If you were advising couples who were just starting out, would you advise separate bank accounts, or not? What are the advantages/disadvantages?

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That is a hard question.

I say if you each have your own jobs, and make your "own" money, and you are both comfortable with it, then have seperate accounts. It is nice to have something to fall back on, and call your own, "just incase"....but that is coming from a divorced person also.

On the other hand, if one of you decide to stay home with the kids, let's say, and there is only one income coming in....then one bank account makes sense. Less confusing.

This will be interesting to see other responses....

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It really depends on the couple, their individual beliefs and situations.

Dh and I have separate checking accounts for a couple of reasons. His bank is the local home town bank and he likes the convenience of it for him. It was not convenient for me however because I work 45 minutes from home so the bank was never open when I needed to go so I opened an account in the town where I work. This works well for us as we both have our paychecks deposited into our own accounts and each account is used for certain things each month.

Also when we first got married dh wasn't exactly responsible with money and having my own account gave me the security that I needed.

Now that I will be quitting my job in the fall we will be going down to one account. Dh has become more responsible and we are on the same page financially. I will likely keep my account open though because I am toying with business ideas and would need a separate account for that reason.

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Proud mommy to adorable Kinsley

I had a thread going awhile back on how other couples set up their bank accounts, just because I was curious to see what they do. It was interesting to read all the responses, but i didn't think to ask whether they would recommend it!

Dh and I are both very independent and keep separate accounts, and share a joint account for all household expenses. This system works very well for us and I would definitely recommend it to newly married couples! Maintaining independence is important in a marriage and keeping separate accounts is one way of doing that. We are both responsible with our finances so there aren't any problems about overspending and debt, etc. It's just nice to not have dh examining every penny I spend, and vice versa! As long as he's paying into the joint account regularly and all our savings goals / budget are in order, then I don't really care what he spends on!

Clearly this system requires a lot of trust on both sides, but it also shows trust and ultimately I think it is a good building block for a strong marriage.

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Before we went down to zero income and living on savings, we had seperate accounts (though our names were on both accounts, it was a matter of whose name was listed first). On Friday's I got "paid" by the bank transferring money from "his" account to mine. His paychecks were direct deposit into his account. The money I was "paid" was for the bills, groceries, my car maintenance, and things for the kids. His account was for the mortgage and things that we did together. There was also money transferred by the bank each week to my savings account and that covered the car insurance and gas to heat the house in the winter. Now that we are living on savings, we have the main "his" account from before and another joint account at a bank closer to our new home. The main account pays the mortgage and bills and the joint account is where we put money from odd jobs and recycling money (We sold an aluminum stage, bought for $200, for scrap and made $1200, plus we got the carpet from it to carpet my basement!!) And that's the account we use for things that come up...school expenses, etc.

My dh and I do have seperate accts. This has helped our marraige alot. And the only reason we started out this way was becasue my job will ONLY DD my check into this once certain bank. I think it helps us because it makes ME responsable for my funds, my own Checking and what I do with it. It also helps because this way I'm not taking away from our household funds either when I want to do something.

I really do think it might depend on the couple. This works for us. It may not work for someone else.

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Call me old fashioned or naive but we have always had a joint account since we said I do, I never saw a reason to have seperate accounts even when we both worked. I guess it would depend on the couple like Mandarenee situation I completly understand. I guess I felt secure enough to not to have to need it just in case.

This is us too.

However if dh had been bad with money, then it would a different story. Truth is if dh had been bad with money, I wouldn't have married him. I know that sounds like a terrible thing to say, but financial security is extremely important to me. And I don't mean wealth, just wisdom. I once broke off a nearly 3 year relationship with someone when I found out he was over $40,000 in debt and had nothing to show for it. No student loans, no regular job. He was living the high life. I thought he was good with his money to see the lifestyle he was living. After 2 1/2 years he told me about his debt. It turned out he was living a 'borrowed' lifestyle. I ended it because I knew that I couldn't trust him financially.

The advantages to joint is sharing the funds and the responsibilities. All money goes in. Bills get paid out. Savings are joint. There is no sense of who paid for what or who owes what bill.

The disadvantage is that if one partner is bad with money, if can affect both of them.

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Mom to dd (age 9) and ds (age 11)
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My parents always had joint accounts and I always assumed I would too. But when dh got out of the army he went a little spend happy. That is not his normal style so I didn't see it coming. He just didn't transition very well. Now that he's (semi) normal again I have no problem going to one account.

Dh had never balanced a checkbook until he married me. His mom did it for him. He kept up with his account online but never had a record on paper. I couldn't believe it.

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Proud mommy to adorable Kinsley

We have always just had one account and it works for us. Actually we have never had enought money to support multiple accounts!!! I once worked for someone who told me that they had 3 accounts, his, hers and house. Since he made more money, all his pay went into the house account to pay for bills and stuff for their daughter. The wife got paid 2 times a month and the first check would go into her account and the second into his. I always thought this sounded like a good idea!

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