Step by Step Resources for Combining Finances and FI Planning

[freeevergreen]

Hi All - I'm looking for relatively simple/digestible resources/guides for combining finances in a relationship, and also for FI planning (though that is definitely "step 2"). 

I've searched, and while there are an endless amount of resources, I feel overwhelmed at what can actually be used in both instances as a quality comprehensive yet digestible "roadmap" to follow, especially on the combining finances part which is the immediate need.

Short story is that my wife and I are looking to combine finances after many years of keeping things separate and she would like some kind of "step by step" guide on how to do that in a healthy and easy to follow way, so we're both happy with the outcome.  Something which maybe outlines the different ways in which couples can do this as far as shared vs. individual accounts, money coming in, spending, funding retirement accounts, etc. and offers a roadmap of options with pros/cons of each to consider.  I'm of the opinion we can do this relatively easily ourselves with just a bit of time and brainstorming together, but my wife is skeptical of this as we've struggled to work through financial topics in the past harmoniously, so any kind of resource anyone has used which has helped them in a similar situation would be very much appreciated.  Suggested books, websites with good "step by step" content, or even an article that covers the basics to consider would be helpful.  She has suggested a financial advisor or coach, or perhaps some kind of class,  and I'm pretty resistant to those ideas due to the combination of time, cost, and high probability of uselessness.  But I'd certainly be open to any of those which come recommended.

Brief background on us to help understand what I'm looking for: 
Married, both in our 40s with two young boys.  Always kept our finances separate and more or less just contributed evenly to shared expense account which worked well for 10 years prior to house/kids.  Over last 7-8 years shifted to our shared expense pool being mostly all expenses, and this started to become more and more challenging logistically, but more importantly emotionally due to different work situations, income, etc.  We have no debt beyond our mortgage and both have a good chunk saved, but she more than I and we've always kept those separate and strangely never really talked about a combined plan for future finances/retirement.  Perhaps needless to say, we are now in therapy which has helped a lot, and we are now realizing that for us it makes the most sense logistically and emotionally to combine all of our finances. 

Fortunately, limiting spending and saving has always come natural to both of us, and our values around those things are pretty similar.  I've been an advocate of FI since my 20s reading Your Money or Your Life, and am relatively well educated on at least the basics through MMM blog and various other resources related to that and index stock investing, and have tracked my money fairly consistently over time, but never really had in place a very comprehensive "plan" for the nuts and bolts of reaching and living FI (vs. just more general things like looking at my spending and plugging things into calculators).  She has always been intrigued by it, but never tracked her money at all, and mostly relied on my advice whenever there were questions about investing in 401k, etc.  Now we'd like to go through all the steps required to actually plan for retirement (whether early or not) so we can be sure we are on the same page with everything.  But the first step to that is combining our daily finances in a way that feels good for both of us.

These are some resources I'm considering:
-  The Heart of Money: A Couple's Guide to Creating True Financial Intimacy (book).  Could be good to help us talk about and plan in a healthy way, but worried it won't have much in the way of the nuts and bolts of combining finances.
-  Smart Couples Finish Rich (book by David Bach).  Seems maybe "too basic" and perhaps won't really focus on how to combine finances?
- The Simple Path to Wealth (or stock series blog which I've read a lot of in the past).  My concern here is that it's mostly just a "how to invest" manifesto instead of an actual step by step guide for all the things to consider and work though to plan for retirement.  Maybe I'm wrong and it is that comprehensive.
- Various blogs, but my impression from reading MMM over the years and various other ones to a lesser extent, is that they tend to be somewhat disjointed when considered as a whole and fairly top level and don't offer a comprehensive step by step approach on how to plan for FI/retirement.  A bunch of the books out there seem to just be (from reading reviews) various bloggers putting their post content together in a book format with often a non-comprehensive "step by step" approach.

