Joint Bank Accounts for Married Couples?

[island3girl]

Should married couples have joint bank accounts and credit cards?

[epifaniesp]

Suze Orman has a pretty solid model for handling joint/individual accounts for couples.She suggests that each partner maintain an individual account, and that they also have a joint account.The joint account is to cover all of the couple's monthly expenses (food, rent, bills, etc.). But the couple does not put in 50% each, instead they put in a fair percentage based on their wage.Ex. Let's say Mary makes 80K/year and her husband John makes 60K/year. Their monthly expenses come out to $3,000.So in their joint account, Mary will put in 57% ($1,710) and John will put in 43% ($1,290) every month. You get these percentages by dividing each individual's income by the couple's total income (so with Mary that would be 80/140, and John 60/140). The couple can also use these percentages to save for things like vacations.

[prostoalex]

For some specific cases, like when one partner in a marriage is a US citizen and the other is not, but is going through a process of applying for US citizenship, joint accounts are part of the *required* proof of joint assets.Before getting married my wife and I went through some marriage counseling with the pastor, and part of the handbook we used handled financial advice. They were advocating using joint accounts and setting certain rules for easier money management. First off, depending on the couple's expense level, everybody gets certain allowance amount (10% per paycheck or so) that they can spend no questions asked.Second, except for the allowance-based purchases, every item over $100 or so should be discussed with the spouse (except, naturally, for emergency cases, like flat tire).

[Nathan W]

I can't answer the *should* portion. But my wife and I do, and it's definitely convenient when grocery shopping, bill paying, and going out for dinner.Plus, it's spawned a fun game: now whenever we go out to dinner, one of us gets to pretend to be generous when the bill comes. "Oh no honey, let ME take care of it this time."