Is His/Hers/Joint accounts a good way ?

[PGF2016]

The Barefoot investor (good blog) has a good way of dealing with this. Joint accounts. Any spending less than 400 is not questioned. Over that the spouse needs to be consulted.

 

[Gordon Gekko]

The fact that you can cite the fact that her contribution was 4% of total expenditure is a bad sign. If you're married, it's a team effort and you should share.

There was a point in time when my wife earned 3 times more than me. She never made me feel bad about it. Now I earn 3 times more than she does, and I am careful to reciprocate. My sense from your posts, rightly or wrongly, is that you are rubbing your wife's nose in the fact that you earn more money than her.

Close your non-joint accounts, run one account, and do up your budgets together.

 

[thedaddyman]

In my own case, my wife and me have our own personal account and we have a joint account for the mortgage and household bills. Both of us have DD's into the joint account but since I am the main breadwinner by far, the bulk of the money comes from me. Children's allowance goes in there as well. Bills are on DD so we both have clear visibility of what gets paid and wife puts shopping and kids clothes etc on a credit card and pays it monthly. If I get odds and sods over a weekend or DIY stuff for the house I do likewise. It works fine and there has never been any hassle. Every so often if we have a bit left over and the balance in the joint account goes a bit too high, she'll sweep it into savings accounts for the kids. we're both ex bank managers so reasonably financially savvy but there have never been any issues. We both keep back what we need for our own personal spending and do so. It works fine for us.

 

[capslock]

We each have individual accounts and one joint account. Both salaries are paid to the joint account which pays for everything household and children related and our individual accounts are for our pocket money. We take the same amount each week and do what we like with it. OP, if you're both getting paid into individual accounts, can you keep back the same as your wife gets paid and whatever is leftover can go to the joint account to cover everything else.

For example, let's say your wife gets paid €1,000 per month and you get €4,000. You keep back €1,000 like she does and transfer €3,000 to the joint account. If there's not enough there to cover everything then you jointly make up the shortfall. Seems the fairest way?