I hope that I didn't provide an overwhelming amount of details (my wife reminds me often that I tend to do this), and I am eternally grateful for any helpful resources you're able to suggest.  Thanks in advance!

[mspym]

The first step is to make sure that you and your wife have a shared vision of the future and a sense of shared sense of ownership over both the vision and the steps to get there. So instead of drowning your wife in details, get curious about how she sees your future and what she wants to do and she feels you can get there.

If you were Australian, I would recommend Scott Pape’s the barefoot investor because he has a simple roadmap for building a solid financial plan together and most critically has a repeated check-in process to keep you on the same page.
Otherwise, beginner-friendly/not too far off mainstream but will still get you going, I’d recommend Ramit Sethi, either his book or his Netflix show and YouTube channel. Again, he starts with working out your shared vision and then planning from there. Sethi gets some heat here for being materialistic etc but he’s sound on the fundamentals and more palatable to the average consumer.

[ixtap]

May I suggest that you work through the case study template either here or at bogleheads.org as a means of pulling all of the information together in the first place? Another resource would be the order of investments at both websites. As you pull everything together, you may realize that you can optimize that ordering better viewing everything as a whole, rather than two parts. This would make steps one and two pure math, you can discuss the goals and the psychology from there. ie, is it more important to optimize or for each to feel the independence of making more equal contributions to current expenses.


Further than that depends on your priorities as a couple. The simplest thing to do is to have one joint checking that all money goes into and gets disbursed from, one joint savings and one joint brokerage. We never got around to most of that and while we do have the one joint checking, it is our only joint account and we didn't create it until DH asked me to take over all of our day to day finances when he was dealing with a health issue. Some couples don't feel that they have combined finances until they have combined their accounts. Some don't feel safe unless each has at least a personal pin money account for emergencies. Some have all joint or authorized users credit cards, some want the ability to spend without feeling the other is looking over their shoulder. That is to say, rather than a step by step guide, you need a topic by topic list of discussion questions to help you work through each issue involved with combining finances.

[Ron Scott]

The simplest thing to do is to have one joint checking that all money goes into and gets disbursed from, one joint savings and one joint brokerage.

Add individual IRAs with named beneficiaries and joint credit cards and I think that covers it for financial assets. The cars and house, etc. should be titled jointly too.

I think this is pretty simple actually.

You both might want some “house rules” designed around personal needs and sensitivities, like when a spending decision becomes a joint one, but the simpler the better otherwise.

[Sandi_k]

As the daughter of a divorced single mom, I will never not have my own account. And I have read many, many, many accounts of women blindsided by a spouse who comes home one day to announce they want out of the marriage.

So we have a "yours, mine, and ours." Through the years, the "ours" account is where we do the majority of our income and outgo.

But I still have a separate emergency fund, in my name only. And DH has his singular account, with the funds he inherited from his grandparents. We both have the other listed as beneficiary on those, but they have been kept as separate accounts, FWIW.

[GilesMM]

Combine all accounts and assets that are combinable or can be jointly titled. You get passwords to all her accounts that are not joint.  That’s all. Then you take over the financial planning and forecasting with control of all accounts.

[mspym]

Combine all accounts and assets that are combinable or can be jointly titled. You get passwords to all her accounts that are not joint.  That’s all. Then you take over the financial planning and forecasting with control of all accounts.

This is not good advice and will not lead to good marital outcomes. 1/10, do not recommend.

[Kris]

Combine all accounts and assets that are combinable or can be jointly titled. You get passwords to all her accounts that are not joint.  That’s all. Then you take over the financial planning and forecasting with control of all accounts.

This is not good advice and will not lead to good marital outcomes. 1/10, do not recommend.

Yeah. No.

[deborah]

My partner and I never had combined finances until after I accidentally met a financial adviser. He suggested that it would work well for, and it has. So we had separate finances for four times as long as we’ve had combined finances now.

