Here are seven things we’ve found to be true about our marriage once one of us became self-employed.

“Keeping score” is dangerous. When one person shifts to a completely different lifestyle, the various dynamics of the marriage will shift. This is true of any major change – stay-at-home parenting, a major career shift, even a significant change in the hours worked.

Dynamics change (and I’m going to talk about some specifics below). Don’t “keep score” based on what the previously-established norms were. Instead, focus on figuring out the new norm and forget about the old ones, and talk about it carefully along the way.

The balance of household chores subtly shifts towards more chores for the self-employed spouse. Here’s an example from our own life. I’m about to start my day, so just before I begin, I’ll toss a load of laundry into the washing machine. Then, at lunchtime, I’ll go downstairs and toss the clothes in the dryer. During my afternoon break, I’ll fold those clothes and put them into the kids’ drawers. Still, after work is over, the remaining work is split 50-50.

It’s easy to say that such an arrangement is completely reasonable – after all, the self-employed partner has the time to do this, right? Well, on the other side of the coin, the partner working outside of the home is also taking breaks but not filling them with housework.

It’s unsurprising that, over a long period of time, the self-employed partner may feel some sense of … unbalance, while the partner working outside the home still feels the arrangement is 50-50. This can easily create hard feelings. The best way to handle it is to talk it out.

The social needs of both partners change. When both of us worked outside the home in fairly social environments, we had similar feelings about how much to socialize with others on evenings and weekends.

Then, when I began to work solo, my ideas in that area changed. During my work day, I interacted with others much less than I did before and thus, after work, my desire to socialize went up quite a lot. At the same time, Sarah’s desires remained unchanged.

Our solution has largely been that we invite people over a bit more often than we used to. On top of that, I’ve started to become more involved in community groups and organizations of all kinds, even taking on significant responsibility in one of them. This balance works out well for both of us.

When children are sick, the self-employed parent ends up being the nurturing one most of the time. As I write this, my son is currently watching a program on PBS (Caillou). He’s home sick for the day and I’m busy trying to get some work in.

While this means I’m rushed a little bit, I am the partner with the more flexible schedule, so when the children are sick, I’m almost always the one that steps in to take care of them. This, of course, means that my wife is less interrupted by such things at her work.

Again, this can sometimes feel unbalanced and, if left undiscussed, feel unfair. The instant one partner begins to feel things are out of balance, it should be discussed openly. Such things can easily fester.

The work of the self-employed partner can often bleed into time that used to be shared doing other things. Today, I’m spending much of my time with my son. I’ll make him snacks, make him lunch, put him down for a nap, and if he feels better this afternoon, I’ll play some games with him and work on writing the alphabet with him.

That means that, unexpectedly, I’ve lost most of a day’s worth of work at a time when I can’t really afford such leakage. So, this evening, I’ll need to make up for it. As a result, Sarah will find herself doing solo things. Thankfully, she doesn’t mind this – she’s an avid reader – but it does mean that we won’t be able to do something together, like play a board game.

It can become harder to discuss work. A few times a day, I’ll go do something completely unrelated to my work, simply because I need the mental break. I’ll read the rules for a board game. I’ll wash dishes. I’ll read a book for personal enjoyment. I’ll visit messageboards.

At first, when I told Sarah about this, she was fairly annoyed. “Why are you wasting time?” was her immediate response.

Here’s the thing, though. Most workplaces do offer breaks – and quite often, other break times are squeezed into work times. We gather around the water cooler and chat. We stop in another worker’s office or cubicle and see what’s going on. We go to meetings. In other words, most “real” workplaces have tons of time for mental breaks.

Since I’m self-employed, I don’t have nearly as many opportunities for those kinds of breaks, so I have to make my own. This usually involves things that would be seen as a time-waster in other environments. Again, this is something that’s worth discussing openly.

Here’s the most important thing to remember if you make this change. It offers a lot of benefits, but it changes countless dynamics within your relationship. The best way to deal with this is to talk about it. If one of you is bothered by how a dynamic is changing, say so. Don’t let it fester and grow and become something seriously problematic.

Good luck!

Well, for every mention of the word “I,” my wife is there in the background, doing something little to make sure it all happens. She’ll cook a great meal, do something amazing for our kids, come up with a plan for some purchase we have to make, or simply be there in the moment with a great smile and a hug.

