I'm really just curious. Do you and your partner share your family's income or is everything separate; money, accounts, savings, etc. Feel free to explain why this works for you.

joint accounts.

our main account is joint. I have a separate savings acct with our bef in it. Dh works full-time and I work occassionally if that makes any difference.

We share everything. What is his is mine and what is mine is his. :)

we share everything (well except that cash I got stashed in my undie drawer :lol)

Yes, all our income and debts are shared. But we came in to our marriage completely debt free, so all our debts have been incurred together and it makes sense that all our income is pooled together too. Because I've been a grad student for much of our married life and working low-paying TAs, it also wouldn't make sense to split up the bills and savings accounts - DH has always made the bulk of the money.

I manage the money and prepare the taxes because DH hates to do this stuff. But we always talk to each other whenever we make purchases over $50.

We share everything. We have on income-provider and we do our budgeting together. We each get the same amount of spending money, and we use one account to pay bills.

We share everything. We have on income-provider and we do our budgeting together. We each get the same amount of spending money, and we use one account to pay bills.

same here.

We both came from backgrounds were money was a source of control in our parent's relationships so from the beginning of living together we decided on a what's mine is yours relationship.

We have equal responsibility in our financial lives. We trust each other not to go crazy and spend lots of money on stupid stuff.

I have friends whose partners will spend thousands on hunting trips or guns or electronics, you name it. If that was going on in our house, it would be a huge problem but because DH and I share to same desires for saving for retirement, standard of living, etc, total sharing works for us.

Thats not to say we don't sometimes question the other's spending habits (his $10 per week lottery habit, my hair color bills, etc.) but overall we are on the same page. Any large purchase is discussed ahead of time.

While DH has historically earned more than me, my income was always contributed greatly to the household. Maybe the near-equality has shaped our money relationship.

We share everything. Spending outside of the regular budget is agreed upon first.

Somewhere in between. We each have separate savings, checking, and credit card accounts, but we also have joint checking and savings accounts and a joint mortgage, car title, etc. We each contribute to the joint accounts $X per month (based loosely on our incomes) and pay all joint expenses from that, and whatever is left in our personal accounts is personal money. This system works well for us and I don't plan to change it. I would personally not be comfortable not having my own private financial accounts.

We have one joint account. We share absolutely all income and bills, except we both have a little Mad Money separately, so I chose Other.

We share everything. We have on income-provider and we do our budgeting together. We each get the same amount of spending money, and we use one account to pay bills.

:yeah:

We both contribute a preset amount of money to a joint account each month for bills, savings, groceries and vehicle maintenance. Whatever is left over from our incomes we keep individually and spend as we like. We also buy our own gas, since that's something we can control our usage on to a large degree.
I'm the house accountant responsible for paying all the bills and allocating savings.
This works out well for us because we're not married yet, so there's still a little bit of separation there. We'll probably keep a similar situation in place after we marry because, quite frankly, DP is hopeless with money. He's not an extravagant spender, but he just has no clue how to manage his money. I think it's an ADD thing. He gives a set amount of money that covers all the necessities of the budget and savings. Then he can blow whatever's left on microbrewed beer and model airplanes. It's entirely up to him how he spends his mad money, which is approximately 1/8 of the total household revenue each month. And it's nice because I don't have to care how he spends it, since the important things already are covered.
Oh, and we're getting ready to buy a house together. We're currently living in a house that I own solely. He pays about half the mortgage, which is way below market rate rent.

Everything is shared, except of course for retirement accounts, but they will be shared upon distribution.

We are a team, a partnership. We're on the same page financially. We have the same financial goals and very similar spending habits. We both earn our income out of the homes, in approximately the same amounts. I see no advantage to doing it any other way for us.

married almost 9 y. everything shared. Except for recent proceeds of property bought and paid off before marriage >> kiddos will inherit.

and I should add, we both are salaried professionals.

We share everything. We have on income-provider and we do our budgeting together. We each get the same amount of spending money, and we use one account to pay bills.

We have one joint account. We share absolutely all income and bills, except we both have a little Mad Money separately, so I chose Other.

The same as the above but I didn't choose "other" I chose "share everything."

He makes all the money, so I hope he shares with me! Yes, we have one account and all of the money is shared. We have lived with a budget for so long that money is one of the easiest pieces of our marriage. Moeny goes to the mortgage, to food, to clothes, to the kids's activities, etc...none of it really feels like 'mine' or 'his'. It is all just part of the family budget. But then, we have been married a loooooong time.

We share everything equally: one joint account, investment/saving accounts in both our names.

We share everything jointly. Purchases of over $150 are talked about prior to buying.

