topic Re: getting married with separate finances in Relationships and Money

getting married with separate finances

GTS — Sun, 12 Feb 2023 17:36:52 GMT

If people get married but don't get joint accounts, cards, mortgage, etc can one who is financially irresponsible affect the others credit?

Re: getting married with separate finances

Remedios — Sun, 12 Feb 2023 18:04:04 GMT

Of course it can

If you're getting a mortgage, and one of the partners has a bad credit, choice would be having it in one person's name only, which makes that person responsible for payments and everything that happens once marriage collapses (and it will), or getting a bad rate - ending up paying thousands more.

Simple thing such as auto loan can drain finances for person with bad credit, when that happens, how are they going to contribute to housing, utilities, groceries etc..

Same goes for card payments, someone who is already drowning won't be able to contribute their share.

It is not about weather finances are separate, It's about weather both parties are capable of covering shared expenses without one needing to be bailed non stop.

Marriage shouldn't be about gaining another dependent, people get burned out quickly, and then the very costly divorce completes the outfit.

These things should be addressed ahead of time and if one cannot or doesn't feel good about discussing it ahead of time, they probably shouldn't get married and/or cohabitate.

Re: getting married with separate finances

Shooting-For-800 — Mon, 13 Feb 2023 03:41:20 GMT

If everything is separate, depending on the state, the two profiles should not affect each other much.

As soon as you apply for something joint, the worse score will impact the better score.

If the better credit person also has the better income, most things will be smooth sailing.

GL!

Re: getting married with separate finances

Horseshoez — Mon, 13 Feb 2023 04:15:22 GMT

@GTS wrote:
If people get married but don't get joint accounts, cards, mortgage, etc can one who is financially irresponsible affect the others credit?

My wife and I are in our 30th year of marriage; as a general rule we've kept our credit cards separate but been joint for mortgages. Our cars have been about 80% joint, which worked to our advantage before we temporarily separated and then individually declared bankruptcy. Since her Chapter 7 in 2014 and my Chapter 13 in 2015, she has purchased one car in her name (2016), and just last fall I purchased one car in my name; the reason for the individual loans were simple, when she bought her current car I was in the middle of my bankruptcy and could not incur any new debt; my bankruptcy has since dropped off my reports, while she still has about a year before her reports are clean, so it was to my advantage to finance the new ride exclusively in my name. We're discussing buying her a new car later this year; we haven't decided whether to do a joint loan, pay cash for it, or put it exclusively in her name.

What is interesting about our marriage, and probably many marriages these days, is there has rarely been a time where our incomes were roughly on par with one another; initially I made about twice what she did, she caught up, and then doubled her income again while mine remained flat. Then my income went to zero while hers double yet again; then the recession hit and hers went to zero and mine started picking back up, and now it is to the point where I'm earning as much or more than the two of us combined, even at our joint peak. About three years ago her company started paying less while asking for ever more productivity; this went on for over a year with promises of advancement but nothing concrete and I begged her to quit as we no longer needed her income. She finally put in her two-week notice in July of 2021, and even then they strung her along until late September before she finally stopped working.

A few additional comments; I know couples where both spouses have always made roughly the same amount; some of those marriages have succeeded, others have failed. Same story holds true for marriages with an income disparity; some succeeded, others failed. Long story short, no one financial formula works for every couple; it takes communicating with one another and a lot of hard work to keep a marriage together, even if money isn't a problem, and if there are financial issues, things are even more difficult.

Re: getting married with separate finances

Rogue46 — Mon, 13 Feb 2023 18:26:41 GMT

My wife and I have been together for 32 years and have always had separate bank accounts, credit cards, car loans etc. It's probably a good thing in our circumstance when I had a business go under in 2014 and had to file chapter 7 it didn't affect her finances at all.

Re: getting married with separate finances

JoeRockhead — Mon, 13 Feb 2023 22:31:43 GMT

@GTS wrote:
If people get married but don't get joint accounts, cards, mortgage, etc can one who is financially irresponsible affect the others credit?

I think it greatly depends on who you're married to. Are they a responsible person, do they share the same sentiment when it comes to spending, saving, being disciplined,etc.... do you both have a genuine respect for what the other brings to the relationship financially, what their credit accomplishments (or goals) are? While credit cards are solely an individual thing , they have a real implication when it comes to purchases that might require a joint effort, a mortgage, cars etc... If one of you is responsible, focused on what's important (and what isn't) for your lifelong financial goals, and the other is irresponsible, frivolous and/or selfish, it's simply a drag on the whole thing in it's entirety.