It’s pretty simple – without Sarah in my life, I would never be able to reach for my dreams. She provides so much of the foundation of our day-to-day life in many subtle ways – and, from my perspective, it is these subtle things that build the foundation of a strong, financially stable marriage.

Here are twelve little things that she does to make it all work. If you want a checklist of little things to do to help your marriage click, this can seriously help.

She listens. When I have something to say that’s actually of any importance, she listens. She stops and considers what I have to say, and she incorporates that into what she’s thinking. She doesn’t simply discard it, but she doesn’t adopt it as gospel, either – she simply listens and actually absorbs my thoughts.

She’s not afraid to say what she thinks. On the other side of that coin, she’s not afraid to say exactly what she thinks. If she thinks I have a good idea, she’ll say so – but if she thinks it’s bad, she’ll say that, too, and support it with reasons. Such open and equal give and take enables us to constantly come to the best decisions for us – in our money, in our work, and in other aspects of our lives.

She’s honest about her mistakes. No one is perfect, and neither is she. However, when she does mess up, she’s willing to admit it. She’ll say things like, “I just didn’t get it done. Sometimes I’m lazier than I’d like to be.” That simple effort in admitting to mistakes makes it much, much easier for us to work together to overcome the problem.

She picks up the slack when I leave it behind. On the other side of that coin, there are often times where some responsibility of mine will interrupt things. I have a phone interview. I have a television interview. I need to get a piece of writing submitted somewhere. Whenever these things occur, Sarah always just steps up. She knows that if I succeed, she succeeds – and I know the reverse is true.

She’ll go over things as many times as I need to. Sometimes I don’t pick up on things. I’ll put things in the wrong place in the pantry. I’ll not get the towels washed, or I’ll forget to use the cold rinse on the cloth diapers. Instead of going ballistic, she just checks to see if I did things the appropriate way and, if I did not, she just reminds me of how to do it. She does it so coolly and calmly that the only upset I feel is at myself for not picking up on the right way to do things.

She has a good sense of humor and a lot of tolerance of my own foibles. Along those same lines, she just rolls with who I am. She laughs at (or at least tolerates) my goofy jokes. She knows the things I’m good at and the things I’m not good at – and worries more about accentuating the positive instead of eliminating the negative.

She understands and is committed to spending less than we earn. We sit down and talk about our financial goals all the time – and she’s similarly committed to putting our financial life on a good path. Thus, our choices are in sync – I’m not worried that she’s out there spending money in ways that are undoing my work – and vice versa.

She’ll make good career suggestions – but isn’t hurt if I don’t take them. My wife reads The Simple Dollar and often has suggestions for improvements on it – ways to market it, post ideas, and so forth. (She also sometimes laughs at the things I do to protect people’s privacy.)

She encourages me to grow – and makes room for it. She gives me breathing room for my hobbies and gives me “alone time” when I need it. That “me” time is the time I use for reading, meditating, and personal growth – which are all key for keeping me sane.

If something is clearly a good deal, she’s enthusiastic about pursuing it. She does almost all of the real nitty-gritty bargain hunting when we make major purchases. She also is the one who will find new and useful ways to expand our search and comes up with good criteria to search on. For example, with our car purchase, she was the one who suggested that we include new cars in the search, which eventually led us to discover that in the current car market new cars have tremendous advantages.

She’s there beside me when things are good and when things are bad. When something good happens, she’s there. When something bad happens, she’s there. She doesn’t back away, regardless of how things are doing. She’s just a steady constant, because she knows that we’re going to be there for each other no matter what happens.

She revels in the simple things in life. It doesn’t require an expensive gift or a fancy dinner to impress her – in fact, she’s happy with a spaghetti dinner and a potted plant for Mother’s Day. She’d far rather lay out on the grass or play with the kids than go out on the town or go shopping.

All together, she makes this crazy ride work. And for that, I’m forever thankful.

You’re now a married couple, settling into a long life together. Now what?

It’s easy to fall into routines in your marriage, and often those routines are hard to break. You can establish routines that lead to a healthy marriage that’s grounded in healthy relationships and healthy money practices, or you can establish routines that are very disruptive.

Which do you choose? Here are ten tactics for getting yourself on a great path to a long-term successful marriage, both financially and otherwise.

Talk to each other as often as possible. Have a healthy conversation every single day. Ask what your spouse is doing and what they’re thinking about. Tell your spouse what you’re up to and what you’re thinking about. The better you understand your spouse in the good times and the normal times, the easier it will be to work through the difficult times.

