I know several married couples who have such an arrangement. Separate accounts, and agreed upon arrangements as to who pays what: he may pay mortgage; she may pay for groceries; he pays for his car, she pays for hers.
That said, I just don't understand why they would choose to manage this separately. Why isn't it "our" money in a marriage, instead of his and hers? Does anyone else use such an arrangement, or know enough to elaborate?
Well in my case my lovely wife cannot seem to grasp that you make X and cannot spend more than X when writing checks and got in trouble occasionally. When we had just the one account there was a few times that I went to pay a living expense bill or an emergency like a service call for an appliance or unscheduled auto repair and there was not enough to pay it because of poor arithmetic. No longer an issue.
The only way it makes any sense is if we've come to the point that people get married and immediately form contingency plans for a divorce. It sounds crass and certainly "unromantic", but then that seems to be the direction we've been traveling for some time now.
Wisconsin is a "community property" State so such a division means nothing in terms of "yours" and "mine" everything is "ours". A "no kids" divorce in Wisconsin splits everything right down the middle.
Regards,
GtG
We each have a small checking account with its bank card because the bank issues only one card per account, and swiping is the way each of us does most of our small-time shopping. It’s just a convenience.
Otherwise, everything is joint, all bills jointly paid. I DO think that all this up-front his/hers anticipates an eventual divorce.
We have separate accounts that work like this:
All accounts belong to both of us legally. My paycheck goes into the account I use primarily, and the same with the account the hubby uses.
I am responsible for the kids school tuition, music and sports fees, insurance, groceries, clothes, gifts, etc. Hubs handles the big stuff.
No chance of over-drafts because we forgot to tell the other about an expenditure and no need to call and ask “is there money in the account” if we need gas for the car, etc.