I’m curious how you budget as a couple or budget with family. Does one person take the lead and it’s their duty? Are you equal participants? Does each person leverage their strengths?
What works for you?
I’m curious how you budget as a couple or budget with family. Does one person take the lead and it’s their duty? Are you equal participants? Does each person leverage their strengths?
What works for you?
I think it starts with shift in mindset from your money/my money to our money.
I’ve found it beneficial to have all money going it and out of joint account.
One person can take the lead both parties must understand and agree to the budget.
I do most of the tracking but ask my partner about unrecognized transactions. They ask me how much money is left in which categories periodically.
This is pretty much how we do it too. The part about yours/mine was key for us to start because we had a shared goal of saving more than we spend.
As a matter of fact, thinking back to it now, we actually started budgeting together even before we were married and before having a joint account. We would pay for things in the ratio of our respective incomes and everything was fair based on the structure we agreed upon.
I think the underlying premise of a lot of these answers (all?) Is transparency and thoughtfulness. I can’t see budgeting together working without that.
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I was going to make my own post but yours is basically my situation. I am the one who isn’t really on top of it, like your partner. We both have our own bank accounts that we get our checks deposited into and then we have a joint bank account that we both contribute to. We have an excel spreadsheet for all of our bills and expenses. We take the total number and divide by two and each pay in our half. We make roughly the same amount of money so that is what we came up for “fair” on our joint bills. We also account for vacation funds and small/large projects and emergency funds. It’s nice to have a round amount that I’m expected to put in every check. It’s reliable
We each pay our car note out of what’s left over after contributing to the joint account. What’s left over in our personal accounts is for personal expenses like snacks and gas. It’s also how we pay for our own hobbies. It’s also a good way to hide a purchase like a birthday present.
If asked, I would show her my personal bank statements and she would show me hers. There’s not really any mystery as to what goes on with our personal accounts. They’re mostly used to save up for things the other wouldn’t get anything out of. I couldn’t expect my wife to throw down on a guitar she would never use for example.
The flip side of that is: why don’t we just put it all in the same account and give each other a hobby allowance? I don’t have a good answer. Maybe we will go that way some day.
Just wanted to add on to the conversation. I didn’t start out as a very responsible person. Getting on a budget and having a bed time are the things that changed my life the most