Joint bank accounts for couples?

13

Replies

  • junejadesky
    junejadesky Posts: 524 Member
    My wife and I have a joint account which we each direct deposit money into with each paycheck to pay the mortgage, bills ect.. But then we each have our own accounts for our own bills (we each of CCs) and our own personal money. We take turns buying groceries or it comes out of the joint account...it has worked out great for us. I don't hound her about what she spends her money on and she doesn't hound me.

    With a baby on the way we are going to add more money to the joint account for obvious added expenses.

    This is exactly what we do. You figure out what your monthly bills are and how much each of you owe. Then have that amount direct deposited into your joint account and all the joint bills come out of that. Works wonderful and we never fight or are stressed about money*********** well almost never :flowerforyou:
  • basslinewild
    basslinewild Posts: 294 Member
    Personally, I would never do a joint account. Most of the bills are half, but I pay for all the groceries. It evens out because he pays for all the movies we go to, when we go out to dinner, etc.
  • hbrittingham
    hbrittingham Posts: 2,518 Member
    A friend of my mother's learned the hard way. SHe and her husband only had joint bank accounts. BUT the house and cars were exclusively in his name. Right before he left her he transfer the cars and home into his girlfriend's name and cleaned out the bank account. She was left broke and homeless. Upshot....everyone should have their own set of finances along with a joint account.

    She must not have had a good attorney. Just because the house and cars are in his name doesn't mean that they belong soley to him when it comes to marital assets.
  • k8blujay2
    k8blujay2 Posts: 4,941 Member
    Yes, we have a joint bank account... it is our home and our money... not yours and mine. I heard it said one time that not having a joint account is just planning your divorce ahead of time and that makes sense to me... while I understand some people can make it work it just wouldn't work out for us.
  • vjohn04
    vjohn04 Posts: 2,276 Member
    No. We keep our money separate. Most relationships strain when it comes to money matters and can sometimes make or break a relationship.

    We keep ours separate. 100%.
    As long as the bills get paid, we're good.
  • gypy
    gypy Posts: 83 Member
    Me & the other half put a certain amount into our joint account each month, for bills & anything we may both need. We then keep an amount in our own acounts, for our individual use.

    Its good this way, she can't see my McDonalds & supplement transactions.
  • OMG_Twinkies
    OMG_Twinkies Posts: 215 Member
    My fiance and I (together 8 years) are doing a joint checking acct for bills, house things, vacations together, etc. But we each also have our own checking accounts that we put 15% of our paychecks into for personal "do whatever you want with it" spending or saving. Been working great for us :)
  • Blacklance36
    Blacklance36 Posts: 755 Member
    We have a joint account and after 25 years of marriage she slowed her working full time to working part time and started mainly living off of my wages. I now work 10 hour days with three weeks off a year and she works 6 hour days and has three months off a year. She travels and goes for fine dinners and lives a high life off of my labors.

    Im thinking of ending my marriage because I feel used and have told her so but nothing is changing.
  • rosellasweet
    rosellasweet Posts: 163 Member
    Yes, we have a joint bank account... it is our home and our money... not yours and mine. I heard it said one time that not having a joint account is just planning your divorce ahead of time and that makes sense to me... while I understand some people can make it work it just wouldn't work out for us.

    I've had people telling us we're going to break up since we started dating just because we don't do everything the "normal" way. I've seen all sorts of relationships fail and many others succeed. The truth is that there is no determining factor that a marriage will fail. Other than the emotional and mental effort that people put into it. Not the monitary.
  • Jackson4590
    Jackson4590 Posts: 145 Member
    Been married five years.

    One joint checking account and joint savings/stocks/etc accounts. My thought truly is if you cannot trust your partner with money how can you expect to trust them with your house, children, or future? I never thought twice about it and until now it has never come up. I make about 40% more than her but that doesn't matter to me - we are a team.
  • NovemberJune
    NovemberJune Posts: 2,525 Member
    We are married and living together and we have a shared account.
  • HannahJDiaz25
    HannahJDiaz25 Posts: 329 Member
    We are married, living together and all the main expenses are handled by our joint account.
    We have main joint account and a savings account.
    For a long time this was it. It worked well, except I always felt a teeny weeny but guilty when I splurged on myself. (he never made me feel like this...I just had trouble spending "our" money on "me")
    So we opened "fun" accounts for both of us. We put a set amount in the accounts each paycheck and that is our splurge money. Now I can buy shoes without guilt! Since it is specifically for fun stuff. YAY
    As for bills, groceries etc, we talk about it together and plan each week. Money has never been an issue with us, even when we were totally broke.
  • emergencytennis
    emergencytennis Posts: 864 Member
    My wife and I have a joint account which we each direct deposit money into with each paycheck to pay the mortgage, bills ect.. But then we each have our own accounts for our own bills (we each of CCs) and our own personal money. We take turns buying groceries or it comes out of the joint account...it has worked out great for us. I don't hound her about what she spends her money on and she doesn't hound me.