Listen to what the other person is actually saying. It’s easy to get used to the routines in your life and in your spouse’s life, making it easy to somewhat gloss over the specifics on a daily basis. Don’t fall into that trap. Listen. Almost every time that a problem is developing, your spouse is telling you about the problem in some fashion. Pay attention to the things your spouse is saying, and if something doesn’t seem right, don’t blow it off. Follow up – and be there for your spouse.

Be honest and actively admit your mistakes – you will make them, after all. Everyone makes mistakes in their marriage. They make a poor choice. They don’t correctly interpret what their partner wants. I know I certainly do it often enough. The best thing you can do when you make a mistake – money or otherwise – is to confess to it. Tell your partner about your splurge. Tell your partner about your mistake. Not only will your honesty make it easier to talk about, you’ll also be driven to do better.

Talk about your long term plans together on a regular basis – and be open to changing them as you grow. Where do you want to be in a year? In five years? In ten years? Tell your partner your thoughts and encourage your partner to share their thoughts. You’ll find that some of them are different, but that many of the goals are in common. The common goals are great ones to focus on because you’re both driven to get there – and you’re able to reinforce each other’s resolve. Talk about these goals regularly.

Work together on the small steps you can do right now to reach those big shared goals. Once you’ve figured out the goals you have in common, spend time talking about what you can do right now to bring you closer to those goals. For us, this has been invaluable at keeping our spending choices in check. We talk about almost every significant purchase and decide together whether or not it’s in line with what we want out of life. Which leads to…

Plan big purchases together – and think about how they’ll impact your other big plans. Excepting any “spending allowance” that you both have, any significant purchase should be discussed together. My wife and I discuss anything more than $20 – and often, we discuss it to death (which is a good thing, because then we don’t spend the money). We are basically checks against unnecessary spending for each other – and that enables us to accomplish our real goals faster and keep our less-focused sides in check.

You’re going to disagree. Work on disagreeing well. You’re never going to agree all the time with your partner. Sometimes, your partner is going to be right and you’re going to be wrong. This will happen. Don’t turn disagreements into competitions. Instead, look at disagreements as opportunities to really figure out the truth of a situation. Do your research and figure out the real deal, then follow whichever side is actually in the right. You’re far better off being wrong and then changing your mind than being wrong and sticking with it like a dog with a stick just so you can “win” – that’s a recipe for long-term failure in multiple ways.

Always strongly support the positive moves your partner makes. Whenever your partner makes a good move, congratulate them. Reinforce the idea that the move was a good thing, and then use their good choice as motivation to make your own good choice, not as an excuse to coast because your partner is carrying the weight. At times, my wife and I almost compete at positive things like cleaning the house or saving money.

Don’t plan for retirement in a bubble – include your partner’s plans and income to develop an overall plan for retirement. Plan for retirement together and make choices that will provide you both with the money you’ll need for your later years. This may mean that one partner saves more than the other because they have a better 401(k) opportunity or they have a higher income. Having said that, it is a good idea to not have all retirement handled by one partner – if one partner has a fully funded 401(k) in his/her name, the other partner might want a Roth IRA in their name, just in case. However, the overall planning should reflect your shared goals.

Reaffirm your love every single day. Tell your partner you love them. Give a hug or a kiss or an embrace. It’s so simple to do, yet so many couples miss out on it. Simple little tokens of love provide a constant reaffirmation of your relationship, plus they ensure that you’ll never feel regret if something unthinkable happens.

Here are some earlier thoughts on tactics for a successful marriage, though they’re not financial in nature.

Got any good, reasonable, frugal advice for people getting started in their marriage? Please leave them in the comments.

Weddings are a traditional sinkhole of a new couple’s money. In fact, I’ve actually written about it before, denoting eighteen tips for a frugal wedding. In fact, entire blogs are devoted to the topic of frugal weddings – one of the best is A Practical Wedding.

So what do I have to add on the topic? It’s easy to get bogged down in the specifics of wedding planning – and when you start racking up the costs on those little details, before you know it, the entire wedding is out of control and you’re starting married life in a financial (and emotional) hole.

Here are ten “big picture” tactics to apply when planning for a wedding that won’t break your bank – or break your future.

Start your planning as far in advance of the wedding as possible. Set a tentative date as quickly as possible and start planning as soon as you can, even if you’re planning something very simple. The longer you have before the wedding, the more time you have to find sales, discounts, and other opportunities that can shave significant cash off of the total bill. Remember, you can cancel reservations with enough advance notice if you find a better deal.

