Finances

[Lollipop20]

What do you guys do with your finances as a couple? We are married, have a 3 year old, have our own savings, both earn well but we still have separate finances although partners earned £35K more than me last year ( we split our bills 50/50 and he pays for most things like shopping/fuel/home related stuff etc). Im just curious what other peoples ‘norm’ is for finances as a couple really and how you work them?

All income include family gifted money from both sides go into joint account, all expenses (mortgage, bills, holidays) and personal spending (his clothes, my clothes etc.) all from joint account. Neither of us have personal accounts.

We both work full time with 1 DC (4). Earning difference between us is about 20%. Savings and investments all joint. However from speaking to friends, we are the minority.

Not sure how relevant this is. Our marriage is great and we trust each other 100%. We are both happy with this setup (which is very important) and we share the same view towards money in terms of purchases and savings. I don’t think this would work if one tends to buy more expensive things and the other prefers to save.

I’m a sahm mum, all money is pooled (we both had assets when we got married). We don’t have a set allowance or anything but we trust each other to be sensible but we both check in with purchases over a certain amount (more as a sense check not asking permission) . Works for us. People do things differently but no-one should be disadvantaged or feel resentful. Honestly though I’d feel awful if I had significantly more disposable income than DH.

All earnings go into a joint account. All bills and personal spending comes out of the joint account. Married 36 years and it's never been a problem. At various times one of us hasn't been earning (at Uni) and it's varied who earns the most. We discuss big purchases and have the view money in a long term relationship is shared.

Everything goes into the joint account, everything including credit card payments comes out of the joint account. Very simple. We are both mid 30s if that is relevant.

DH and I earn about the same. He has higher salary but I have income from btl houses. After tax it works out similar. We both put £1k into our joint account each week. We've just finished paying for our mortgage this month so in future it will just have to pay other bills and food. Salary goes into our own accounts. I get PIP too into my own account. We both pay our own mobiles, pay for personal expenses such as hair cut and buy gifts out of our own money. We have joint savings and personal savings. While my niece was at uni I sent her money into her bank account each month as I knew my sister could not afford it. I would not have felt comfortable taking that out of joint money. I know my dh occasionally gives some money to his Mum who is old and always feels cold so has heating on very high. If ever we split up we both know everything would just be 50:50.

Everything is shared in our house. We get paid into a joint account and transfer enough for bills into another joint account just for bills.
What's left in the account our wages go into is available to both of us for anything we need or want - food, fuel and fun.

I earn far less than DH as I'm part time and term time but I have our son the rest of the week and both children in the holidays so we save on holiday clubs and wrap around care. DH would never see it as he earns more so is entitled to more - he earns more which obviously pays for more for our boys but what I don't provide in financial income I make up for in childcare, flexibility in work to cover things like inset days and not having to source holiday cover every time a school holiday comes around.

Ever since we moved in and bought our first home we did joint finances. We put all of our earnings into one joint acct, all bills and daily expenditure come out of that and then we each have allocated spending money (same amount each) transfer back out each month to personal acts.

My husband earns 7x what I earn. We're married so whatever is his is mine and vice versa. We make all financial decisions together.

I think the difficulty comes when women go part time or even become stay at home parents to look after children. And then perhaps put their career on the back burner to remain part time and care for the children, House, husband etc. So sacrificing individual earnings and wealth for the entire family unit.

Equally if a man did this I feel it would be fair to combine finances if married.

Similar to some of the replies above, all of our money goes into one joint account. We have been doing this since we were dating. We have been married for 12 yrs and have 2 DC. I am a SAHM now and DH has a good salary.

All income goes into the joint account, and all payments and bills come out from that account. We have several saving / investment accounts, all of which are under my name but we share accesses.

We trust each other completely and will always discuss if we need to make big purchases. I usually do all the everyday shopping and generally we dont check on the expenses unless something doesnt seem right. We decide togther how much money we would save into which account each month and talk about long term finacial plans.

We see everything as ours and never argue over money. Hubby is a saver and im a spender, but nothing unreasonable, it works well for us. I dont understand how people can keep things all separately specially when there are kids involved. Some of the comments I have read sound to me like flatmates arrangement rather than a family.