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Finance can make or break a relationship. In fact, it’s the leading cause of stress in a relationship.
Have you ever had a financial disagreement with your significant other about money? When it comes down to money, are the two of you often on the same page or are you on two totally different spectrums? How frequently do you discuss your financial strengths and weaknesses? Are you honest about your finances?
These questions (and more) are vital in ANY relationship!
Communication is extremely important! In order to ensure that both of you are on the same page, you gotta be open and honest about your financial wins and your financial woes.
The four tips below will help couples resolve their financial differences while making their relationship stronger!
1 – Discuss your financial goals
Do you and your spouse/partner engage in small talk? Do you find yourselves talking about almost every topic imaginable? Have you had recent conversations about your financial goals?
Try it – what do you have to lose?
Candid conversations about your financials are a MUST! Stop letting fear keep you from discussing your finances. Does fear stop you from spending money?
In order to succeed collectively with your finances, it’s important to set goals.
Find out what your financial goals are by asking questions:
- Do you want to buy a home?
- Are you interested in having children?
- Did you take out student loans? How much do you owe?
- What is your credit score?
- Should we keep individual accounts or set up joint accounts?
- How much money should we save in an emergency fund?
- Are you a spender or a saver?
These questions (and more) lay the foundation of how you expect to accomplish your financial goals.
Ask questions. What are your deal-breakers?
Develop an action plan. Find out needs to happen in order to meet your financial goals.
By setting S.M.A.R.T. goals your relationship is on the right track to ensure financial success.
2 – Hold Accountability Meetings
Your significant other should be your accountability partner! The both of you will hold each other accountable about your finances.
It’s imperative for both of you to communicate and hold each other accountable for their actions!
My accountability meetings, my partner and I often discuss our:
- Strengths
- Weaknesses
- Opportunities
- Goals
I’ve heard that some couples have their meetings on a monthly basis. We tend to have our meetings on a bi-weekly basis. They tend to occur on or around our paydays.
We follow up with each other throughout the week to ensure that we are on the same page.
Our pay schedules have recently changed at work. We’ve gone from biweekly pay to semimonthly pay. This basically means that instead of receiving 26 paychecks a year, we will only receive 24.
This has kind of thrown a wrench in how we do things. However, by planning and keeping the lines of communication open we have been able to help each other. We saw that there was a problem and we created a solution that would not disrupt our daily routine.
3 – Share Financial Responsibility
Have you ever heard someone say, I make all of the money and my wife takes care of the bills? In fact, I’ve heard multiple individuals (most whom I know personally) say this. They’ve even admitted that they don’t check the balances in their bank accounts, let alone their user name and password.
Seriously?
I don’t know about them but I check my account balances on a daily basis! Large or small, I need to know what’s in there at all times.
For couples, I believe that financial responsibility must be a mutual agreement!
Everyone has bills and they’re paid on a monthly basis. You can’t avoid it. Well, you can and then you’ll be sitting in the dark or out on the street!
It’s important for both parties to know usernames and passwords as well as how to log in and pay a bill. If you don’t want to manually log in every month, set up bill pay. Automate your bills and let the bank do everything for you. Keep in mind, just because the bank will process the payments on your behalf, you need to review your statements to ensure you’re billed correctly!
It doesn’t just stop there. The both of you should consult with each other when making decisions.
If a major appliance goes out, one person may not care what brand name you purchase but it’s important to discuss the cost of the item and the benefits of each. If all of the refrigerators have the same functions but they cost differently, choose the one that best suits your budget.
Financial literacy is important for both members of every marriage. From being able to make an important decision with your spouse to know what to do in an emergency, it is important for you to know what your financial picture looks like.
It’s important for both of you to know what’s going on financially. Both parties are expected to contribute to a relationship. Therefore, it’s important that responsibility is shared concerning finances.
4 – Be Honest
In the long run, I believe that honesty is definitely the best policy. Once can get away by being dishonest for a short term, but ultimately, honesty is what pays.
~Kapil Dev
Keep it 100% with each other. Simply put, be honest and stop lying about money! I was at Publix just the other day and the shopper to the left of me said, oh wait. I need to put this item on a separate receipt, my husband likes to check and I don’t want him knowing that I purchased this item. My first thought was if you’re using the same debit card wouldn’t he figure it out when he reviews your online account balance??
I read an article on TheStreet.com about financial indiscretions. In the article I read that, 15 million Americans have concealed a bank or credit card account from their live-in spouse, partner or significant other; 31% of Millennials (18-37) admit to keeping a secret card or account, their Baby Boomer (54-74) parents do so, too.
It’s time out to hide or conceal items that place your finances in jeopardy. In the end, was it worth hiding that credit card, bank account or rental home (yes, people have gone through some crazy extremes).
I’m not opposed to setting up a separate checking account for those items that you want to splurge on. I get it! However, both you and your partner will need to agree on how much to allocate to the separate checking account!
The best thing that you can do for each other is to be open, honest and completely transparent about your finances.
That’s It!
That’s all folks! Four money management tips for couples. I hope that you were able to take away useful information from this post. I get it discussing finances is hard, especially when you’re not financially savvy! If you’re open and honest about your finances, it will make things that much easier.
I’d love to hear from you. Do you and your partner openly discuss your finances? What tips or tricks work best for your relationship. I’d love to hear your suggestions in the comments!