Be completely open with your partner on what your ideas for the wedding are. Some people want very simple weddings, with just a few friends and family. Others envision huge, elaborate ceremonies with hundreds in attendance. Some people insist on being married in a specific church. Others are happy being married anywhere. As soon as you can after the engagement, talk about both of your expectations about the wedding. You may find your partner wants something completely different. Knowing this early gives you time to find solutions that make both of you happy.

The best place to trim fat for the wedding is the guest list. A long guest list can create a huge bill for your wedding and reception. Instead of inviting everyone you’ve ever known, consider trimming the list down to something manageable. Focus on people genuinely important to you, not merely everyone you can think of. Every additional guest brings a cost – additional supplies, additional food, and so on.

Do as much of the work yourself as you possibly can. You don’t need a wedding planner. Plan it yourself. Poke around online for guides to wedding planning, then move through those guides and take care of them yourself. If you need help with some of the tasks, ask people you trust for advice before you turn to professionals who are usually more interested in selling stuff than actually helping you. You’ll always save money if you go to a place knowing what you want.

Provide as many supplies as you can yourself – go bargain shopping. Minimize the supplies that others are providing and find them yourself. Keep a master list of all of the things you actually need for the wedding, then go bargain shopping. Look at unexpected places like Oriental Trading Company or a thrift store – you’ll be surprised how many quality items you can find for stunningly low prices.

Look among close friends and family for photographers, organists, florists, and other key roles. At our wedding, my sister-in-law (a florist) handled the flowers (at cost) and my wife’s aunt played the piano (for free), plus a close friend volunteered to be photographer (for free) and another friend volunteered to be the DJ (for free). Look around your social network and see what you can find. One great source can be found at the house of worship where you’re getting married (if that’s your choice) – if you have personal ties there, ask the ladies’ auxiliary for help with things like catering.

Hold the ceremony in your home, your parents’ home, or outdoors. Concerned about the fees of renting a place for the ceremony? Think outside the box a bit. Get married outside or in someone’s home. I’ve attended multiple beautiful outdoor ceremonies over the last decade and none of them had any cost.

Make your own invitations. With the quality of home printing, it’s easy to make your own invitations. Get some classy stationery and print them yourself. You can find lots of templates online if you’re unsure about the design. My wife and I designed our own invitations and saved literally hundreds of dollars.

Use a family-owned restaurant for catering. If you are in a position where you have to hire someone for catering, look for a local family-owned restaurant, even if they don’t typically cater. In particular, look for a local restaurant that you have been a patron of so you can be sure of the quality. Family-owned restaurants are usually very civic-minded and are thrilled at the opportunity to be involved – usually at a good price.

Use a good stereo system for the reception music. Don’t hire a band – and don’t hire a DJ, either. Ask around your social circle to find people that have a good stereo system that can be used, then set the whole thing up yourself. Attach it to a computer with a large music playlist and let people DJ by committee – lots of fun and very little (if any) cost.

Got any good, reasonable, frugal advice for people planning their weddings? Please leave them in the comments.

At some point in a relationship, it becomes clear that the people involved are interested in tying their lives together.

What does that mean? It means different things for everyone, but as you prepare for that major change, there are lots of opportunities to build a great foundation for the future. There are also lots of opportunities to watch money slip through your fingers – money that you will wish you had later on.

Here are ten great things to do to make your engagement a successful one – and one that doesn’t have to break the bank.

Don’t buy into the ludicrous expectations for a ring. The hype about wedding rings is in overdrive. Do not buy into it. Two or three months’ worth of salary is not a reasonable amount to spend – it can create a negative financial impact that will last for years. It can delay your ability to buy a home, reduce your ability to save for retirement in the short term, and (quite likely) put you into a debt hole that will be hard to dig out of. And, if the engagement is accepted, it’s a hole you’ll share. So, what can you do?

If you’re expecting a ring, make a concerted effort to convince your partner to spend less. Make it clear that you not only don’t expect but that you don’t want an exorbitant ring. After all, the money could be put to better use on a down payment for a home, on retirement savings, or on other things that will help you both in life.

If you’re buying a ring, be reasonable about it and share your feelings with your partner. Discuss the purchase to some extent with the person you’re considering proposing to. Find out their feelings on the subject and explain your position that a lower-cost ring will provide greater rewards in married life.

