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Combine Your Finances With Your Spouse or Partner
When arranging your fiscal expectations, you and your partner need to sit down and consider the many building blocks to monetary security, including: Setting financial goals, making wills, choosing beneficiaries, eliminating debt, reviewing your health insurance and life insurance policies, and deciding how to divide your responsibility for financial tasks.
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To do list – Getting Married or Partnered -
Quiz – Find out if you're ready to tie the financial knot.
The following checklist will help insure that your marriage starts on an even financial keel:
- Discuss your goals. Get together to discuss your financial goals for the near and distant future; for some people, home ownership is a priority, for others, it’s early retirement. Talk honestly about what’s important to you both over both the short- and long-term. Be sure that you’re both onboard with developing a concrete plan for every aspect of your finances, from eliminating debt to crafting a smart savings plan.
- Update your beneficiaries. Every investment account and insurance policy should have a beneficiary listed. If you’d like your new spouse or partner to receive these benefits when you die, be sure to update your policies accordingly.
- Deal with your debts. Overspending and debt are the source of friction in many long-term relationships.1 Do an honest assessment of the debt that each of you brings to the table, and set goals for paying them down, starting with the highest-interest consumer debt. If you have multiple credit card accounts in both of your names, consider closing some of them to minimize confusion and impulse spending.
- Review your insurance policies. Check all policies thoroughly for gaps and overlaps in insurance coverage to avoid costly mistakes or overspending later on. If you both have health insurance benefits through your respective employers, review both policies and sign on with the one that provides the best coverage for you both. Unmarried couples should double check to see if their employers will offer them health and other benefits, since not all companies do. Finally, if you plan on having children, you may want to consider adding coverage for pregnancy and childbirth.
- Draft or update your wills. No one wants to think about death and dying, but putting off putting your affairs in order will prove more painful in the long run. If you don’t have a will, it’s time to discuss your wishes for your property, assets and any children you may have. Finding the right legal assistance to help you draft or review your will is an expense worth taking on so you can both move on with enjoying your lives together.
- Divide and conquer. Splitting up financial duties according to your strengths will benefit you both in the long run; if you’re better at organizing and your mate has a head for numbers, then take on those tasks that you do best. Now is also a good time to set up and stick to a financial record-keeping system you can both maintain, access, and understand.
1 Love & Money (SmartMoney)
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Posted By Adryenn Feb 25 6:16 PM
Before picking out matching checkbooks, or comingling your finances, be sure you do a risk analysis on both of you. Check your credit, taxes, and ...
Before picking out matching checkbooks, or comingling your finances, be sure you do a risk analysis on both of you. Check your credit, taxes, and any outstanding debts/support/etc. You want to know if or when that joint account could go missing and then make a value judgment to decide if you want to fully merge your finances. One couple I profile in my book, "Every Single Girl's Guide to Her Future Husband's Last Divorce" had all their money in one basket. The Department of Child Support Services came and took it all, even though by CA law half of it was hers as community property. And they never got it back. So always make sure you have a rock solid understanding of where you and your future partner sit financially. - Adryenn Ashley
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