Re: getting married with separate finances

privacyadvocate69 — Sat, 18 Feb 2023 07:24:37 GMT

If a person I was interested in marrying said they wanted "separate finances", I would suggest that we go ahead and have separate lives too.

Marriage is supposed to be a team effort. If someone isn't willing to throw their money into the team pot, I don't see how that works. I know some people are happy with it, I just don't see how it works. I mean, if one person retires with $2M and the other retires with nothing, is the rich one going to go on vacations alone? If one gets hit with fat medical bills and drains their savings, is the other one good with saying, "Sucks to be you, but you're not getting any of MY money!" If one gets sick and has to stop working does the other one say, "Well, we can stay married but if you can't put money toward the bills you're going to have to move out" ?

When I got married, I was 34. Wife was 28. I was making about $80K/year and owned a house and a car. She was unemployed but did have $10K in cash (and no car or other assets). How would "separate finances" work there?

We never talked about money. I added her to my checking account to make it a joint account, she put her money in it and that was that. We got a joint credit card...it's the oldest card we have. Not many issuers will issue a joint credit card anymore.

Fast forward seven months...she got a job making about $35K/year. Fast forward another couple of years and she was making $75K. Fast forward a few more years, she is making $165K to my $120K. Somewhere in there, I was unemployed for a while when I was in between jobs and again when we relocated across the country. As it stands now, I will probably have to stop working much earlier than planned due to a disability. Really glad I didn't insist on "separate finances" 17 years ago!!

Re: getting married with separate finances

Rogue46 — Sun, 19 Feb 2023 15:41:24 GMT

@privacyadvocate69

Having separate finances doesn't mean my wife and I don't split the bills or otherwise work together financially. She takes care of the mortgage and a few other bills while i pay the car payments/insurance and some other things. It's a setup we have always had and for our circumstances it works just fine.

At the end of the day we are married and what's mine is hers and vice versa it's not MY money or HER money.

Re: getting married with separate finances

GTS — Sun, 19 Feb 2023 20:39:51 GMT

@Rogue46 wrote:
@privacyadvocate69
Having separate finances doesn't mean my wife and I don't split the bills or otherwise work together financially. She takes care of the mortgage and a few other bills while i pay the car payments/insurance and some other things. It's a setup we have always had and for our circumstances it works just fine.

At the end of the day we are married and what's mine is hers and vice versa it's not MY money or HER money.

@Rogue46I couldn't have said this any better. My significant other and I have been together for 10yrs and living together for 7yrs and and talking about marriage. We have a system to split the bills that works. She is a little less irresponsible and I have been working with her. At this point I would never get a joint account with her. I save for the future and any misfortune and she doesn't, she likes to splurge after her bills are paid. My fear is that with a joint account she would spend the "savings". Her credit is in the toilet and I have been rebuilding mine (because I used to be like her). Or with a joint credit card she would max it out. I would never not have her back if she would become unemployed or whatnot, that's what I save for, I'm just a little more mature when it comes to finances.

Re: getting married with separate finances

privacyadvocate69 — Mon, 20 Feb 2023 01:23:21 GMT

I guess if I couldn't trust someone I wanted to marry with money or credit, I don't feel I could trust her with much of anything else.

I also think it is inaccurate to refer to a pot of money as "our" money if only one person has control over it.

Re: getting married with separate finances

SeaProbe — Mon, 20 Feb 2023 02:42:16 GMT

@GTS wrote:
@Rogue46I couldn't have said this any better. My significant other and I have been together for 10yrs and living together for 7yrs and and talking about marriage. We have a system to split the bills that works. She is a little less irresponsible and I have been working with her. At this point I would never get a joint account with her. I save for the future and any misfortune and she doesn't, she likes to splurge after her bills are paid. My fear is that with a joint account she would spend the "savings". Her credit is in the toilet and I have been rebuilding mine (because I used to be like her). Or with a joint credit card she would max it out. I would never not have her back if she would become unemployed or whatnot, that's what I save for, I'm just a little more mature when it comes to finances.

Well said.

Compatibility covers a broad spectrum, of which money is just one part. The key, as always, is finding ways to make things work. Separate finances can absolutely help keep the relationship thriving when differing money habits would otherwise derail things.

I really see it similar to a food allergy; we can enjoy different foods and still have a great meal together.