Don’t “overdo” the moment. Make your proposal simple and memorable, not something incredibly over the top. One good idea – return to the spot where you first met or re-enact your first date. This will not only mean much more than reserving a table at an overly expensive restaurant, but it’ll keep your wallet from burning up, too.

Seek pre-marriage counseling. My wife and I attended pre-marriage counseling with our pastor and it was incredibly helpful in getting us to talk about the areas where we needed to work on our relationships. If you’re getting married through a church or other house of faith, consult the religious leader there – he or she will almost always help you through this.

Start talking about your shared money situation. This is vital – so vital, in fact, that I wrote a detailed guide to those first money talks during one’s engagement. This is vital, because if you don’t start off on the same financial page with the same ideas about roles and spending and sharing resources, it will be very hard to get on that page later on. Your engagement is the perfect time to do this.

Be completely honest about your individual money situation. Now is the time to open the books and be fully honest with your partner about your true financial situation. Don’t hide anything – get started with complete honesty. Don’t hide anything, because at some point, your partner will need to know about any big debts you are sitting on or other such issues, and that problem will also be your partner’s problem. Talking about it now allows you both the time and space to figure out how to handle it – together.

Start planning long-term financial things together. If you’re considering financial choices that will have a long term impact, include your partner in the discussion. Plan out your retirement savings and your career choices together, because those money choices will affect your partner greatly in the years to come.

Talk about a pre-nupital agreement, even if it seems unnecessary. Some people firmly believe a marriage is for a lifetime. If that’s so, great – it should be very easy to draft an agreement because you’ll never have to execute it, right? Others might believe that they don’t have enough assets to worry about it – but will that be true in ten years? No matter what, a pre-nupital agreement can save you a lot of headaches later on, so talk about it now.

Talk through your problems with your partner first and foremost. Marriage is a lifelong commitment, one where you share everything with your partner. As you move towards that day, you should be talking about your problems and concerns with your partner, not hiding them away. Hiding them now or seeking others to talk to sets a poor precedent for your relationship, one that will cost you time and time again over the long run.

Got any good, reasonable, frugal advice for people who are engaged – or about to be? Please leave them in the comments.

In the most recent reader mailbag, I answered a question about marriage from a reader named Sally: You and your wife seem to have a very strong marriage. Can you give me some tips on how to keep my marriage strong? What do you do to keep it that way?

After I posted the question and my response (which I quoted below), I received a small flood of emails from readers telling me about their troubled marriage at length and asking me for more suggestions along these lines, something that I was happy to oblige in the first email, but by the time the twentieth or so arrived, I realized that this would make a better standalone post than simply reiterating the same ideas in a long string of emails.

First, a general note: my belief is that a successful marriage is built one moment at a time. From what I’ve learned, a marriage is like a stone wall: it’s a mix of big things and little things, all assembled together to form something strong. Sure, there are a lot of big rocks in that wall (the big moments in your marriage, like your wedding day or some other big, key moment), but those rocks don’t fit together without a lot of little rocks to fill in the gaps and make them strong.

Most marriages seem to have little problem with their big moments. It’s easy to think back and think of big, happy moments in the marriage. I tend to believe that most marriages fail because of the small moments. Our individual lives get so busy that we fail to spend the time and effort to put those little stones in place, and when a bit of pressure is applied, the wall falls apart easily. On the other hand, when the little stones are there to fill in the gaps, the wall becomes strong and able to withstand anything that comes along.

I also believe that the little things are hard. Often, it’s not a matter of desire – almost all of us genuinely want to make our marriages work and work well. The challenge for many is that we get wrapped up in the complexity of our own lives. Others simply have difficulty expressing or showing what we feel.

What follows are twelve little things I do quite regularly to put those little pieces into my marriage. Please, use as many of these as seem reasonable. The first five are quoted from my response to the original question in the mailbag.

I tell my wife I love her every single day. I usually do it in the morning before she leaves the bedroom, and on weekdays I’ll also tell her when I see her in the evening for the first time. I usually couple it with a kiss. It’s so simple, but it’s a constant reminder of the fact that I do love her, no matter what.

I ask about her day, listen, and ask follow up questions. I do this not only so I can keep tabs on her professional life, but also to give her a great chance to vent about her situation. Everyone needs to talk about themselves sometimes to someone who is interested – I try to provide that for her as often as I can.

