this post was submitted on 05 Dec 2024
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My wife and I have one set of shared bank accounts (checking, bills, savings), and that's it. Ever since we got married. She had her own account for like a year or so after we got married, but she didn't use it, we were just too lazy to close it for a while. We swapped over her paycheque early on.
I dunno, man, we seem to be an outlier, cause the idea of maintaining separate finances as a married couple just seems so... alien, to me. It quite literally never occurred to either of us, as an option.
Downsides include that you can't really keep secrets. For example, I know how much she spent on me for Christmas, and where from, she's just not gonna give me the receipt until next year.
And yeah, if we ever divorced, that'd probably be a problem. 12 years in, I don't think that's happening.
Anyway, if keeping separate finances doesn't seem weird to you, I don't see much downside. As long as you CAN agree on who should be responsible for what, seems entirely manageable to me. Biggest upside for joining up, I would think, is less legal work for you each to get access the other's assets, in the event of a death or similar event.
We have our accounts from before we were married, but I don't consider it to be separate finances. I take care of all of it. Some of our expenses come from "her" account, and some from "mine". Every now and then I go through the bills and rebalance to make sure we aren't spending more than each account takes in. Both of our names are on all of the accounts.
We do have one account we both contribute to, it covers our vacation fund and a car payment. I brought that account into the relationship but never used it much (long story as to why I have it), so it makes a good vacation fund account.
My account is a credit union, and it's great, except for one issue - it's not local. In fact, it's in another state. Occasionally this is an issue, like when we need cash for something. My wife had an account at a regional bank (there are a few left), so we use that when we need cash. The setup works for us.
We generally buy everything on credit cards, then pay in full every month and reap the cash back awards.
It's interesting that none of the financial institutions you have an individual account with provide an ATM that's close to you. I mostly use resources like https://www.visa.com/locator/atm (or whatever the website of my financial institution directs me to) to find an ATM to use. There is pretty much always an ATM nearby for the debit cards I actually have (note that I usually say to not set up a debit card for accounts since that increases my risk for fraud with minimal upsides for me).
If I was in your situation and was single, I'd open an account with a bank that provided an ATM that's close to me and/or had lots of ATMs around the country, and just keep $100 in that account so it doesn't get closed for inactivity, and then transfer money to it when I knew I'd have to get cash soon.
Well, there's a fee for using those ATMs, though my credit union reimburses (up to a certain amount). So, it does work and did work for many years before I met my wife. I'd get cash back at the grocery store, usually, and avoid the ATM fee issue. There might be local ATMs that are free, but I doubt it. I haven't looked.
I was thinking larger sums of money, though. Recently I had my eye on a used bicycle for sale locally, and the seller wanted cash. I ended up not doing it, but getting $2500 in cash wasn't going to be easy with the credit union. The local bank would have been much easier, just drop in (during their open hours) and do a withdraw. It's a rare situation, but that's the kind of thing that comes up.
Similarly, before mobile deposit, I had to mail them checks to deposit, with all the delays and risks associated with that.
Your solution works, but you have to watch the minimums. I'm pretty sure my wife's account has a minimum balance (which may be $500, I don't remember), and some banks require you to have direct deposit set up or you have to pay a fee for the account.