Managing household finances

My DH spent most of his working life away from home, so I always handled the finances and as a ‘stay-at-home’ wife, it made more sense for savings and investments to be in my name too. I’ve friends who leave absolutely everything to their DHs and don’t even know where their savings are! At least when DH died, I was able to deal with most things without help.

I have always run the family business, including finance.

In the beginnng this was because DH was away so much and incommunicado (before internet, email or mobile phones, the places he went to, often devoid of any telephones.). I handled everything. Now we divide it, I run the household, still, and accounts and he handles savings and investments. Well, thta is the theory, but everything is now discussed between us, although I look after current account banking and credit cards.

We manage our finances jointly. I met a lady in the bank one day. The poor soul had just lost her husband, she was coming to see the bank manager as she had no clue about finances or paying bills. Husband did everything. I've often thought about that lady and hope she got on ok. I remember telling her at the time, that she had come to the best place. When I went home I was really glad that I would never be in that position. If Im the one that remains, I know how to manage and where everything pertaining to our finances is. It's something both in a relationship should know.

My brother was surprised when I told him I had never balanced a cheque book and stunned when told my husband hadn’t either. Couldn’t see the point of it. We survived.

Nowadays everything is done by direct debit and apart from checking nothing surprising has been debited from my account there really nothing else to do.

One thing I had to have demonstrated to me after he died was how to use a cash machine. I had always simply asked for cash when I needed any which wasn’t often as I used my bank card for purchases.

I've always been in charge of the financial admin, and I've tried so many times to show DH the ins and outs of the spreadsheet without success. In case I fall under a bus, I've sorted out a crib sheet for him, and our AC also have the password as a back up. All contact details, reference numbers, renewal dates for insurance policies etc are on the sheet, and just about everything is paid by direct debit these days, so as long as he can work out how to pay the monthly milk bill and paper bill, he should be fine! We don't account to each other for our expenses, but we each probably spend about the same overall on clothes, hobbies, going out with friends and so on. We do talk first about the bigger things - holidays, furniture, etc.

We have no money to invest kitty so Himself’s got a pretty straightforward job to do! Pay the bills. Spend what’s left of our monthly pensions. A doddle really ...
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My DH insisted that he specially selected me as his wife because I, a bank clerkess, would be able to do all the finance and mathematical stuff at which he was hopeless. It transpired that his hopelessness was selective, because as a Carpenter/Joiner running his own business he daily managed to do all the complicated stuff such as calculating stresses on roof timbers, correctly estimating time, wastage, materials for tricky jobs - though he did claim to be unable to calculate the VAT due on the final bill.
Consequentially, I did all his business's invoicing, accounts and Tax/VAT returns UNPAID, while also managing all the household finances. working full time and bringing up 2 DDs I think he got a bargain.

I’ve always dealt with most of the finances as DH always said I was better at it than him. Now he’s s gone I manage it all easily.
My Mil had a dreadful time when her husband died she hadn’t a clue.

I always looked after the household expenses. DH came from a family where Father always handed his wages over to Mother to deal with so I supposed it seemed natural to him for me to do the same. In the years before he died a lot of the accounts for energy and so on had been changed to my name only which made it much easier for me to carry on with them after he died. Just left me with the labyrinth of dealings he'd had with TV and broadband!

DH actually does our money, accounts, investing etc. But we talk about everything.

We have joint accounts and, now we are not paying for school fees, uniforms, children's activities and a mortgage and we have more money to spare, we trust each other not to go mad. Unlike a friend who spent £2,000 on new dining table and chairs without discussion.

Himself sorts our finances. I’m happy with that.
#lazygran

I just wish we had a little more to juggle. Hey ho. Health is wealth I remind us.
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I've handled our finances for as long as I can remember. When we bought a house we each had our own accounts plus a joint account for the house, including the mortgage. We funded the joint account equally and our own accounts were our own concern. I earned more and would usually pay for theatre tickets and holidays. I have never wanted to account to anyone for buying expensive clothes or shoes.

We don't argue about money and discuss major payments. We have a list of work needed to be done to our house and we talk about what's next and how much we're going to spend.

Now we have a joint account in the UK and in France and I have a business account. Every now and then I do try to show DH what to do - how to get into the accounts - but he's not that interested. One day I will have to write it all down for him.

I manage the accounts. This is a swap in retirement - he felt that it was a job he could more easily do during our working years, but now he has to do the more 'active' jobs I do it.
That's just the clerical side though - he sees and discusses all expenditure, and where we put our savings and which charities we donate to.
I wouldn't consult him about say, coffee or lunch with a friend, maybe once a month, which is budgeted for as my 'spends'. Anything else needs discussing.
And yes, he'd be fine picking it all up again, even though he grumbles about on-line banking!

I am in charge of finance here and transfer "pocket money " to DH's personal account. He is a terrible spendthrift and we would get into trouble if I allowed him free rein.
Everything is online and he knows the passwords as does DS, so I have no worries if anything should happen to me.

He does bills by standing order and looks after the car. I do food and household expenses.
If either of us wants to spend over £250 on anything at all then it is up for discussion (my garden table and chairs are waiting for the end-of-season sales).

We each have a rough idea of how much the other is spending but we are fortunate to not have to account for every penny at the moment, unlike when children were at home and I knew exactly how much I had in my purse.

All accounts are kept in a file so available to either of us.
I would have to concentrate to make sure I was paying everything if need be, but I'm confident that things are sufficiently well organised that either of us could pick up the other's expenditures.