Like, did you both keep your personal accounts plus open up a joint one? Or just pool all your money together? What accounts do you pay your bills out of? If you go out to eat, how do you pay?

36 comments

  1. Pool money together and then figure out a budget together.

    Bills and eating out together are paid from a joint debit account.

    Frivolous individual spending comes from separate debit accounts. We both allocate a set % of monthly income to each month.

    Any frivolous spending outside that is discussed and jointly decided on.

  2. We kept our separate checking accounts but shared a savings we tried to keep at a certain amount and tried to keep paying for stuff kinda equal-ish.

    I stay at home now, though, so he just has all the accounts and cards.

  3. We combined ours in a fairly convoluted way that works for us lol

    I have a checking and savings account and my husband has a checking and savings account. (Different banks) When I get my paycheck each month (I’m on salary) I send him all but enough to cover my credit card bill & $500 to keep in my checking account.

    Depending on how our income & expenses line up each month we’ll either add to his savings or mine. My savings is for emergencies only (like a serious, we do not touch account) and his is for more general savings (property tax, annual insurance payment etc.) And then he pays all of our bills.

    If I want something/need something I’ll charge my credit card and when we go out to dinner or do something together etc he charges his which he pays out of his checking account which holds all of our bill and spending money.

  4. Married 30 years. Everything in one pot. Well, a few pots. Yes, all money goes into joint accounts. We pay everything out of joint accounts.

    If either of us need money, we simply get it. We tend not to discuss it unless it’s a significant amount that might affect the bills/budget that week.

    For us personally, if we need more than $500 we would probably check to make sure it’s not going to throw something off. Anything less than that isn’t going to be an issue.

    Both of us also tend to carry a few hundred in cash for emergencies or just in case money.

    We sit down once a week (usually Sunday night) and go over our finances. Basically just a talk of this is what we currently have as balances, this is the bills we are paying this week, these are coming due next, this is where we are short term goal wise and long term goal wise. Any questions or planning goes on during this time.

    It works for us.

  5. We basically just do one account and dump both paychecks in. In our state, your assets and income are basically merged anyway, so you might as well have visibility.

    Both of us were married before (and divorced) and in both cases we maintained our own accounts and tried to split up the bills fairly. It honestly just resulted in a lot of distrust about who had more free money and who was paying more bills. It’s not why we got divorced, but it wasn’t helpful either.

    I mean, in my current marriage (10+ years), if a random amazon box shows up, I can look at our account if I want to and see how much the thing cost. It honestly works pretty well. We both have a threshold where we know we should talk to the other and where it’s fine to just buy something and either of us can look anytime we want….and speak up if we don’t like what we see very much.

  6. Lots of different methods work for different people.

    For us, I felt like it was important that we have our “own” accounts and our “own” money. We have a fairly traditional style marriage – I pay all of the house bills out of my account. She picks up groceries or food with her account. If there is some large purchase we usually discuss it, not for “approval” but just as part of normal daily conversation. Simply due to our lifestyle I transfer money into her account pretty often. I try to do it where she doesn’t have to ask for money. This works great for us

  7. We each have our own personal checking and savings accounts and then we have a joint checking and savings. A percentage of our income goes into the joint automatically from our employers. We use a joint credit card for all expenses (including going out to eat) and pay that and anything else that is joint from the joint account. Personal accounts we do whatever we want with them. The percentages were determined by figuring out what our spending was each month plus what we wanted to save and then calculating that. It’s 70-75% of our incomes that go to the joint account.

  8. We have kept our apart, she pays for our groceries and I pay the regular bills, and she sends me money for rent.

    I like it this way, because I can surprise her with gifts and bank statement won’t give it away

  9. We have our own checking accounts and pool savings, everything is paid from the savings account and then we have our own fun money to play with. We each take turns with dates.

  10. Just pooled our money and finances together. Did not make sense to not be all in and have one foot in and one foot out of the marriage.

  12. We moved in together before marriage and that’s when we started merging our finances. It was mostly out of laziness on my part because I got tired of writing checks to her for my share of expenses after I would get paid. So, she added me to her account and I changed my direct deposit to it and she managed all our bills with the joint money and continues to do so today.

    Every account we’ve created since except the last few years has been joint. If joint is not possible (i.e. IRAs), then we are each others primary beneficiary/transfer on death.

    Currently, I’m the sole income earner. However, my dad passed in 2019 and my brother’s divorce started in 2021. Both events had outcomes that made us change a couple things. First, even though we were saving well for retirement, we started getting more aggressive with depositing to HER retirement to try to bring her balances up. Second, we opened a new checking account in her name only that we keep a small balance in as a “backup” account. Third, we opened a credit card where she is the primary card holder, not me. Even though I’m the only income earner, the Fair Credit Reporting Act allows you to use “household income” so she got approved.

    These three changes were because of account access issues that both my mom and my brother ended up having. That made us realize that while 95% of our money is just fine in joint accounts, we both need to have financial accounts where we’re the primary. That way, when one of us passes, the other will have accounts fully under their control while they deal with getting control of the accounts that they weren’t primary on.

  14. We combined into one account. We also have a shared savings for trips, home repair, emergencies, and a line of credit for extra emergencies where money is needed NOW.

    Everything comes in and out of the same account. I handle most of the finances and keep her up to date on any issues.

    We talk about big purchases before we buy them.

  15. A lot of people just keep the accounts they have, add each other and use each account for different reasons. We closed some and combined the others. All of our expenses, including eating out, come from the same place so it doesn’t matter who pays.

  16. We have separate counts. We do have one joint account that my husband opened, but only he puts money into it and he wanted it that way. We were both secure in our jobs and everything because we met later in life. And my parents have been married over 50 years and never once combined their finances. I already had my house with the mortgage and he just moved in and he pays some bills that I ask him to pay and I pay others. Works for us.

