Women often get tagged as spendthrifts, but men can be just as bad. Check out this recent post from the Women in Red community:
"(My husband) and I were paid last Friday, into our joint account. After paying our rent and his student loans, I went to visit my parents for the weekend. Upon my return, I discovered he has spent ALL of the remaining balance of our bank account on fast food, clothing, and going to movies."
How do you cope with a spouse who can't handle money? Some of the Gals in Red advocate ruling with an iron wallet:
"Your hubby is behaving like a little boy whose mommy will always come to his rescue and fix everything," wrote one irate woman, who prescribed the following punishment -- I mean, solution:
- Open your own account and have your paychecks go there.
- Divorce your credit from his. Take him off your credit card and vice versa. (This won't help if you live in a community-property state: Arizona, California, Idaho, Louisiana, New Mexico, Nevada, Texas, Washington or Wisconsin.)
- Sit down with your husband and agree about who pays what and when. Put it in writing, and make him sign and date it.
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It's so tempting to play dictator, especially when your spouse behaves irresponsibly (or takes refuge in a state of perpetual cluelessness). But, I've found, that isn't the road to a strong fiscal partnership.
As one reader put it: "I don't think this is about money, I think it is about communication. . . . There are better ways to handle the situation than to treat your spouse like a criminal (or a) child."
I'm not saying it's easy. It has taken all seven years of my relationship to get 80% on the same financial page as my spouse. And we still stumble. Recent example: Although he's in charge of paying bills (a triumph for him and a relief for me), I'm the one who had set up our automatic transfers to our ING savings accounts. That means he balances our checking account according to bills paid, often forgetting to include withdrawals for savings. The other day we came within $1.94 of overdrawing our account. Again.
Whose fault was that? We try to skip the blame game and go right to a solution. In this case, my husband needed a written record of the weekly savings withdrawals. Simple. Better communication solved the problem.
So when I hear women say that they can't trust their partners or that "he makes so many mistakes with our money that I have to take over," I don't buy it. Taking control doesn't solve the underlying problem (unless you want a mate who is perpetually helpless).
One issue might be confidence: Some men are just as anxious about money as many women are and dislike managing it. If your mate is fumbling the ball, he may lack basic money skills -- which can masquerade as a sort of macho indifference. ("Yeah, I spent the money for our bills on clothes. So?") Those skills can be learned.
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But from what I've seen, most couples never take the most basic steps of setting up a financial foundation for their relationship. Here's how to do it:
- Agree on at least one goal, whether you want to get out of debt, save for a car, give the kids hockey lessons or visit the Outer Banks. Your priorities establish a base from which you make other money decisions. This is the most important first step.
- Play to each other's strengths. My husband is great at handling day-to-day expenses. I'm good at monitoring the overall monthly/yearly budgets and planning for our retirement.
- Talk daily about money. Each partner should know the baseline of what's going on: the balance in the household accounts, the cost of upcoming expenses and how much can be spent on what each week or month.
- Respect each other's "needs" and negotiate them. If you "need" to get your hair done and he "needs" a flat-screen TV, figure out what's possible financially and plan accordingly. Nobody gets everything they want, in life or in marriage, so be flexible.
Continued: A month without spending
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I AM FUSTRATED BECAUSE I HAVE TRIED EVERYTHING TO GET HUBBIE TO LOOK AT OUR FINANCES BEFORE HE GOES TO BUY SOMETHING HE HAS NOT CHANGED IN THIS ASPECT FOR OVER 26 YEARS AND YES I FEEL LIKE MOMMIE WHO GETS US OUT OF TROUBLE WHEN HE GOES OFF THE DDEEEPPPP END. I JUST DO NOT KNOW WHAT ELSE I CAN DO. WE HAVE ARGUED ABOUT THIS SEEMS LIKE FOREVER.