Joint Accounts with Spouse?

[Tiamat]

I plan on -

Joint accounts for everyday living.

Separate accounts for retirement and hobby based spending IMHO leads to the least arguements. She can buy her handbags, I can buy my computers -- without argument.

 

[tami]

Originally posted by: AccruedExpenditure
I can't think of any reason why I would want to have a joint account with my spouse... Yes, be open with financials, but no... we shouldn't share a bank account/credit card, etc... when is this ever a good idea?

you aren't even married yet

anyway, before i got married, we took this community class and a financial planner met with us. he basically told us that we should have a joint account as well as our own personal accounts -- just in case an account is closed, there's always a backup.

plus, i buy presents for my husband using my account, and i don't want him to know how much i spent.

 

[dabuddha]

Originally posted by: sixone

Originally posted by: spidey07
Not having a joint account means you aren't really commited to the marriage IMHO.

 

[Pacfanweb]

Go ahead and have individual accounts. Then let one person die, and the survivor needs the money in the dead one's account to help pay bills.

Then the survivor will wish it was a joint account.

 

[ATLien247]

Originally posted by: vi_edit

Originally posted by: shilala
Here's how ours works...
I have a wife and two kids.
My paycheck goes into the only account there is.
That money goes toward taking care of our family.
My wife puts her paycheck into the only account we have.
That money goes toward taking care of the family.
She pays the bills.
I make more money than she does.
She works harder than I do.
When we want something, we buy it. If it's big, we discuss it. "Big" around here is anything over 100-200 bucks, I suppose.
If I have a pocketful of money and she doesn't have any, I give her some.
If she has a big wad of money and I'm out, she gives me some.

I guess the key is that when I got married, there wasn't any more "I".
It became "us".
The kids are just more of "us".

:thumbsup:

:thumbsup:++

 

[Britboy]

I agree. The people I know that have money problems in their marriage are the ones who maintain seperate accounts. It shows there is a level of distrust and selfishness when couples aren't willing to pool their resources.

 

[ColdFusion718]

Wait until after you get married. I had a joint account with my ex-fianceé and when we broke up, she tried to screw me over on my share of the deposits (I contributed 75% and she, 25% but she said we should each get half haha).

 

[meltdown75]

we have a joint account for the house & mortgage, a couple others for lines of credit, etc. and still maintain our own accounts as well.

i think joint accounts is a good idea to an extent, but it is nice to still have my own personal account too.

 

[Cheetah8799]

If my girlfriend and I get married, we will have three accounts. Each of our own, and a joint for paying bills and stuff. We've already talked about it, and both think it's the best way to go.

I have one friend who went full joint with his girlfriend before getting married (they are married now). I think he's nuts. She controls all the money, he has none of his own and I never see him or hear from him.

 

[thirdeye]

My wife and I have a joint account (more like she has access to my account) and we seldom use hers. We've even recently mentioned closing hers all together and just using mine/ours. I bring in more than a majority of the pay and she pays the bills from my account. Works well for us, because we both know what we have to spend between paychecks. If either of us want something large on our own, we just use our credit cards and pay it off over a few months.

 

[Powermoloch]

I have a joint account w/ my mom .....anyways..she does all the deposits it's all good man :thumbsup:. She needs financial support, I gotta do what I gotta do :heart:

Originally posted by: vi_edit

Originally posted by: shilala
Here's how ours works...
I have a wife and two kids.
My paycheck goes into the only account there is.
That money goes toward taking care of our family.
My wife puts her paycheck into the only account we have.
That money goes toward taking care of the family.
She pays the bills.
I make more money than she does.
She works harder than I do.
When we want something, we buy it. If it's big, we discuss it. "Big" around here is anything over 100-200 bucks, I suppose.
If I have a pocketful of money and she doesn't have any, I give her some.
If she has a big wad of money and I'm out, she gives me some.

I guess the key is that when I got married, there wasn't any more "I".
It became "us".
The kids are just more of "us".

:thumbsup:

:thumbsup: +++++++++

 

[ATLien247]

Originally posted by: Powermoloch
I have a joint account w/ my mom .....anyways..she does all the deposits it's all good man :thumbsup:. She needs financial support, I gotta do what I gotta do :heart:

You should change your name to Powermooch...

 

[dr150]

Originally posted by: Shadowknight
Given the cases where spouses have run off after cleaning out the entire joint account, I couldn't see having a joint account as a good idea.

You'd have to be a moron to leave everything in a checking account.

Most have a savings/401k account where rules can be set up that both are needed to withdraw said funds.

.............IN ANY CASE, I've had live-in GFs and splitting the bill at the end of the month was a HUGE PAIN. Getting married and having a joint checking account made things loads easier.

If you marry an irresponsible spender with no sense of saving, then you're in for a ROCKY marriage!