I agree with everything mspym says. If doing separate finances has worked for years, it’s worthwhile moving slowly, and discovering how each of you separately have it working for you currently. And what you each value about how you do things now. After you both appreciate the way both systems work, it will be time to understand what you’ve actually both got, and work out how you both want it to look in the future.

[Ron Scott]

Combine all accounts and assets that are combinable or can be jointly titled. You get passwords to all her accounts that are not joint.  That’s all. Then you take over the financial planning and forecasting with control of all accounts.

This is not good advice and will not lead to good marital outcomes. 1/10, do not recommend.

Yeah. No.

I am old enough to remember, in the days before people said things like “yeah no”, Giles’ comment would be viewed as tongue-in-cheek, and the sex roles, excuse me, gender roles, could be easily reversed without changing the comedic effect.

‘Cest la vie.

[neo von retorch]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poe%27s_law

Poe's law is an adage of internet culture which says that, without a clear indicator of the author's intent, any parodic or sarcastic expression of extreme views can be mistaken by some readers for a sincere expression of those views.

To be clear, in our marriage, my spouse fully endorsed combined accounts, and having me manage all bills, investing, and forecasting. That didn't make for a bad marital outcome, because it was a plan we built together to capitalize on each other's strengths.

We use BitWarden with a free 2-person organization, and share all important passwords through that so either of us may, at our leisure, access any of our joint or individual accounts. There are a few with 2-factor authentication that we cannot access without the other person present.

In contrast, if you say "I get passwords to all your individual accounts and I am in full control of financial planning and forecasting with control of all accounts" you sound like you think of your partner as a weakness you are trying to remove. You may not mean it that way, but you worded it that way, so take a moment to reconsider your choice of words, and your intent.

[Greystache]

Sorry, I don't have any resources to point you to. But I do have a recommendation. Keep it simple. If you live in a community property state, keeping separate accounts is just an illusion of independence. The only reason to hold assets separately is if you owned some assets prior to marriage that you don't wish to combine. In our case, we were both flat broke when we got married, so we never even thought about separate finances. Also, there are certain assets like 401Ks that must be held by individuals. Other than that, it is simpler to jointly own everything. We also keep a list of all accounts and passwords in a secure place so each spouse (or our heirs) can access every account. If you have separate assets that you want to combine, like real estate and bank accounts, you might want to kill two birds with one stone and transfer those assets into a living trust. We do keep separate credit cards so we can buy gifts for each other without the other spouse finding out ahead of time.

[Sandi_k]

Sorry, I don't have any resources to point you to. But I do have a recommendation. Keep it simple. If you live in a community property state, keeping separate accounts is just an illusion of independence. The only reason to hold assets separately is if you owned some assets prior to marriage that you don't wish to combine.

OR - if it's an inheritance. Co-mingling an inheritance makes it community property. If you hold it separately, it remains yours alone.

[MDM]

If the two of you consider the Investment Order suggestions, do you reach the same conclusions on how those should apply to your joint situation?

[Metalcat]

To be clear, there is a huge difference between having joint accounts and pooled finances.

DH and I have entirely separate accounts, we came together a bit older as two fully formed financial entities with very different financial situations. Instead of combining things, we've always kept everything separate because it's just so much easier that way for accounting purposes.

However, we conceptually pooled resources immediately. So although the accounts are separate, that's more convenient than ideological in nature.

He has a stable career and a predictable income and a pension, plus he owned the house before I moved in and had the mortgage in his name only. So what we did was put virtually all of our life spending accounts into his name and all bills come out of his accounts. It's just to easy to track this way.

This is a great approach for a couple who want resources totally pooled, but want to essentially live off of one income.

Whatever is left over from his income got transferred into my account and that plus all of my income went towards our massive debts, or large, unusual purchases, and then to my savings accounts because his pension is automatically filled.

You have to decide first how pooled you want your resources to be and what that means to you. Are you 100% pooled where literally all spending is agreed upon? Do you want a "yours, mine, and ours" distinction?

