I love my family.
They’re great, inspirational and kind. And last week at Thanksgiving, it was hard not to succumb to the warm fuzzies and think about how lucky I am.
But I was also reminded how clueless caring, loving people can be when it comes to money. (more…)
The “should married couples have separate bank accounts” debate is old news, especially since Oprah keeps revisiting it in her Debt Diet series. Here’s a new twist though – should the separate accounts also be secret ones? That’s the topic The Detroit Free Press took on in this article (it first appeared in The Arizona Republic).
I should be the last person to post this since I am the only one on the editorial staff here who is not married (not counting our super-intern, Mary, who is still in college). But, even the headline, “Couples Agree to Love, Honor, and Hide Money”—as if hiding money somehow goes against you loving and honoring your partner—sort of struck a chord. Is it not possible for couples to love, honor, and have certain things they don’t tell each other?
Just because two people decide to share their lives doesn’t mean they have to share everything else, like email addresses for instance. You can be a “we” without having too many “ours.”
I totally get the whole we-must-have-honesty-so-we–can-have-trust thing. But, is it so wrong for me to have my own money stash and not tell my husband how much I have piled away? People have different spending habits and I know that I won’t be able to merge mine with anyone else’s.
I realize that things get complicated when you factor kids in or a stay-at-home parent. But it seems okay, healthy even, to not only have a “secret account” as the article dubs it, but also to not have to forward your balance statements to your significant other to develop “trust.”
Like I said, this rant is not supported by any real life experience, so if any of you actually know what you’re talking about, please chime in.
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