    With a baby on the way we are going to add more money to the joint account for obvious added expenses.

    This is exactly what we do. You figure out what your monthly bills are and how much each of you owe. Then have that amount direct deposited into your joint account and all the joint bills come out of that. Works wonderful and we never fight or are stressed about money*********** well almost never :flowerforyou:

    Sorry to pick on you, You are a married couple, so how do you work out how much each of you owe? You are a household, and the accounting is how much the household owes, n'est pas? Any extra money left over after the bills are paid is shared money, 50/50.
  • HannahJDiaz25
    HannahJDiaz25 Posts: 329 Member
    Been married five years.

    One joint checking account and joint savings/stocks/etc accounts. My thought truly is if you cannot trust your partner with money how can you expect to trust them with your house, children, or future? I never thought twice about it and until now it has never come up. I make about 40% more than her but that doesn't matter to me - we are a team.
    '

    This is how my husband and I see it too!
  • Onesnap
    Onesnap Posts: 2,819 Member
    Hubby and I started dating when we were 17. We were both working at the time (so it just made sense) and got married when we were 23. We always had separate accounts too (and still do. We're 36 now).

    If you both work I suggest having a joint account and two separate accounts. Same with credit cards. This way you can always buy things that will not show up on his radar (either gifts, or something for yourself). I also have a credit card I just use for work travel.
  • MelsAuntie
    MelsAuntie Posts: 2,833 Member
    Joint account for the whole 42 years to date. Easier by far. Part of the time he was the primary breadwinner, then for 23 years I was the one working. HE is in charge of the finances, I don't WANT to have to deal with it.
  • michellechawner
    michellechawner Posts: 892
    Right now we've only been dating 2.5 years, so we have separate accounts - we are discussing marriage within the next year or 2 in which case we will be doing joint accounts so either one of us can access money in an emergency - and We decided a very long time ago that I will be handling all finances as he is bad with money and loves to impulse buy and then he runs out of money and complains... so I am the planner and I will handle all finances.
  • dwalt15110
    dwalt15110 Posts: 246 Member
    I think this is more than just a simplistic problem. You need to know the law in your state. In mine, if I was married and my spouse did something that would render a lawsuit being pursued against him, then, in order to gain restitution, anything that had his name on it could be attached to settle the debt. That is why here it is so important to keep assests separate: houses, cars, bank accts, 401Ks etc. Don't just do something because you're married and you think everything about you should be joint. Make an informed decision to protect your assets for you and your family.
  • Onesnap
    Onesnap Posts: 2,819 Member
    Been married five years.

    One joint checking account and joint savings/stocks/etc accounts. My thought truly is if you cannot trust your partner with money how can you expect to trust them with your house, children, or future? I never thought twice about it and until now it has never come up. I make about 40% more than her but that doesn't matter to me - we are a team.
    '

    This is how my husband and I see it too!

    I don't see having separate accounts (and together accounts) as a trust issue. We're together nearly 19 years now and we've always had joint checking and separate checking (direct deposit from our payrolls). My husband handles all of the bills now (we have 2 homes, and one rental property so there's a lot to handle). I used to when I was the breadwinner but he's done a great job balancing it all over the years.

    I would never see a separate account as a trust issue. I travel a lot for work and it helps to have a separate account and separate credit card. I travel all over the US and it just works for us. His side business account is also separate.

    I just say don't judge--you have to do what works for you!
  • Onesnap
    Onesnap Posts: 2,819 Member
    Joint account for the whole 42 years to date. Easier by far.

    Depends what your situation is. You have to do what works for you. It has always worked for us to have joint and together accounts.
  • rosellasweet
    rosellasweet Posts: 163 Member
    Been married five years.

    One joint checking account and joint savings/stocks/etc accounts. My thought truly is if you cannot trust your partner with money how can you expect to trust them with your house, children, or future? I never thought twice about it and until now it has never come up. I make about 40% more than her but that doesn't matter to me - we are a team.
    '

    This is how my husband and I see it too!

    I don't see having separate accounts (and together accounts) as a trust issue. We're together nearly 19 years now and we've always had joint checking and separate checking (direct deposit from our payrolls). My husband handles all of the bills now (we have 2 homes, and one rental property so there's a lot to handle). I used to when I was the breadwinner but he's done a great job balancing it all over the years.

    I would never see a separate account as a trust issue. I travel a lot for work and it helps to have a separate account and separate credit card. I travel all over the US and it just works for us. His side business account is also separate.

    I just say don't judge--you have to do what works for you!