What purpose do you want every account, either joint or separate to serve?

Years later we have more joint accounts because we sold his house and have bought multiple houses together with joint mortgages/bank accounts. Our primary residence is still paid from his income and account, the other two are paid from a joint account where the rental income comes into.

Our bills are in the name of whomever set them up, but they are all still paid from DH's account. We both use his credit card for everything. Generally he is in charge of the day-to-day bills and I'm in charge of the bigger picture and investments.

We have a single joint chequing account because I get free VIP banking and we had to create a joint account for DH to have all of his existing personal banking under my free VIP umbrella. That account serves no purpose except to make it easier to move money between us when needed.

We both have access to all of the accounts with all of our passwords to, well, everything, are stored in a single Bitwarden account that we share.

As it has been mentioned, you don't actually need to change anything, especially not right away. What you need to do is really understand each other's financial vision and goals, and then discuss the purpose and function of every account you have and how you could possibly arrange things differently, and why.

There really is no step-by-step process because what you should combine and how you should pool is so specific to your circumstances, and requires some pretty in-depth conversation to come together on.

For some people it's very easy to discuss transparently every cent each other spends, for other couples that would be suffocating. How much financial autonomy and privacy do each of you need? What does that look like for each of you?

[mspym]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poe%27s_law

Poe's law is an adage of internet culture which says that, without a clear indicator of the author's intent, any parodic or sarcastic expression of extreme views can be mistaken by some readers for a sincere expression of those views.

To be clear, in our marriage, my spouse fully endorsed combined accounts, and having me manage all bills, investing, and forecasting. That didn't make for a bad marital outcome, because it was a plan we built together to capitalize on each other's strengths.

We use BitWarden with a free 2-person organization, and share all important passwords through that so either of us may, at our leisure, access any of our joint or individual accounts. There are a few with 2-factor authentication that we cannot access without the other person present.

In contrast, if you say "I get passwords to all your individual accounts and I am in full control of financial planning and forecasting with control of all accounts" you sound like you think of your partner as a weakness you are trying to remove. You may not mean it that way, but you worded it that way, so take a moment to reconsider your choice of words, and your intent.

It also depends on who is saying it and what your experience with that person is. "It's a joke" only works for so long and then one's can start thinking, wait I think they mean that...

[NotJen]

If you live in a community property state, keeping separate accounts is just an illusion of independence.

Not true.  Having your own account gives you access to money in the event that your spouse is a complete jerk.

Sorry, still mad over this. 

My best friend was going through a divorce - nothing official had been done - they were still figuring out lawyers, how to file, etc.  She goes to lunch, tries to pay, and her debit card won't work.  Her husband had removed her from their joint banking account (and didn't tell her).  It was the only access she had to any money.  They had combined accounts when married, and that was it, she had no money to for herself, even though she brought a decent sum into the marriage.  She was mortified.

Was it legal?  Nope.  Was he able to do it anyway?  Yep.  He signed a fucking paper saying it wasn't legal to remove her without her consent.  I urged her to sue him, but she didn't.

So yeah, I'll always have a separate account so I can't be held hostage like that.  Even if it is technically joint money, I'll still have access to it if something dumb happens.

[RetiredAt63]

Combine all accounts and assets that are combinable or can be jointly titled. You get passwords to all her accounts that are not joint.  That’s all. Then you take over the financial planning and forecasting with control of all accounts.

This is not good advice and will not lead to good marital outcomes. 1/10, do not recommend.

Yeah. No.

Enough women are shuddering at this that I am amazed no-one felt the earth tremor.

[NoVa]

Everyone is different. Married 40 years, never had a joint account. There were times the wife made more than me, others where I was the breadwinner. Never had an issue dividing up the bills. Personal spending is personal. For small stuff we don't need to decide whether a computer game or composted cow manure is more important, if you want it, get it from your funds. I am a firm believer in financial independence, especially for a spouse. No one should be stuck in a relationship because they can't afford to leave.

