Avoiding Marriage Money Problems

Money remains to be the primary cause for divorces in the US. For avoiding marriage money problems, it important to take a seat and have a serious financial discussion with your new spouse. It might not be glamorous or thrilling, but it’s something that should be done, or you are going to end pay for it – literally – in the future. Keep reading to find helpful tips to help the both of you in avoiding marriage money issues.

Table of Contents

Tip 1 on Avoiding Money Problems in Your Marriage: Set Objectives

Money is the one of the primary causes of couples divorcing is that people can have very varying expectations on their way of life and how their money needs to be spent. As an initial tip to avoid money problems in your marriage, answer the following questions when setting objectives for your financial future with your spouse:

What your money should be spent on, what’s necessary and what’s discretional?
What are shared expenses, and what are the expenses each spouse is going to account for?
Which accounts need to be made into joint accounts, and which ones need to be retained separate?
When there is a difference in income, who needs to be contributing to what and what amount?
How are debts that were brought into the marriage going to be managed?
Who is going to be responsible for actually taking care of paying the bills?

Tip 2 on Avoiding Money Problems in Your Marriage: Plan for a Future

Clearly, it’s difficult to predict what the future may bring, but that shouldn’t stop you from taking a seat and roughly planning out what you want it to be. Set goals that you are going to need to save for and how long you anticipate it should take to save for them presently, to avoid marriage money problems down the road. Continually go back this matter, as your expectations and situation is going to change over time. Some basic topics to think about include:

Are you going to purchase a house?
Are you going to have children?
Are you going to save for college for any potential children?
When are you going to retire?
How often are you going to want to travel?
Are you going to be remodeling or redecorating your home at some point?
Are you going to be purchasing vehicles?

A lot of of this may become a realization as the list of things you and your spouse want gets bigger, and you can witness your money diminishing away to zero. On the other hand, you need to understand that now and flip out now, instead of figuring it out later when you’re immersed in debt and your home is in foreclosure.

Tip 3 on Avoiding Money Problems in Your Marriage: Create a Budget

Its crunching numbers time now is when you sit down with your basic predictions of how much money you have incoming (after taxes) and the amount this should cost. The primary things to include in your budget are:

Income (salary, business, property, and investment incomes)
Assets (financial institution accounts, property, investments)
Liabilities (mortgages, credit card debts, loans)
Expenses (rent/mortgage, food, utility bills, clothing, transportation, insurance, investment contributions, traveling, entertainment, and any other spending you are going to be making)

Tip 4 on Avoiding Money Problems in Your Marriage: Figure Out a Way to Make it Work

For younger couples, this can be an intimidating exercise to go through. So be sure to be honest, tolerant, and open to compromising. If you can get through this, you will have overcome the most possible reason to get a divorce. Lastly, regularly go over your financial plan to steer clear of future marriage money problems. You will often discover that your initial presumptions and expectations were terribly inaccurate, so make the time to bring your plan up to date prior to you going any farther.

Acquire Legal Assistance with Avoiding Money Problems in Your Marriage

Money is most likely one of the most general argumentative topics between spouses. If you have concerns about financial matters associated to marriage the counsel of a professional can be priceless. It’s wise to reach out to a local family law attorney that can help you create a premarital agreement, plan for the purchasing of property, and establish tax benefits and liabilities.

Source:

Avoiding marriage money problems. Findlaw. (2018, November 14). Retrieved August 4, 2022, from https://www.findlaw.com/family/marriage/how-to-avoid-marriage-money-problems.html

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