 

[Ausm]

Having a joint account is excellent for her when she files for divorce she knows exactly what she will get


Ausm

 

[dirtboy]

Originally posted by: cbrsurfr
Makes things easier when one of you die.

Not true at all, if you know what you're doing.

 

[KarenMarie]

We do not have a joint account... but... every friday, the b/f comes home and hands me the paycheck in the still sealed envelope. he has no idea what is inside or how much he has in his personal account. I am in charge of his personal account and sign his name to everything.

i used to do the same with his business account, too, but recently had him sign the forms to allow me to legally sign my own name instad of illegally signing his.... the bank has issues with me signing his name even if it is with his permission and although our bank looked the other way all these years, they are now merging with another bank and chaning managment, so i felt it was best to be legit.

the b/f has no idea how much money we have, nor does he worry about it. as long as he can get cash out of the aTM whenever he wants, he lets me deal with all the money.

 

[spidey07]

Originally posted by: Ausm
Having a joint account is excellent for her when she files for divorce she knows exactly what she will get


Ausm

You forgot about your savings, your 401k, the house, the cars, the everything.

 

[The Stigenator]

my eventual plan if i ever get out of my anti woman stage..

we btoh make money, portions go into a joint acct.. from there we run the house / buy stuff. If we want to make seperate purchases and stuff we can from our own money. so i got my money for my geek toys and what not. Joint cards will come from joint acct, personal cards from personal acct.

technically its a fiscal responsiblity of eachone.

 

[desy]

Joint account for everything home/kids/savings related.
We each get a 'allowance' of a few hundred a month for personal clothing, entertainment, gifts, hobbies.
That way I don't complain about her spending all our money on photo developing and she doesn't compalin about my hunting or golf.

She had trouble with it first cause I make 2X as much but as a couple its 50/50 and we pull as a team not in opposite directions. We discuss anything over $50 for the joint stuff.

 

[MattCo]

Originally posted by: shilala
Here's how ours works...
I have a wife and two kids.
My paycheck goes into the only account there is.
That money goes toward taking care of our family.
My wife puts her paycheck into the only account we have.
That money goes toward taking care of the family.
She pays the bills.
I make more money than she does.
She works harder than I do.
When we want something, we buy it. If it's big, we discuss it. "Big" around here is anything over 100-200 bucks, I suppose.
If I have a pocketful of money and she doesn't have any, I give her some.
If she has a big wad of money and I'm out, she gives me some.

I guess the key is that when I got married, there wasn't any more "I".
It became "us".
The kids are just more of "us".

Wow, rarely do I agree so completely with someone on ATOT. You just described my marrage.

 

[davew0670]

Originally posted by: Pacfanweb
Go ahead and have individual accounts. Then let one person die, and the survivor needs the money in the dead one's account to help pay bills.

Then the survivor will wish it was a joint account.

my wife and I have separate accounts but we know each others info to be able to get any money if anything ever happens to us.

 

[Ausm]

Originally posted by: spidey07

Originally posted by: Ausm
Having a joint account is excellent for her when she files for divorce she knows exactly what she will get


Ausm

You forgot about your savings, your 401k, the house, the cars, the everything.

I know Unfortunately been down that road twice

Ausm

 

[Pacfanweb]

Originally posted by: davew0670

Originally posted by: Pacfanweb
Go ahead and have individual accounts. Then let one person die, and the survivor needs the money in the dead one's account to help pay bills.

Then the survivor will wish it was a joint account.

my wife and I have separate accounts but we know each others info to be able to get any money if anything ever happens to us.

Not legally, you won't. If your accounts are separate, and one of you dies, the other has to wait until the will is probated (think that's the term) until you get the money.
If you die, and your wife doesn't bother to tell the bank and just keeps getting cash with your ATM card, that's technically illegal, even if she's the one you're leaving it to anyway.

 

[Turbopit]

Originally posted by: spidey07
Not having a joint account means you aren't really commited to the marriage IMHO.

What's the point of getting married if you aren't going to do things "jointly". If you do everything as individuals, your really just roommates.

We just have "one" account, but everything is based on a budget. That way we can sort of keep track of spending. Not to keep each other from buying anything, but it makes sure we aren't duplicating spending or spending a bunch of money on something at the same time something else needs paid for. Keeps us much healthier financially.

 

[AccruedExpenditure]

Originally posted by: Turbopit

Originally posted by: spidey07
Not having a joint account means you aren't really commited to the marriage IMHO.

What's the point of getting married if you aren't going to do things "jointly". If you do everything as individuals, your really just roommates.

We just have "one" account, but everything is based on a budget. That way we can sort of keep track of spending. Not to keep each other from buying anything, but it makes sure we aren't duplicating spending or spending a bunch of money on something at the same time something else needs paid for. Keeps us much healthier financially.

What's the point of bumping this?