[Dreamer40]

Combining finances and FI planning are two separate projects.

As for combining, I agree with the advice to keep it simple. My husband and I combined everything from marriage day one, and it’s worked out great. We’re on the same team and have good communication. All the money is in joint accounts and we use an envelope system for budgeting. Every month, an agreed-on amount of money goes into envelopes for each of us to spend however we want or save up for something bigger. You can decide what counts as a personal or household expense. We tried actually transferring an equal amount to separate individual accounts, but it wasn’t worth the effort and we got rid of those accounts when we changed banks.

But this all depends on your relationship and background. Some people would never be comfortable in this situation. We aren’t people who have drama or fight about stuff. We’re both really reasonable and on the same page. Trust your gut. I could never have combined finances with previous people I dated. So glad I didn’t marry any of them.

Deciding on how much to spend and save is maybe more complicated. Hubby and I sat down with our budget and decided together what felt right for us, then assigned numbers to our different spending envelopes. We’ve adjusted this over time as our life changed. Then picked a simple investment plan and moved on. If this process causes bickering/disagreement/discomfort, then I’d look for a more structured guidebook/program/counselor to use as guidance. If you feel really differently from each other about how this part should go, I’d hold off combining finances until you’re on the same page.

[Dee18]

I have dear friends who have been married 40+ years, now with 2 adult children.   Both had professional careers, one in law and one in medicine.  A few years ago the husband, who was a gentle, loving husband and father for decades, began having serious mental health issues and resisted treatment. Last year he kicked his wife.  When she was contemplating moving out and divorcing, she realized she had no money or credit card solely in her own name. She didn’t even know the passwords to their investment account to access that joint money.   Fortunately she was able to finally convince him to get the medication and help he needed, but that assault was a huge wake-up call to her. Every woman ( and man ) should have some money that is solely hers. While it may be illegal for one joint account holder to have the other taken off the account without her permission, it is not illegal for one joint account holder to withdraw the funds from the account. 

[freeevergreen]

Thank you all so much for your thoughtful replies!

Definitely a lot to think about.  I think as I sit with it I realize that the mechanics of combining finances aren't really that complicated, and probably the "keep it simple" advice is most applicable for us for that piece and the best method is just to brainstorm some ideas, pick the one that feels the best to us, and try it. 

We previously had a very convoluted system that I came up with where we looked at the number of hours I worked every week vs. the time available after my extra Dad/household duties and she transferred that much more to our joint account as I am paid hourly and she is on salary.  Aside from being a logistical headache every month, it had a tendency to build resentment on both sides for various reasons.  Her idea was to instead try this year having her just contribute a set amount based roughly on what it was last year instead of looking at my hours every week/month.  We never really settled on that idea and this year have just contributed equal amounts to our shared account until we worked it out, but then just recently she ended up contributing a big chunk simply because we need cash as we're replacing both of our aging vehicles at the same time, so it basically worked out that way somewhat serendipitously I suppose. 

I can certainly understand the pros and cons of combining finances and leaving them separate, and I do think every relationship and situation, and in our case time of life, likely thrives under different circumstances.  Our method of keeping things separate worked so well for us prior to buying a house and having kids that it actually had the unfortunate negative consequence of leading us to believe that we didn't have to talk about or worry about our financial relationship at all in the future as things evolved and our responsibilities became more intertwined.  At this point, each of our spending is probably 99% shared anyway.  We just have relatively little of what would be categorized as "personal spending".  We'll likely keep our taxable accounts and emergency funds as separate accounts just for the wisdom of safeguarding against an unanticipated relationship disaster, but the idea is we'd like to move into thinking of them and acting on them as shared assets, and I believe that will work better for our relationship moving forward, though we are still definitely working through some of the emotional complexities of that piece as well.

