Jan 21 2008
Family Finances
How do you manage your family finances? Do you have a black and white account of how much each of you earn or do you actually hide money from your spouse? Married couples fighting over money is a very common problem, not only in poor families but also rich ones, which do not have difficulties with the monthly bills.
I know of a couple whereby on each of her husband’s payday, the wife would transfer out a large portion from his account to a joint savings account, leaving him just enough for his daily expenses. Her husband had complained to mine but because his wife is saving for their future, he is left with no choice but to comply.
I also know of another couple whereby the husband had purposely left out his wife’s name as a joint owner when he bought his apartment, although they were on the verge of getting married at that time. Recently, the wife bought a unit trust fund in her own name and demanded that the husband pays for the monthly instalments (the husband is earning much more than the wife). He is doing so at the moment but is trying to wriggle his way out of the arrangement. I always tell my husband that they are such a funny couple because they have such distrust over each other’s monies and motives but somehow has managed to stick together.
Then, there is this woman that I know who will make a great advisor on how to hide money from your spouse. One of her ways include giving her mom quite a large sum of money each month (obviously she trusts her mom) but part of it is actually for her own savings, which her mom will deposit into an account specifically set up for the purpose. So, whenever her husband goes through her own bank balances, all he sees is a very small sum available.
Personally, I’m happy to say that I trust my husband to know how to spend responsibly and moderately. I don’t really care if he treats his friends or relatives to dinner once or twice a month (I know some spouses do make a big issue out of it) or that he has rewarded himself with a new shirt now and then. I guess I’m not a control freak in that way.
So, is money a sensitive issue in your household and do you actually control the finances of your spouse?
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We did up a budget last year — TOGETHER — where we agreed on what amount of our money went towards what…like gas, groceries, savings, tithing to the church, entertainment, etc.
I keep track of all the receipts and make sure we don’t go over budget. So far, we’ve stuck to it and we haven’t had many problems.
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Money management is definately a difficult part of marriage life isn’t? Less is a problem and more is also a problem. It is statically shown that financial problem is the main cause of divorce. Well, what to say? We cannot hide away from the fact that says “Money is the root of all evil”.
I personally thinks that trust between husband and wife is the most important thing where money matters and it shouldn’t be a sensitive issues between couple. There are many ways to manage your finances when you are married. It depends on how it suits best for you and your spouse. Both parties must agree and stick to the same decision in order to make it works well. We always hear of when we are married, “what’s yours is mine and what’s mine is yours.” Why shouldn’t this be the case where money matters?
Whenever you have any problem with money issues in marriage life, just ask youself this question “Is the money more important or love is more important?”
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I have always been the one to take care of the money in our house and it works for us - I do it very well. Hope you had a great weekend - see you soon. Kellan
PS - I always love your thought provoking posts - keep it up!
It used to be me in charged of the money, hubby gave me all his paycheck and asked from me as he needed it, sometime he felt that i was in control and he has no say in it.
But, now, we do a budget together, decide our saving and spending on paper first, so no one can say who is in control.
We don’t have a joint account, but we have access to each other’s account.
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I heard money was one of the leading causes of marital issues…..I can believe it. Since I am no longer bringing in a real income, all the bills must come out of hubby’s paycheck. We have a joint account where we can both see where all bills and budget monies go throughout the month. We also have separate retirement accounts, investments, etc. We don’t hide anything from one another, because come tax time,…we both have to report everything jointly….
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I’m vy lucky n happy that we don’t hv any financial issues with each other. I trust him completely to ctrl his own finances. As I’m a SAHM, he pays for all the family expenses and sometimes for my personal ones too. No complaints.
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We share the expenses, we have separate accounts. The problem seems to be that sometimes I tend to overspend
so I like to give my card to hubby. In that way at least I don’t have the “temptation” to buy 
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I WISH I had money to hide from my guy. Nope, we’re pretty bad at finances…and it’s funny because in real life, before the girls were born I was an Insolvency Administrator. I HELPED people file for bankruptcy and bankruptcy protection. I did their budgets. I provided them with credit counselling. Yet, I still have a really hard time managing our household money. I’ve pretty much given that job to Colin now.
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He spends more than I do. He makes more than I do. I make him keep the accounts so I don’t get stressed over the spending. But, secrets? No way.
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I am a details person; the hubs is not. We keep separate bank accounts because it’d drive me mad otherwise. It ends up that I pay for “long term expenses” like retirement, Sun’s future education, as well as debt. The hubs pays “operating expenses” like utilities, cable, as well as the mortgage.
We didn’t plan on it going this way, but I have to say it’s working well. We fight more about dirt on my floors than money. That’s good, right?
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We put everything into a joint account though our retirement funds are in our own names. We are pretty much on the same page though my husband is a bigger spender than me - if he wants something he just goes and buys it and he buys the best. It frustrates me sometimes but he is freelance and we can go from no money to a lot of $$ really fast so I try not to sweat it…
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wow..some couples are really funny eh? as for us, everything is out in the open
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we have separate accounts and joint account, but i never contribute a cent into the joint account, and all the while i do not have to share the expenses too, he would even pay my credit card and insurance. so, consider lucky indeed.
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He is the sole breadwinner but I am the Finance Minister. We agreed to have it this way because he is very bad in finance and he wants less stress. So every month it will be my duty to pay the bills, do the marketing, wire funds to our Malaysian accounts, etc with his salary of course. We have a so called joint account so it’s all very transparent. I guess it all boils down to trust.
Good post!
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I hide my money in a secret place.No matter how he loves me I won’t let him know my little secret.He always let me control of the family finances.That’s what make me love him so much.:)
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Good question. We manage everything in Excel with macros that I programmed. I keep up the day to day finances while my husband manages our long term growth and all that jazz.
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He makes the money; I manage it. And we fight about it only *rarely*–THANK GOD!
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I don’t check on his account, but, I do ask him to pay for all the kids expense, at least, I know, where his money goes…
You know, most men just cannot stand a woman who controls his wallet and bank account. We have separate accounts and I think that’s important in case something bad happens to my husband, I am still capable to raise the kids.
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we have joint account and also our individual account but we have access to all of them. we bought houses separately just bcoz of the epf money but we pay them together. well, we have no, my money, your money…it is all our money.
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