Poll: Who does the finances in your home?

My husband and I are considering making a radical switch and having me take over the finances and bill-paying for awhile. Jesse has always done the lion's share of this because he's the nerd, he's good at it, and he likes it.

However, we're both thinking it might be good experience for me to try my hand at it. He also wants me to know how to do it in case something were to happen to him (he's always thinking of everything to make sure I'm well taken care of!).

Because I'm curious, I thought it'd be fun to do a poll for couples. So, take a minute to vote below:

This should be interesting!

Comments

[Marcia]

I've done it, and we got in debt...my husband did it and we got in debt

Now we both do it and we are getting out of debt. He sees things I miss and vice versa.

[Trina]

Hm. My Mom had to give over the finances to our Dad many years ago. She just said that it gave her too much of a "control" mindset over how much he should be "allowed" to spend (pocket money, entertainment type purchases, etc.).
I am sure that some women wouldn't have this problem, but it was a problem for her, so she had to trust God to take care of all of the finances from then on.
Now Dad gets my sister or I (we are 24 and 22) to pay most of the bills when he gets them in the mail, or once in a while if we are busy my Mom or he will do it. But he recieves the bill and decides when he wants it paid.

[Helen]

I "handle everything" which means an Excel spreadsheet, paying bills, etc. But he definitely inputs his expenses and we make decisions together. I have just a bit more time than he does, and also more attention to detail so I just keep everything organized. Plus I do most of the shopping/spending so I just enter it right away.

[maria]

I do my bills and about 70% of my mom's bills for her. She does her checkbook, but I pay her bills via internet for her.

My DH is good at it but doesn't want to fool with it. He doesn't mind me doing so long as we have money in the bank, bills are paid, and if he wants something he can use his card and not worry if there is enough money to cover it or not.

[Arlecchina]

I'm guessing that since all of us ladies read this wonderful blog on frugality, we're more involved with the family finances than the general population!

My husband is overjoyed to leave our finances to me. The only thing he does is balance the checkbook periodically since I'm not very good at math. :-)

[Krista]

My Husband did the bills for the first 4 years of our marriage, then I did it for the next 6 years and now he's back to doing it again. We sit down each Sunday and go over things together, so we each know the status though. With a toddler, he has more time than I do right now. Also, he's more of a spender and it helps him to see just how much goes out each week (or more often) when he logs on.

[LeAnna C]

My husband is mostly in charge of the finances but we work mostly as a team. I write checks for bills when he is really busy but he does the balancing of the checkbook and figuring out how much we need to put into each category for life from each check. :)
We have been good for each other for sure, I am the penny pincher and he is more lenient with finances so we always discuss in length purchases with pros and cons and we try to wait at least a week before buying something to make sure we really, really want it.

[Spoodles]

I tried handing the responsibility for the money to my husband a few years ago after he complained about our "broke" condition. (We weren't.) By the end of the first month, he not only didn't ever want to see our checkbook again, but he never again asked me what happened to all the money he thought we'd have! We handle decisions more cooperatively now, but I still do the nuts and bolts stuff.

I'm sure you'd enjoy handling that aspect of things for a while. You're not confused about money the way he was at the time ;-). Still, I think it's best to let the real nerd drive most of the time. We get a little antsy when we're not in charge...

[Beth/Mom2TwoVikings]

I'm the geek and the financial detail person. DaHubby's the visionary and "idea man". We have our Dave Ramsey family business meeting the 3rd Sat of each month to go over the budget for the upcoming month. While I write the budget, he gets approval and/or veto power. LOL He's better at the bigger picture while I'm the DR-junkie who chipping away at it everyday! LOL

[Karen]

I handle all of the bills, budgeting, and everything. I enjoy doing it, and I'm good at it. He is always aware of what I do and when I do it because we communicate about money freely. We discuss the budgeting, major purchases, and financial decisions. He definitely has some input, but he tends to defer to me for the most part because he trusts my judgment.

[TheAngelForever]

I have been paying the bills and everything since right after our wedding. Hubby missed a few payments and I nearly killed him for the late fees. Now 7 years later it has never happened again, unless the US postal service lost a bill and we did not receive it.

[Jennifer S]

I am the one with the skills in this area so I do all of the bill paying. Every 2 months or so, I remind my husband how to access our accounts and what the passwords are so that he is equipped, "just in case." Kind of like how Jesse wants you to know.

However, major purchases and financial decisions are made together.

[Krista]

I handle the bills, but my DH always knows whats going on.

[Trixie]

Hello!

