Any advice before marriage?

Finances are really something you should approach together.

Honestly, if you feel the need to have a secret account, I think that's a red flag about the relationship.

DH and I have our separate accounts, and we are considering opening up a joint account for bills.

But we discuss major purchases, share expenses, and work through financial stuff together.

I agree with Rebecca - if you feel the need for a secret account, there's a problem. We combined our finances - that's just what worked for us. You need to have a discussion with your FH about how you guys want to handle finances.

The best way to handle finances is together. I don’t mean you need joint accounts. I just mean that you need to speak with your future spouse and decide what works best for you as a couple. For us, it was having mostly joint money. I am a stay at home mom and most of our money is deposited into a joint account. We do each have separate savings accounts and we each have an individual credit card in addition to our joint credit card. A lot of the other stuff financially and legally will depend where you live- some states are 50/50 on marital assets and some are not.

View Quoted Comment Ummmm I never wrote the word "secret."

View Quoted Comment My oh my. I never wrote the word "secret." How did this even get started?! One can have a seperate account from spouse and he/she knows about it....

View Quoted Comment Thank you for sharing

My FH and I have been living together and paying bills together for almost 2 years, and we have our own separate accounts. We may be opening an account together to share some savings, but I prefer to have my own account with my own hard earned money so that I can make sure I know where it is going. I trust my FH with finances of course, but I like to know where my money is going.

View Quoted Comment I feel ya on this, girl!

I think you can do whatever you want. It's what ever makes you and your FH comfortable and happy. My fiance and I have separate accounts, we just send each other money for bills and decide on big purchases together. I wouldn't mind having a joint account, but he doesn't feel comfortable (nothing to do with us, the way his mom and stepdad handled it). We decided to meet in the middle and open an account together one day, but also keep our own accounts.

View Quoted Comment This is a good idea. Thanks for sharing.

Different things work for different couples. We had a joint account for shared expenses along with our individual accounts when we moved in together about 7 years ago. After we got married, we opted to completely merge our finances. It makes things a lot easier for us to manage our money and see how much can go into the savings account, etc. when it isn't all spread around as much. However, I think 1 of the main reasons this works so well for us is because we have very similar spending/saving habits. We discuss big purchases with each other, although we rarely make them to begin with lol. The most important thing about finances in a marriage is having open communication. Make sure that your financial goals align with each other (i.e. agreeing on a debt pay-off-plan if you have debt, saving for a house, etc.), and just talk to each other about what guidelines and processes you two want to have (like....is there a certain amount of money for a purchase that needs to be discussed beforehand, and what is that amount). In terms of legalities, I'm not really sure. I mean, you want to make sure the paperwork is filed correctly lol. Otherwise, if either or both of you own part of a family business or have some sort of assets you want protected in the event of a divorce (no one wants to think about divorce, but it is a statistical possibility), then maybe consider if a pre-nup is a good move for you. I don't really know much about them since neither of us had anything warranting a pre-nup, but people come into marriages with different things.

We have a shared savings account and will soon open up a shared checking account that we will use for all bills. We'll keep our separate accounts for any extra money.

View Quoted Comment Okay, good plan. Thanks for sharing.

View Quoted Comment Yes I agree. I dont think I would call it a secret account , its an account that he knows I have but is separate from our joint accounts. I think its always a good idea to keep something aside for yourselves but I do think its important to talk about finances together regardless.

View Quoted Comment Smh, It's crazy how a responder put words in my mouth (i.e secret account), which I never made mentiom of and now several responders are rolling with it.

My wife and I each have an individual account as well as a joint account. We use our joint to pay for bills, meals out, things like that. Our personal accounts are used more for personal shopping and gift buying. I like the idea of having a personal account because I can purchase her a gift without her knowing where it is coming from or how much I spent. But combining finances is really personal preference,

View Quoted Comment Thank you for sharing!

View Quoted Comment Sorry . Your right. I just saw the word secret account and I thought it was mentioned previously.... so my bad.
Anyway , I see nothing wrong with having an account separate from your joint accounts. My mom always taught me to have a rainy day fund because on one of those rainy days you may want to treat yourself to a mani/pedi and some one lol... Good luck with everything girl 😊😉

* I meant mani/pedi and some wine...
Damn i hate spell check lol

I do think that it is a good idea to have your own separate account. it's fine to have a joint one for joint things like household bills, etc but making sure you've got your own resources is good too.