Men need to beware of that. If you cannot stand your mother-in-law-to-be today, do not marry the daughter under any circumstances. For she will turn into a near carbon copy of her. Fortunately for me, I was always able to get along with my MIL but I never saw that coming as my younger wife seemed to have no resemblance to her mother whatsoever in either appearance or demeanor.
My other advice is that if your spouse wants to keep finances separate after marriage or have some kind of pre-nup, that is a warning sign that the marriage will fail.
My wife and I have pooled our finances since Day 1 and we both know exactly what the other is spending and so we save and plan together. In my opinion, that is the only way to do it. One side benefit is we never have to buy each other birthday or Christmas presents (as the other would see the charges and immediately ask what the expenditure was for). Instead we go to a nice restaurant or a weekend trip together to celebrate those things.
Trying to keep finances separate in a marriage never works well in my observations. For that sets up a situation where one spouse is trying to obtain or keep a financial advantage over the other.
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Our unwritten rule about money is that there are NO major expenditures outside of groceries, clothing, and medical bills for necessary medical expenditures, without discussing it first.
Even then, although the snow tires are a necessity, they are so expensive that we both know ahead of time what that is going to be.
We have NEVER fought about money. Course, I’m beyond frugal with money, having very little of it growing up. What I did have I worked too hard for to spend it foolishly. And don’t come panhandling at me either. You ‘ll get ignored or a cold, icy stare.
Agree. Pool the finances. Both of us hate shopping, and that’s a positive. Some couples we know have a shopper and a shopping hater, and there are constant issues.
We used to go to dinner with another couple. When the bill came, Hubby paid ours. Both of them would pull out their wallets and pay separately. Not saying it was wrong, but it sure was weird.