Re: getting married with separate finances

SouthJamaica — Mon, 20 Feb 2023 19:17:45 GMT

@GTS wrote:
If people get married but don't get joint accounts, cards, mortgage, etc can one who is financially irresponsible affect the others credit?

Technically, in the circumstances you describe, if one of the two has bad credit, it has no direct effect on the other's credit.

But if two people are married, their lives are intertwined, which can wind up in many ways causing one spouse's finances to impact the other's.

Examples: Spouse A can't afford to pay for things, so Spouse B has to pick up the slack.

Spouse A has judgment creditors, who can try to levy on Spouse B's bank accounts used to support Spouse A.

Spouse A owes a lot of taxes, so Spouse B can't get the benefit of a joint tax return without becoming liable for Spouse A's taxes, so Spouse B winds up paying more taxes.

Re: getting married with separate finances

iced — Tue, 21 Feb 2023 21:46:48 GMT

@privacyadvocate69 wrote:
I guess if I couldn't trust someone I wanted to marry with money or credit, I don't feel I could trust her with much of anything else.

I also think it is inaccurate to refer to a pot of money as "our" money if only one person has control over it.

Our decision to keep everything separate had nothing to do with trust, but rather convenience. There is visibility into each others' finances (we've linked Fidelity accounts and share statements from other accounts, as examples) so nothing's hidden, but it's a pain to combine and an even bigger pain to separate should it ever be needed, and for no gain in doing so.

Simply put, there's nothing to gain by having joint accounts but something to lose in doing the same.

Re: getting married with separate finances

Kforce — Sun, 26 Feb 2023 17:31:00 GMT

@Horseshoez wrote:

Long story short, no one financial formula works for every couple; it takes communicating with one another and a lot of hard work to keep a marriage together, even if money isn't a problem, and if there are financial issues, things are even more difficult.

^^^ This

Re: getting married with separate finances

robsteriam — Thu, 02 Mar 2023 00:07:54 GMT

My wife and I have all of our finances together. Regarding loans, we are currently renting. However, our last house was financed only under my wife's name. The thinking behind that was to get an investment property under my name. I manage our finances, I ensure all the bills get paid on time, I pay off our CC, and we each get an allowance from our check to spend freely on anything we want without feeling guilty. She's not great with money but I am, and that's the reason I manage our money. As long as I give her a "budget" on how much she can spend, she sticks to it. She trusts my judgment and decisions when it comes to our finances.

We have one bank, which is a joint account. We have multiple savings accounts (Emergency, Travel, and Everything else), which my wife has full access to but no visibility when she logs in. It helps her not overspend :-).

The most important aspect of our relationship is open and honest communication. I learned from my previous relationship money was challenging to talk about and caused a lot of strife. My wife and I speak freely about money regularly, which is very important.

Re: getting married with separate finances

Gladius — Tue, 07 Mar 2023 14:59:47 GMT

Separate CCs, separate checking and savings, separate car payments, 2 joint savings accounts which we both contribute accordingly, 1 joint checking, two shared CCs (0 balance), joint mortgage. It's all about convenience.

Re: getting married with separate finances

Thomas_Thumb — Sun, 21 May 2023 02:05:08 GMT

@GTS wrote:
If people get married but don't get joint accounts, cards, mortgage, etc can one who is financially irresponsible affect the others credit?

The correct answer is NO. However, late payments on bills such as utilities or cable/phone bills may impact certain credit scores for both if both names are listed.

Re: getting married with separate finances

Latoria — Wed, 30 Aug 2023 08:14:27 GMT

Nowadays, separate finance in a couple is a great idea. It allows everyone to be responsible for their credit score and make both expensive and cheap purchases without their spouse.

Re: getting married with separate finances

Horseshoez — Wed, 30 Aug 2023 12:13:24 GMT

@Latoria wrote:
Nowadays, separate finance in a couple is a great idea. It allows everyone to be responsible for their credit score and make both expensive and cheap purchases without their spouse.

Ummm, wut?

Re: getting married with separate finances

FireMedic1 — Thu, 31 Aug 2023 11:00:14 GMT

@Latoria wrote:
Nowadays, separate finance in a couple is a great idea. It allows everyone to be responsible for their credit score and make both expensive and cheap purchases without their spouse.

Say what? Were on to you and your posts and threads you've started @Latoria. Lets see how your own thoughts are. Not something thats generated.