As for the specific FI part, thanks for the good advice there as well.  I will definitely take advantage of the case study forums both here and possibly bogleheads.  We have a long list of things to work through that we made, and probably simply prioritizing them all and working through them piece by piece using the resources here as well as elsewhere is as good a step by step as any.

Thanks again for everyone's help!

[EchoStache]

In case you check back on the thread, I only have a small suggestion to make in case you find it helpful. Married 27 years and have had 100% joint finances since day one. Our paychecks go into our account.  From there, we decide where our money goes.  We communicate.  It is part of a healthy marriage.  We have financial goals, and we pursue them together.  Only separate accounts are 401k and IRA, but we contribute equally in terms of total dollar amounts...it doesn't matter who makes more as it is all our money. 

The exception is that we each want to have some anonymity when it comes to discretionary spending.  So we came up with an amount that we both agree to that is free and clear to be used in whatever way we want.. i.e. spent on wants or saved up over time for bigger wants.  Not that the exact dollar amount matters, but just as an example, wifey gets $120/month of blow money.  She spends it as she pleases or saves it up for bigger stuff.  (I actually don't take a spending money allotment, but could).

It has provided some freedom for little day to day spending while keeping >99% of our money unified and working towards our joint goals.

So I just thought that maybe agreeing on a reasonable discretionary spending allotment each month will allow for some freedom while keeping jointly focused on the big stuff.

Good luck!

[Metalcat]

I have to say, every single time I read "blow money" here, I'm imagining you folks and your spouses snorting coke.

[freeevergreen]

In case you check back on the thread, I only have a small suggestion to make in case you find it helpful. Married 27 years and have had 100% joint finances since day one. Our paychecks go into our account.  From there, we decide where our money goes.  We communicate.  It is part of a healthy marriage.  We have financial goals, and we pursue them together.  Only separate accounts are 401k and IRA, but we contribute equally in terms of total dollar amounts...it doesn't matter who makes more as it is all our money. 

The exception is that we each want to have some anonymity when it comes to discretionary spending.  So we came up with an amount that we both agree to that is free and clear to be used in whatever way we want.. i.e. spent on wants or saved up over time for bigger wants.  Not that the exact dollar amount matters, but just as an example, wifey gets $120/month of blow money.  She spends it as she pleases or saves it up for bigger stuff.  (I actually don't take a spending money allotment, but could).

It has provided some freedom for little day to day spending while keeping 98% of our money unified and working towards our joint goals.

So I just thought that maybe agreeing on a reasonable discretionary spending allotment each month will allow for some freedom while keeping jointly focused on the big stuff.

Good luck!

Thanks so much for your reply!  Yes, thinking about things as "ours" vs "mine and yours" for us is a move we've decided will be healthiest for our relationship, but since we've operated for so long the other way it needs to be a gradual process for us (more for my wife than I, but probably best for both of us).

Ha! I initially read it that way too!  Funny if that is an actual standard term on this forum.
I have to say, every single time I read "blow money" here, I'm imagining you folks and your spouses snorting coke.

[cheaplynn]

Chiming in to say that we found it very beneficial for our relationship to combine finances. I am the planner and also wanted to find a book that spelled out the perfect process step by step, but the reality is that we started with a simple joint account and then I started adjusting from there. That was the thing for me--just get started with something, then figure out how to refine it. It is an ongoing process, and it's one that requires us to talk more about our money...which is a very good thing, both financially and for our relationship.

As for the longer-term planning, we are in the process of working with a fee-only, one-time financial planner. We were feeling good about our day-to-day management and annual spending, but just struggled to do longer-term math, especially with our slightly-more-complex retirement funds (a combination of two pensions + one social security, all hitting at different times). We interviewed a few planners and made it clear that we were looking for support in figuring out a less traditional retirement plan (early semi-retirement/coasting, then eventually dying as close to zero as possible) and chose our advisor based on their responses. All of them were like "yeah, sure, that's fine," but one made a point to mention that he has worked on plans like this before and asked specific questions that really hit at the core of our vision. We went with him, obviously. I know that plenty of people on this forum would see this kind of service as a waste of money, but I'm pretty financially conservative and it just felt right in my gut. We still had a little bit of 'special' money from a wedding gift set aside, and it just to happened to be the exact amount for the service. Seemed serendipitous.