I handle the finances at our house for the same reason Jesse does, ahh the nerd thing comes in pretty handy sometimes:)

I have full control of everything and the only mandate from my husband is to not get us in trouble with the IRS or run us into bankruptcy. ;) Other than that his eyes glaze over when we talk money.

Actually George is pretty good with money and it isn't a problem for me to handle the finances because I like to do it a lot (nerd, nerd, nerd) and I do it for my clients too.

Can't wait to read what the other commentors have to share!

Trixie

[Cathy]

We've both tried doing it alone before and both made bad financial decisions so we both do it together now. I pay the bills as they come in and he keeps track of savings and pay credit card balances. It works great for us.

[Mary]

DH did all of our finances for about 9 months after we got married. Then he deployed very unexpectedly for 11 months. And I was completely lost because I hadn't been paying the bills. So, when he came home from that deployment, we decided that I am the one that pays the bills. Technically, not a lot needs to be done, as virtually everything is set to come out automatically, but now I know, when DH deploys (and he's done so 14 times in 9 years of marriage) that I'm not up a creek without a paddle.

[Rachel]

My husband did all of the finances the first four years of our marriage; but two years ago I asked if he wanted me to take over (he was getting overwhelmed at work and also working on his masters...still is), and he was happy to give that chore to me. He still calls the shots and somehow keeps a running tab in his head (probably since I don't spend much anyway), but I pay bills, enter receipts, and reconcile. My only downfall is that occasionally I get sidetracked with home stuff and have to ask him to pay a bill online (he likes paper copies of everything). ha

[Ruth]

I pay all the bills and do all the budgeting. DH and I make any big purchase decisions together, of course.

[Brittany]

DH technically handles most of the balancing, entering and bill-paying. He's much better with numbers and organization than I am. (I never balanced my checkbook before we were married!) However, we work together to set the budget and make major decisions. Also, it takes both of us to stick to the budget we set!

[Vicky]

My husband is in charge of our finances, although I'd like to be. He is a little, um, lax about things.

I grew up in a family where my mom did it, but HATED doing it. I always thought it would be nice to have a guy who did it. And it is, to an extent - however, he isn't as thrifty or frugal as I am and tends to be carefree about spending. That's why I want to be in charge, but he's not good about letting go of that. ;)

[Shawna]

My hubby stays away from the money, for the most part. He likes not having to worry about it, and I think I'm pretty good at it. :)

[Aryn]

My husband does the day-to-day bills, I do the forward planning, investing, and taxes.

[Melissa]

I take care of all the finances. My husband is in the Navy so he is out to see A LOT. I am good with numbers and a better saver. And it wouldn't get done if my husband was in charge because he is so busy with work and gone all the time.

[Rachelle/mamabear]

Right now I do all the finances. I have been doing them for about 10 years now!! My sweet hubby did it when we first got married, he would forget to enter things in the check book or use the Atm card and not enter it!! Things went a bouncing !!! He handed my the check book and said have fun! I have been praying that he would take this "job" back. with so many little ones , I find it hard to put the time aside for this. Plus I really don't like this job!!! I love being a helpmeet to my hubby, just don't like this job! I do think every wife should at least know how / what to do in this area. At least you are prepared for whatever life brings.
Blessings-
Rachelle

[Leah S]

There was never any question about it in my marriage, I take care of all the financial stuff. My husband and I are complete opposites - he doesn't like math, I love it and used to work as an Accounts Payable Clerk when I was a teenager.

It's worked out very well, my husband never stresses over the money, he can swipe the debit card worry-free and we don't bounce checks. :)

I always tell him what's going on with the money, even though it doesn't mean much to him, or doesn't register as anything. I could tell him that we have $5,000 in the account or $1,000, and it means the same to him. He assumes that I have plans for most of the money or that I'm saving up for a major expense.

When my husband does want something expensive (like a computer), he'll work out the numbers with me, and do his best not to push me over the edge by not leaving any breathing room. Life DOES happen! :)

[Stacy]

My husband is in school working on a major in accounting and...I handle the household finances. We make the decisions together, but I do the bill paying, checkbook balancing, etc. I'm enough of a control freak that if he was doing it I'd be checking it over anyways, and I'm more detail oriented than he is.

[Lynn]

I do home and my husband does the business. His has the much harder of the two. You are organized so this probably won't be a problem for you. But once I had three kids and my schudule got busier I found it hard to fit it in. I dreaded taking the time to sit down and balance things out, pay bills, budget, etc. Now I have a set day and time to do it and it is much easier to handle. Once a week I just do it and it does not become overwhelming. Do you use a budgeting program like quickbooks or something? I was just curious how you keep track of everything. Is it really just by the envelope type system?

