Fighting with your significant other about money is a time honoured tradition amongst couples. NPR spoke with a financial adviser to come up with a simple set of rules that help keep those problems to a minimum.
Photo by aisletwentytwo.
Basically, NPR suggests setting up accounts with a “yours, mine, ours” principle. Speaking with financial advisor Kitty Bressington, they came up with three tricks to organise your finances so both people have private spending cash, but you’re both still covering the bills:
- Set up a joint account to cover the basic bills.
- Set up a plan with automatic contributions to a retirement account, college savings account and other long-term savings goals.
- Then, each partner in the couple should get a set amount of spending or “fun” money every month that’s discretionary.
It’s a really simple setup, but it’s a joint management technique that keeps things easy while still offering up lots of freedom. Of course, depending on your finances, you’ll need to mix things up a little, but the principle still remains the same no matter how you end up dividing that all up.
Comments