years ago, I can't remember when or why now. I think he felt a lot more comfortable then and it's really getting to him that he feels like he can't buy anything - fwiw he can buy whatever he wants as far as I'm concerned but he just doesn't feel comfortable. If having separate accounts makes him feel more comfortable then I'm totally onboard with that.

@PizzaForOne he really is a sensible man. We move money every month into a joint savings account. Well we have two - one for things like MOT, car insurance etc and then a more longer term joint savings account.

It depends on your incomes. 100 would buy you a dress in Zara, a meal in Pizza Express and a couple of coffees. For a youngish student that seems quite reasonable, but isn't a huge amount if you're in your 30s and earning. How much do you normally have left in the joint account at the end of the month? Maybe work that out and divide it into 3: 1/3 extra savings (possibly into a holiday or fun savings pot rather than a when the car breaks down pot) and 1/3 each.

We do it the other way around. Most of our money is ours and we each have our own saving (for big things the other doesn't really see the point of: skiing in my case and iphones in his!) We then have joint holiday savings and official savings for boring things like washing machines. We also have a joint account for shopping, eating out and takeaways. If we took turns to pay, we'd both feel it was 'my' money and wasting it on takeaways. If it's from the joint account, somehow we're less mean about it and enjoy life more :D

We have a similar set-up - all our incomings go into a joint account, and we take out £X/mth each into separate accounts that we can do what we want with. It works well - guilt-free spending from our own accounts.

How much we get each month has varied depending on how comfortably off we are. At one point we only had £20/mth each, because our childcare costs + mortgage were huge. Things have relaxed since then :)

Similar situation, my wife a SAHM. Take home ~5.5k/mo, we each take 60 quid a week for hobbies/non-essential personal spending.

Just IMO it should be the same amount each. Up until recently hers was higher because of the higher cost of women's haircuts, but we have moved haircuts to joint spending.

I would feel guilty if I was your DH taking more than you, but I get people will have different opinions.

I think you should probably have the same amount of spending money. It may not always be the case that you are the lower earner, you might end up on a high wage eventually, or he might change jobs or face redundancy one day, so it's all swings and roundabouts in a long lifetime together, hopefully.

But you need to start being responsible about budgeting - it's no point hand-waving it as if you can't learn it, you can and should.

But you need to start being responsible about budgeting - it's no point hand-waving it as if you can't learn it, you can and should.

Yes I know. I'm trying and I figure having a set amount to spend per month is the first step. We've also agreed a monthly grocery budget as we were overspending there too - well, me really since I do the food shop. So we've agreed the set amount for that and will go back to meal planning too which will help us stay within that budget.

We do what your DH proposes. We have determined that 150 pounds per person fits well within our finances.

From the 150 pounds we pay clothes, shoes, hair cuts, beauty products (me), games (DH), books, presents for friends and going out. Basically everything that we do separately from eachother.

This set up works really well. I don't feel guilty when I spend 80 pounds on shoes. I don't get annoyed when he buys yet another Xbox game.

@CC2021 we have an entirely separate account for groceries. Once a month I put money into it. It has lead to eating soup and bread on more than one occasion during the last week of the month . It makes it much easier to not overspend.

You need to work out what your joint expenses each month are, and then pay into that account proportionately to what you earn so you're equitably contributing to your shared expenses. What you have left over is yours to keep to spend or save/invest. Unless your wages are very low, I would think you would have more than £100 per month. Your dh should be paying 7x more than you are for shared expenses, so what is left over for each of you is then your own personal money. If the amounts are significantly different and your dh wants to transfer more to your account to even things out, great.

We have a 100% 0% discrepancy in finances. What works for us is that we have a very similar attitude to spending and we would discuss any big spends together.

So we have one joint account and that's it. No individual accounts for personal spends. We do have savings accounts and they are in individual names but they aren't seen as mine or his, they just happen to be in those names and partly for historic or tax reasons.

Money (mine) goes in. Bills and shopping gets paid for. If either of us wants to buy something we do.

Bigger spends are discussed, we know how much will be in the bank at the end of the month, if it's different we would discuss it. We have a joint savings plan.

I can't have DH coming to me feeling guilty if he needs shoes or his computer is broken, or even if he wants a hobby item, he's a grown man I love and respect, it would be embarrassing for both of us.

We also have a huge difference - my DW runs a small business which is essentially a glorified hobby, makes very little money. My income is in six figures. I pay all the bills and give her a monthly sum which is hers, though she does spend some of it on food shopping etc.

We decided against joint accounts years ago, I don't feel the need to know where her money goes and I wouldn't want her analysing every entry on my bank statement either. Not because there's anything untoward about it but because I think it would make us defensive and potentially lead to arguments.

@CuteOrangeElephant I love your suggestion of a separate grocery account! I mentioned it to DH and he likes that idea so we're going to look at opening another account in the new year.

We've decided to go for £100 each and will see how that goes and can adjust if necessary.

Thanks all for your input on what works for you.

Good to be of help!

I will add that in our account it isn't purely groceries, it's all variable expenses such as food, eating out, days out, swimming, presents for family, cleaning stuff, random household expenses. This gives us some room to balance. If we have many days out we can spend less on groceries etc. We put 175 euro per week in there.

I found this an easy way to get a grip on our finances without starting complicated budgets.