[Iva]

The Man Beast makes the money and I write the checks - however, I make sure to discuss bill paying with him so he knows exactly where the money is going. I refuse to take all the responsibility. It's a joint effort, for sure.

[Meags]

My husband does it but when we set up our monthly budget we go over all the categories together and make the decisions.

[Kelli]

We just completed FPU, and we now do the bills together as Dave Ramsey's suggests. It's worked well this way and has been a whole lot less stressful!

[Cathy]

I handle the money around here. DH is deployed about every other year or so, so it just makes sense for us. We tried having him doing it for a while at one point but it just really isn't his area of expertise (despite the dual Math and Business degrees!) I keep him informed, though.

[kelli]

We are self-employed/incorporated... so that adds some extra "fun" to our finances! Because I'm the money geek, I do the finances as far as actually writing out the bills and keeping the QUicken files going... but we definitely discuss how finances are going TOGETHER. It's a team effort!

[Cynthia Gilbert]

My honey asked me to handle the finances when we were engaged, which works great for me too since I love numbers and planning. He loves that I plan ahead for expenses and non-monthly bills (something he's never been good at) as it lowers his stress level.

Ideally, I would love him to be more involved in the day-to-day maintenance so he would know what to do if something happened to me, but he's only recently stopped getting a deer-in-the-headlights scared stare when I show him the budget so I think that might be off in the future still. :-) Numbers are not for everyone, but I think he'll get there eventually where he can at least learn how I do things so it won't be greek to him if he has to manage things.

For the time being, we are on a tight budget and he supports it 100% - which is what makes it possible for me to be a SAHM. If there is something that he wants, then we work out a way to get it, usually by a combination of saving and selling some things we don't need. He's such a sweetie and it's so rare that he asks for anything, that we always find a way - and without resorting to credit cards!

[Jaynee]

My DH and I both kind of do it. We use separate joint accounts and just kind of each pick a few bills each month to pay, and then others we have automatically withdrawn from either account every month. The only reason we are in debt is because I like to spend money (he's a saver), but I've been working since December to live cash-only and become consumer-debt free and hope to have that accomplished by August 2010.

[Jennifer]

Good for you! I think it's really important for both husband/wife to be very familiar with finances.

My husband and I have similar spending habits and we both like math, but I handle bills and balancing the checkbook. I personally haven't found it to be an extra stress. One thing that has made bill-paying a LOT easier (and saves on postage too!) is online banking! If your bank offers this, check it out. They'll even mail the bill for you to someone who doesn't offer online payments. We use FNB Olathe.

[Sarah]

We plan our budget together and any large purchases, but I handle the majority of the finances and bill paying, for several reasons: I love it, I'm good at it, I have more regular time to do it (he's a surgery resident), I do most of the shopping for the family and, like Stacy said, I like to know what exactly is going on, so I would be looking at it all the time anyway.

I think that you must make decision together and be on the same page, and that it's always good for all members of the household (both spouses, plus kids) to know how to plan expenses, pay bills, balance the checkbook, etc. For the day to day getting it done, though, it seems to work best when one person takes the lead so nothing falls through the cracks. Who does it in each family depends on who has time, ability and desire to do it or who wants to get better at it. You both need to be comfortable with whatever you decide. That said, though, both spouses need to know where you stand financially and the person not handling the nitty gritty needs to know what all is involved so they could take over if needed.

[Renee]

I've been taking care of all the financial stuff since shortly before we got married because he was that happy to not have to deal with it. I'm the nerd and use Quicken for record-keeping and reporting and Excel for budgeting and he regularly thanks me for taking care of it because we're (he's) in much better financial shape now.

I do keep him informed on passwords and where to find the info if anything were to ever happen to me, and of course we discuss big purchases (house, cars, appliances) but we're very blessed to have enough breathing room in the budget that we don't really have to stress over things the way we used to; I budget for the year (and discuss it with him) and then tweak as needed each month, but the tweaks are minor as our sinking funds are well established.

[Katie]

We work together in the following way: my husband manages the budget spreadsheet and pays bills. I visit the ATM once a week to get our envelope money. We go over our budget together at the beginning of each month and whenever changes need to be made.

When my husband deployed to Iraq last year and I managed all our money, I was continually thankful for his organized budget spreadsheet and automatic billpay. His organization was the gift that kept on giving while he was away!

