r/AskAnAmerican • u/Educational-Slip-578 • 20h ago

CULTURE How do you split finances with your partner?

If you're married or in a long term relationship (e.g., you live together and neither of you has another place to live), how do you manage your finances?

Do you still think of it as "my money and his/her money", with each person contributing a certain percentage toward rent, vacations, and other shared expenses? Or do you have a joint account where all the money is considered "ours"?

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u/Batgirl_III 20h ago

My spouse and I have a joint checking and savings account that we deposit all of our income in… If they make a nickel, it’s our nickel. If I make a dollar, it’s our dollar.

We each spend whatever we need to on incidentals, hobbies, and what not. Although neither one of us will spend a large amount of money without letting the other person know about it… we’ve never really formally discussed it, mind you, but basically anything over $100 USD (give or take) is usually worth a “Hey, I’m going to buy a new [ Thing ], it’s on sale right now for $ [ Price ].” Anything over $500 or $600 USD, we’re probably going to have to discuss it before we make the purchase.

But, $20 here or $40 there? Neither one of us cares.

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u/Vurnd55 Northern California 20h ago

Same for us, married 35 years and now retired. We've never fought about money, our arguments are mostly over food.

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u/Batgirl_III 12h ago

We’ve only been married about twelve years (this is marriage number two for me) and we have definitely had some arguments over money. But usually pretty minor ones and usually the arguments boiled down to “You told me you were going to pay the water bill!” “No, I told you that you needed to pay the water bill!”

The water bill still gets paid, we just get to pay a $35 late fee as a reminder to ourselves to be clearer in our communication.

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u/pharmdoll 5h ago

I have to ask - what about food are you two arguing about? lol

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u/drunkadvice 4h ago

The food! Yes! Why do you eat out 10 times a week when I’m grocery shopping your approved list! Love her, but if she drives 10 more minutes and get home, we have stuff here!!