    ^^^ This, this, this.
  • dearly4ever
    dearly4ever Posts: 61 Member
    Hubby and I used to have joint everything when we first started dating and then continued that once we got married. We recently split our direct deposits into having a joint account just for bills and a joint savings account we each put money in. Whatever is left over we put into our own accounts but we each have access to the others account. It just made it easier that way, you spend without feeling guilty LOL. He can go golfing to his hearts content and I can buy shoes to my hearts content ha ha and it seems to be working great so far.
  • gangsterfurious
    gangsterfurious Posts: 56
    My husband and I have a joint-account. We've decided that I do the budgeting and pay the bills because I'm a little more organized on that front than he is. After I take care of things and put some money aside, I write him a check and he deposits it into his personal account, this is his spending money that he has left for the month. I do the same and transfer the money electronically into my own personal account. Seems to work well, that way if we want to buy each other a gift or do something we don't want the other person to know about (not like THAT), we don't have to worry about the other person seeing it.

    Also, we do much better financially this way for some reason. Maybe it's because I can see the bigger picture with both of our incomes combined.
  • RunsOnEspresso
    RunsOnEspresso Posts: 3,218 Member
    We have separate. We have talked about joint but never got around to it. It's just not necessary since we have a system that works for us.

    He moved in with me so all the bills were already in my name and set up to my bank account. We have a spreadsheet in which I enter the bills, tally it up and halve it. He usually gets groceries so those go on the spreadsheet and reduce what he owes. Then he sends a check as needed.

    He currently makes more than me now but he pays for anything I need/want if I can't cover it. When I was making more, I paid.

    I think the key is to find what works for both of you.
  • Onesnap
    Onesnap Posts: 2,819 Member
    Been married five years.

    One joint checking account and joint savings/stocks/etc accounts. My thought truly is if you cannot trust your partner with money how can you expect to trust them with your house, children, or future? I never thought twice about it and until now it has never come up. I make about 40% more than her but that doesn't matter to me - we are a team.
    '

    This is how my husband and I see it too!

    I don't see having separate accounts (and together accounts) as a trust issue. We're together nearly 19 years now and we've always had joint checking and separate checking (direct deposit from our payrolls). My husband handles all of the bills now (we have 2 homes, and one rental property so there's a lot to handle). I used to when I was the breadwinner but he's done a great job balancing it all over the years.

    I would never see a separate account as a trust issue. I travel a lot for work and it helps to have a separate account and separate credit card. I travel all over the US and it just works for us. His side business account is also separate.

    I just say don't judge--you have to do what works for you!

    ^^^ This, this, this.

    Thank you. :flowerforyou:
  • Athena53
    Athena53 Posts: 717 Member
    Separate accounts. I'm a financial control freak. I earn the bulk of the money (DH is retired and on SS). DH writes me a check every month from whatever he hasn't spent and I figure out what to do with it. Most of it goes into savings. I'd go nuts if we had a joint account and money disappeared as DH made withdrawals or debit card purchases even though his spending is modest (and mostly household stuff). Totally irrational, but I'm more comfortable with him spending what he wants/needs and then figuring out what to do with the balance at the end of the month. The investments are all in my name and DH would rather have root canal than talk to our financial advisor. He knows roughly how much we have and what kind of things it's invested in, and that the billas all get paid. That's enough for him. I trust him enough that he's an Authorized User on my credit cards so we can both accumulate hotel/airline points. That's something I woudl never have done with my first husband- the guy was an out-of-control spender.
  • Vivian06703188
    Vivian06703188 Posts: 310 Member
    No one ever wants to think about the financial trouble of a joint account. I have been married a couple of times and this is what I would suggest after trusting and having my account cleaned out when he was having an affair I didn't know about. You keep your personal account and put a right of survivor on the account in his name (this can easily be changed at any time). This is not a joint account it just means if anything happens to you he won't have to go through probate to get at your money and all of that money will go directly to him and not into an estate. Have him put a right of survivor on his account. Then open a joint account just for the bills and each of you when you get paid transfer your portion of the bill money into that account plus 20 dollars. At the end of the year when you reconcile the accounts you will have overdraft protection and the remaining money can be used for a cruise so your holiday is paid for. This is a win win you have security and a joint account to pay bills.
  • ClareWantsProgress
    ClareWantsProgress Posts: 173 Member
    Joint account. We're a team. Extra money from sideline jobs goes into a "fun account" for concerts, clothes, etc., but all of the "real" stuff is shared. If I couldn't trust him with money I wouldn't have married him. :)
  • Vivian06703188
    Vivian06703188 Posts: 310 Member
    Oh did I mention my first marriage lasted 16 years so don't think time mean a dam thing a man changes and will clean you out.
  • jaimrlx
    jaimrlx Posts: 426 Member
    If you have a good dynamic and trust in your partner, go for it. I was cheated on, left, kicked out and all of my money stolen right after a paycheck when I was young(er) and dumb. It's a scary thing, but it sounds like you and your husband will do just fine.

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