We have joint accounts now since I am a SAHM. When I worked we each had separate accounts. I either gave DH a specific amount of money each month or paid bills from my check book in that amount. It worked for us because we were very different in our spending. I tend to be more frugal and watch sales, use coupons, shop second hand, etc. If he wanted something he would just go buy it without paying much attention to the cost. As long as our bills were paid it worked out fine. I closed my checking account when I became a full time SAHM. Now we share accounts and DH does try to be less of a splurge shopper. Although after telling me the other day that we only had $120 left until payday he went out and bought a new computer game while picking up DD's $50 medicine!! :hammer I think he does things like that so that I won't ask him to go to the store for me!

Joint here too.

We have one that he isnt on but its for the kids and he just wasnt there when I opened it. He can access it online if he wanted though....

We used to share everything. We still have a joint savings and checking account that my $ from work goes in but DW also has her own account. She is on disability and it is the easiest way to be able to show where her $ is going if social security ever asks us to prove where her $ is being used.

We share everything.

Everything that can be joint is, and everything that can't (retirement accounts, pensions, etc) we list each other as beneficiaries.

And our religious beliefs are that we own one another's bodies, as well.

We used to have one account. But, neither one of us agreed on the way the other spent money, so in the interest of not allowing money to become a huge issue, we have a joint account and each of us has a seperate account. When I worked, then obviously his money went into his account and mine went into my account. Now that I'm not working, half of his paycheck is deposited into each indv. account. Then, we transfer the $$ we've agreed upon to pay our "half" of the bills, and then he can't argue that I'm spending more than he is, and I don't get upset if I want to save for something and he blows the money on video games. It works for us!

All joint accounts.

We always know what the other's up to money-wise - except when I have to buy clothes or (cloth) diapers for the kids. Then I just give him a heads up. Heck, the other day he stopped by TRU to see if they had anything our 4yo would like for his birthday (in a few weeks), and called me to get my take on which train accessory kiddo would like better (and that wouldn't drive me nuts with sounds or whatever). And we know all the passwords into all our bill-paying stuff, as well as paypal and blah blah blah.

Oh, his 401k is in his name, but I'm one of the beneficiaries, and same deal with our life insurance policies.

And our religious beliefs are that we own one another's bodies, as well.

what does this mean?

We have a joint checking account (viewable to both of us), into which DH deposits his paycheck every two weeks. That account pays all our bills. We also have a joint savings account, though it's only got a few cents currently.

As for individual accounts, we both have retirement accounts in our own names (with each other as beneficiaries), and I have a money market account in my own name from before we were married (also with only a few dollars in it, alas!). We also have individual checking accounts, into which we deposit things like birthday money (we used to have "fun money" allowances that went into our individual accounts, too, but there's no room in the budget currently for those). That way, we have some autonomy in our spending. Our system works pretty well -- it strikes a nice balance.

Our accounts are all joint, except our grocery money is in my personal account. There's never too much in it anyway.

Everything is ours, we share everything.

joint accounts. This subject comes up from time to time on here. I'll see if I can pull up some of the old threads with a search.

We have joint accounts.

We have seperate accounts. For the first 5 or so yrs of marriage we had a joint account but we're not the absolute best in keeping up with debit card purchases, checks written, etc. It got to the point of us asking each other, what was that 10 bucks for, what was that 25 bucks for, etc. It became a point of tension. Dh decided to go to seperate accounts and at first I was upset but after a month or so and we were no longer questioning each other's purchases it was nice. Generally he has certain bills that he pays and I have certain bills that I pay simply becaue that's the way that we broke them down to be even in accordance to our different amounts of income. However should one of us come up short for whatever reason the other one doesn't bat an eyelash at picking up that bill. Also, I must say, dh just doesn't understand how easy it is to spend more money at somewhere like Target than you originally intended and I don't have him bugging me about such as that any more ;)

We have always had a joint account. All our money is pooled for family expenses, regardless of who "worked for it". It is family money, and we have always done it that way.

We share everything.

I marked other. For all practical reasons we share everything.

We have a joint checking & savings acct at a brick and mortor bank in town and also a joint checking and savings at ING (Electric Orange and Orange accounts) online bank. We also have separate savings accounts at the CU for the hospital DH works for. And all our investments are separate, with each other listed as beneficiary. We got married after being single and on our own for awhile, so kept some things the way they were...

We have a joint household account. Each of us carries a debit card for that account. DH has a personal account and I have a personal account. We both know the password and pin number for each other's account but don't snoop out of courtesy. I talk about what I buy anyway :lol It's mostly fabric right now! I know what he buys cuz I see it.