[Rebekah]

Well, my husband has recently taken a more active roll in our finances. In the past, he would hand me his check, we'd briefly discuss what was due, then I would sit and pay everything and balance the checkbook.
Since my pregnancy and the birth of our second son, I just was not able to keep up with it very well.
Now, he has put together a whole budget program on his computer at work. He figures everything out and I simple write things in, pay bills online, or mail them when necessary.
It really works great for us! I like knowing what is going on without having to "think" through budgeting, etc.
Since we learned about Dave Ramsey and began budgeting more strictly, our system really works for us. There's a lot less stress knowing in advance where the money is going to go.

[Dawn]

We divide the responsiblity. He sits down to carefully balance the checkbook once a month when our statement arrives. He also keeps track of our investments.

I organize/pay the bills and maintain the checkbook throughout the month. If any bills are higher than normal, I'll run it past him just so he is aware.

Any major purchases (over $100, and even some over $50) are discussed before the purchase is made.

[Debbie M]

We each take care of our "own" finances. We each are in charge of part of the income and we use it to pay our own expenses plus we are each in charge of some of the bills.

This works for us because we have different styles. I like to have everything balanced and know where everything is. He likes to keep a general idea of things in his head without having to write everything down. We can each keep doing things our own way without driving the other person nutso.

Also, I have a somewhat conservative investing style, and he has a more aggressive investing style, so with each of us in charge of some of the money, that's good diversification.

This puts us in the odd position of occasionally "lending" each other money. Neither one of us wants to ask for help, so that helps keep us motivated to do a good job with our part of the money. But if things come up, of course we aren't going it alone.

We are working on setting up a system so we can each discover and access each other's accounts if necessary.

**

Oddly enough, my parents have a similar delegation-type of system. My dad used to take care of their finances, but he's entrepreneurial and overly optimistic which led to problems. Finally my mother decided to get a paying job and to take over all the common bills except for the house. After that point, the utilities were never cut off, though occasionally we would get evicted and have to move. (They haven't moved in decades now, though, so that's good!) My mother also quit getting ulcers after that point.

[Lisa]

I used to do it. Dh does it now. We "meet" every weekend to discuss what is what. I also get "my" money at that time.

[Chiara]

Hmmm... I guess you can say I am also a nerd hahaha. I do the finances in terms of paying bills, looking forward to the next few months, projecting expenses, savings, etc. My DH is a financial planner but he's not very patient or detailed when it comes to keeping track of expenses. He is, however, superb at investing, which is what he does :) So, I stick the money into the savings and when it reaches a certain point, he can take some and invest it.

We both have "allowances" but for the most part, we discuss big expenses with each other to make sure the other person is ok with spending the money.

[Jen]

I do most if not all of the finances because DH is in the military and can be gone for months on end so it's easier for me to do them.

[sarah]

As a numbers nerd married to an artistic type, I handle the bill paying and day to day budgeting. However, I firmly believe that God has set my husband as the head of the household and that means following his lead in the big picture of our finances.

We sit down and agree to general direction and priorities, and I make it happen. We regularly have informal discussions about tweaking things here and there (ie - he's okay with me couponing and finding deals, just not "too much").

I've found that even when we spend money that I didn't necessarily want to but my husband did, God is always faithful and provides what we need. Although some days it sure is a test in Biblical submission!

[Mrs. Querido]

At first it was just me. Then we went through Financial Peace and decided to let him have a go at it since he didn't know how to balance a checkbook even. He learned, we were fine and now I am back at it because I am at home the most and have the most time to keep an eye on things.

I am accountable to him though. So I guess we do it together too!

He knows at any given time how much is in checking and savings because we communicate over finances. Don't want any surprises.

I am just the data entry person I guess :)

[Jennifer]

I have to say that working together is your best bet. I write the checks and do the online bill pay, but the decisions are made together. If you're talking about just the logistics of how everything gets paid, then it should be the more organized of the two of you. Otherwise things might get overlooked. As long as you're comfortable that you'd be able to do the organization side if you had to, then why not stick with what works? It sounds like you're on Dave's plan and have stayed debt-free with your current system. If it ain't broke, don't fix it?? :)

[Danielle]

I pay the bills online, check the bank statement daily, do the budget and get the cash for my husband to use during the week. He doesn't like doing any of this, it makes him stressed and frustrated. I like the control. He has input on big money purchases but I do the day to day to day.....

[Danielle]

Just fixed my url from previous post. Apparently I don't know how to spell.

[Carrie]

When the hubs and I were dating in college, I found out that he was all kinds of finance charges on his credit card. After we got engaged, I immediately merged our finances and declared myself CFO.

It went like this: We were moving out of the country, so we no longer needed my car. DH had this smallish debt. I sold the car, and used the money to pay the debt -- on the condition that he would henceforth leave the finances to me. I promised we would never be in that position again.

Eleven years later, we have both kept our promises.