  17. We have personal accounts, and joint account for everything related to our life (rent, bills, food, dining out, etc).

    We top it up 50/50 each month.

    If we want to go on a trip we just discuss it first, then book everything from joint acc, and pay for everything related to our both from a joint acc.

    Personal is for investing, purchases for myself (like closing). I earn more than my wife, so most likely I will buy a house where we both will live.

  18. Did a budget and contribute equally to a joint account, also kept our own accounts and CCs on the side.

    Discuss any large purchases prior to buying.

  20. We have three accounts. The first is a joint checking account, both of us put the majority of our paycheck into for bills and daily expenses. Pretty much everything comes out of this account. Bills, groceries, eating out, vet bills, medical bills, random streaming subs, everything. The other two accounts are a personal savings account for each of us that a small percentage of each of our paycheck goes into. These savings are for us in case one of us wants a big budget item for ourselves and for buying each other presents. Come Christmas time I always pull cash out of my savings to buy his presents so he doesn’t see the transactions and spoil the surprises lol

    The vast majority of our money goes into the checking account.

  22. Most of our money goes into a joint account, but we kept our existing separate checking accounts. We allot a certain amount per week to go to our separate accounts for personal “fun” money, haircuts, medications, etc.

  23. 3 bank account. Hers, mine, and the house. She and I put in the budgeted money into the house. She had her account all to herself and I had mine.

  24. Opened a joint one and closed the others. All money goes into it. Pretty much that easy. Setup a budget to manage it which is just an excel sheet with income and expenses and leftover.

  25. We pool all our money together in joint checking and joint savings accounts. We also have a joint credit card with travel rewards that we charge everything to. We also have a joint backup credit card and a couple store cards. We keep the credit card paid off weekly.

    Neither of us are big spenders and we are free to buy whatever we want. If it’s something big or something for the house, we always pick it out together. I (wife) handle all the finances and keep him posted on where we stand.

  26. We kept our personal accounts. We each pay different bills. I get the mortgage, groceries and general household items. He’s currently getting utilities, car and the house improvements and repairs.

    If we get food out – we really do more take away these days – he usually pays (since I’m the grocery person/cook).

  27. We opened up a joint account when we started saving for our wedding. Then all wedding gift money went into the account. All our paychecks, bonuses, etc go into this joint and all bis like credit card and mortgage get paid from it. We have our own personal that gets money transferred to on auto and we also take some of our bonuses and put them into our personal. I rarely use my personal account.

    I spend the majority of the money and my husband earns majority. He trusts me to spend within our means. Ill sometimes give him a heads up on purchases over 1k.

    I don’t even bring a wallet when we go out because it doesn’t matter who pays since it’s joint money. And we primarily use our joint credit card for points and pay it off with joint. We also have many savings accounts that get money auto drafted into from joint.

  28. We started combining money before we got married. Even before we lived together, we got joint credit cards. We combined all our finances after we got engaged but before we got married.

    We have several accounts but most of them are joint. We each have 3 accounts that aren’t joint:

    2 of them are government regulated investment accounts that *can’t* be joint. That being said, we each put an equal amount of money into it every month.

    1 of the accounts is just an individual savings account that is just used for gifts for our partner and if we want to get something that is very individual. For example, I just bought the new iPhone and took the money from that account. Only about 5% of our pay cheques go into that account. And this account usually only has a few hundred dollars in it. It’s basically just a personal fun money and gift account.

    After we get paid, 95% of our money goes into the joint accounts. Our monthly investment money comes out of our joint accounts. Idk if that makes sense lol.

    That being said, even our personal accounts are *our* money. It’s just a way of organizing our finances.

  29. Separate checking accounts, separate credit cards, and we each have our own savings accounts. We also have joint savings that we both contribute to but don’t touch without agreeing on it first. Each has a 401k and other individual investments. We are each responsible for certain expenses that we pay from our individual checking accounts. We just take turns paying for stuff like going out to eat and fun activities. We both had well established financial/investment histories when we met, it made sense to keep most of that separate.

  31. It all depends, there is always one person who makes more, who spends more, who trusts less. This is one of the top reasons couples argue. Know that in a divorce, all debt and money is split. Do if one person saves, the other gets half. If one person creates debt, it is now the other person’s debt. Honestly I hate that, its not fair when im the more responsible person.

  33. We didn’t. We chose to keep separate accounts and decide who was paying which bills. Currently, my spouse is unemployed due to injury (that we can’t get the doctors to fix) and back in school to re-train for a new career, so my paycheck gets split between both accounts on a 75/25-ish split with me paying the majority of the bills and spouse paying a couple of the smaller bills and still having some money for personal expenses.

  34. Own accounts. 60% goes into a joint account for joint expenses. We have another savings account that we contribute the same amount to.

    13 years together, 2 kids, 2 cats.

    Your personal circumstances will dictate how you decide to do things. Is one of you a spender/collector/into gadgets? Do you (singular or plural) have student loans? Do you have any outstanding debts? Do either of you send money to family? And kids to support? Any plans to do further education? Expensive hobbies (golf, for example)? Do you want like to buy gifts for one another? The list goes on, but it is important to reflect on.

  35. Married 13, together for 16 – our finances are combined. We have one main joint account. I have my own account that hubby moves money into for monthly expenses that I usually take care of (think groceries, school supplies, new clothes shoes for kids or myself). Our bills are autopay from our main account.

    I have access to all our financial logins/accounts, but hubby does most of the bill maintenance and payments because I apparently came wired to be perfectly happy as a hobo under a bridge with no utilities if left to my own devices.

    EDIT TO ADD: When we go out to eat he pays because if I whip out my card I tell him he better be ready to put out. Every single time. So now it’s a race.

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