We don't really have much savings right now but after we pay off the last credit card (debt free happy dance!!!!), all that we used to pay towards debt will go into savings in the household account.

All of our accounts are joint ownership, however we still have our "own" accounts for spending. Everything is joint for rights of survivorship and for taxation reasons, regardless of who the money actually belongs to and who spends it.

seperate. weirdly, everything feels shared and we've never had an issue - but dh pays most bills. yet we spend our personal money as we like.

We have a joint checking and savings. I have a personal savings through a credit union, but it is mostly there because I have had it for years and there is no real reason to close it. DP is aware of it and knows the balance.

So, joint, mostly. However, I handle all of our finances because I am good at it (and like it!) and DP is not. :)

what does this mean?

Usually that when he says, "My shoulders are killing me!" I correct him and remind him that those are my shoulders and he has to let me rub them. God says so. :lol

Shared. I manage all our money, though, by his request-- he's hopeless at it, so about a year ago he begged me to take over, and we're both very happy with the arrangement. I budget for everything, and if he wants something he asks me if we can afford it. It doesn't come up often-- we don't really have any money "left over" for purchases made just for fun, so the question of how to spend such money is really a moot point. Every dollar we have is needed in four separate places, for very essential things, and DH trusts me to make sure it's spent in the wisest way.

We have everything separate. It works out really well for us. However, my DH gives me money every month since I make way less than him.

We used to keep it all separate. Then I left my job to be a SAHM. I kept tapping into savings to fuel my checking account, so it seemed absurd to have it. DH and I merged and, now that I'm home, I'm in charge of tracking, balancing, and budgeting our finances.

Everything is separate, I mean everything. I have no access to any of DH's money, I do not even know exactly how much money he has or what he spends it on. He makes considerably more than me, his gross income is more than twice mine is.

Granted, he pays the mortgage, utility bill, phone, cable, some of the groceries, etc. But I pay the daycare bill, some of the groceries, gas/maint./repairs for my vehicle, all of of DS clothes, and all of DS medical bills not covered by insurance (copays, deductibles). Guess who comes up nearly broke before payday every single time? It sure as heck ain't him! And he still thinks I "owe" him money each month to offset the mortgage, utilities, and such. It makes me feel like a tenant living in his house rather than his wife.

I hate it, I absolutely hate it. I was against this set-up from the start. I wanted a joint account where all of OUR money went to pay bills. It wouldn't matter who pays how much of what because all of our money would be in one account together, it would all be going to pay our bills. DH just thinks I want to spend all of his money and bleed him dry. He has said many times he doesn't want me touching HIS money. Gee, I thougt all of it was OURS, regardless of who earns more.

On a somewhat related note, I just found out recently that DH has made no changes whatsoever to any of his assets since we've been married. My name is not on the deed to the house, I am not listed as benficiary of any life insurance (his parents are WTF?), retirement savings etc. I changed all of that stuff right after we got married so DH is beneficiary of all my life insurance, retirement savings, etc. I may not have much, but DH gets all of my assests if I die. What would my situation be if something (God forbid) happened to him. We don't have a will or anything drawn up. I honestly don't believe he has done any of this with any ill intent, he just never bothered to do anything about it. I have the feeling that I could really get screwed some day.

OK, that got really long and ranty. This whole thing just depresses me.

We share a main account, and I have an account from parents to CYA... So, what's his is mine and what's mine is, uhm... mine? Call me the budget volcano...

Unrelated, we always joke about how my standard of living would go up if he dies before me. Well it was funny at the time, anyway...

Somewhere in between. We each have separate savings, checking, and credit card accounts, but we also have joint checking and savings accounts and a joint mortgage, car title, etc. We each contribute to the joint accounts $X per month (based loosely on our incomes) and pay all joint expenses from that, and whatever is left in our personal accounts is personal money. This system works well for us and I don't plan to change it. I would personally not be comfortable not having my own private financial accounts.



This is how we do this too. However, we haven't had any extra for our personal accounts.. we are struggling to keep the joint account open:irked:

we share everything (well except that cash I got stashed in my undie drawer :lol)
:thumb..yep that one :D

We have household and separate accounts but the income is shared equally- we pay towards the same bills, same savings and each have the same mad money amount. I make more than him and I can't imagine thinking that because of that, I deserve to spend more on non-household things.

I chose 'other', so I am explaining...

We have a lot of accounts. Some are joint with rights of survivorship and some are individual with the spouse as beneficiary. We each know all the pertinent information for every account and we have taken turns being responsible for maintaining our family finances over the years.