Good luck with the process! Don't try to get it 'perfect' right away. Just keep communicating about what is working and not working, and make adjustments as you go.

[freeevergreen]

Chiming in to say that we found it very beneficial for our relationship to combine finances. I am the planner and also wanted to find a book that spelled out the perfect process step by step, but the reality is that we started with a simple joint account and then I started adjusting from there. That was the thing for me--just get started with something, then figure out how to refine it. It is an ongoing process, and it's one that requires us to talk more about our money...which is a very good thing, both financially and for our relationship.

As for the longer-term planning, we are in the process of working with a fee-only, one-time financial planner. We were feeling good about our day-to-day management and annual spending, but just struggled to do longer-term math, especially with our slightly-more-complex retirement funds (a combination of two pensions + one social security, all hitting at different times). We interviewed a few planners and made it clear that we were looking for support in figuring out a less traditional retirement plan (early semi-retirement/coasting, then eventually dying as close to zero as possible) and chose our advisor based on their responses. All of them were like "yeah, sure, that's fine," but one made a point to mention that he has worked on plans like this before and asked specific questions that really hit at the core of our vision. We went with him, obviously. I know that plenty of people on this forum would see this kind of service as a waste of money, but I'm pretty financially conservative and it just felt right in my gut. We still had a little bit of 'special' money from a wedding gift set aside, and it just to happened to be the exact amount for the service. Seemed serendipitous.

Good luck with the process! Don't try to get it 'perfect' right away. Just keep communicating about what is working and not working, and make adjustments as you go.

Thanks for that insight and encouragement! 

Definitely talking about money more is a good thing, but we had to do some relationship work in therapy to get to a point where we practice enough empathy to each other's sensitivities around the topic to be able to do so in a civil manner.  That was a big step and it is exciting to be moving towards a deliberate shared vision of the future (with money and otherwise). 

We were so focused on whether to have kids in the future (she wanted to and I was on the fence) that all of our pre-marriage work focused around that and we never touched on finances, largely also because it was never an issue for us in 8 or so years together so we just naively assumed it would keep chugging along that way even through major joint financial decisions like buying a house and college funding, changing incomes, and retirement.  Pretty baffling to me that two thoughtful and practical people would not have realized that was a topic to fully iron out, but I think your advice to not worry about "getting it perfect" immediately and instead focus on ongoing communication to continue to improve is very wise.  I suppose that is more or less what we did, but just not enough regular communication on it and what we were doing and certain specific situations brought up some pretty intense unexpected feelings and conflict.  I think thankfully we are on the right path now.  Thanks again!

[use2betrix]

We have all joint savings and checking - easy to combine. Her retirement accounts stay in her name (easy that way) and vice versa.

We have all joint credit cards and money pulled from the same accounts.

All our finances are in personal capital (now empower), so we both have access to view everything. I generally “manage” all the money, investing, planning, etc. in personal capital, she categorizes all expenses each month and I include the information on a shared note showing metrics for each year.

My wife and I have been together for 12 years - she was 18 and I was 23. I’ve contributed to 99% of our shared 7 figure net worth. She generally doesn’t do paid work. It’s “our” money and “our” accounts. Our whole process has always been a transparent breeze. I would not have married someone I didn’t trust, nor align with on financial matters. She’s much more frugal than me, but since I make a pretty solid income, she doesn’t get after me too much on my spending. We discuss most things over around $100. I was actually planning on ordering something for a few hundred dollars this morning, she mentioned maybe we should wait til next months budget since we have a lot of expenses this month. It was a good suggestion, so we’re waiting til next month.