I try to surprise her on a regular basis. I’ll spend an hour preparing a really excellent supper when she doesn’t expect it. I’ll spontaneously give the kids a bath when she’s comfortable on the couch under a blanket, even if it’s her turn. Doing these little unexpected things not only shows her I care, but also often compels her to do similar things for me.

I hold her hand. I do this all the time, whenever it crosses my mind and seems appropriate. I’ll just hold her hand gently while we’re talking or we’re riding in the car or we’re waiting for an appointment or we’re sitting on the couch in the evenings.

I talk about EVERYTHING with her and let her determine what’s interesting. If something is concerning me, I don’t hide it from her. I tell her about it. Most of the time she’s interested and we’ll discuss it – sometimes she’s not and I let it drop (this is key – if she’s not into the topic, I don’t push it). Either way, though, she gets the message that I’m making an effort to share and be open.

I work on building a positive relationship with her family. Whenever I visit or see anyone in her family, I make a special effort to try to establish or build upon a strong relationship with them. This accomplishes several things: it makes her more at ease in a family situation, it helps me to build stronger ties with people that are important to her, and it helps me to understand the influences that were around her as she grew up.

I send her messages during the day. About once a week, during a time where my wife is really present in my thoughts, I send her a little simple note by email. All it says is something along the lines of “I was thinking about you just now. I can’t wait until I see you this evening.” It’s just a very simple way of letting her know she’s on my mind and in my heart.

I put careful thought into gifts I give her. Sure, it’s easy to just run out and get a generic gift to cover yourself during an anniversary or a birthday. However, a gift with some real thought behind it means substantially more than an obviously off-the-cuff gift.

I encourage her to follow her passions and interests, even if they don’t inspire or interest me. If my wife chooses to spend significant time on a project, it’s obviously something that’s important to her. That doesn’t imply at all that it has to be important to me. If she’s involved in her own project, I give her positive encouragement and then work on my own interests instead of saying things like “that seems like a waste of time.”

If she needs me, I willingly contribute to those passions. If something genuinely excites her and she wants me to experience it, I willingly involve myself in whatever it may be: a particular type of art, a craft project, a yard project, whatever. Even if I don’t enjoy it, I do have the opportunity to learn more about my wife and what she’s passionate about, which means that my understanding of her grows.

I look for opportunities to build mutual friendships. The idea that there is a group of people that are “my” friends and another group that is “her” friends can be a big dividing factor between us. Instead, I often focus on building friendships and relationships that we share with others so that something of a community of friendship and love grows up around us.

I hold her every night, even if it’s just for a moment. I might be completely exhausted when I go to bed in the evening, but I take a moment to move close to her, put my arm around her, and hold her close, even if it’s just for a minute or so. That moment of physical contact to end the day is a simple sign of love.

Luckily, we managed to overcome this tendency over time. What brought about this change, though? How were we able to go from avoiding money talks (and being confrontational when the topic came up) to being able to rationally, calmly, and happily discuss things today?

I made up a list of ten distinct things that worked for us in terms of making conversations about money work in our relationship. Some of these might seem overly simple – others might seem like they won’t possibly work. Don’t overlook them, though. Give these tactics a try, preferably in combination, if you’re having difficulty talking to your partner about money.

Be willing to admit your faults and mistakes. During the conversation, your partner will likely point out mistakes that you’ve made along the way. Be open to this – don’t get defensive. Be willing to admit that you’ve done wrong in the past and also be willing to look for good solutions to these problems that work for both of you.

Pair any accusations with admissions of your own faults. One good way to defuse a situation that might dissolve into accusations and counter-accusations is to pair any statements you might make about your partner’s behavior with statements about your own mistakes. You might point out that your husband spends too much on his golf trips, but at the same time admit that you spend too much on home decorations.

Identify some things you’re willing to sacrifice before you sit down. During any money talk, you’ll likely have to be willing to commit to making some personal changes. This can be hard, especially if it’s simply foisted on you out of nowhere. Instead, all participants should spend some time before the conversation thinking about some changes they would be willing to personally make to achieve success.

Establish a “no yelling” rule. No one involved in the conversation is allowed to raise their voice, period. If you feel an emotional wave coming on, simply ask to stop for a bit and do something to calm yourself down. Likely, when you feel an emotional surge, it’s a good thing, because you’re getting close to a truth that needs to be laid bare and actually discussed.

Open the books completely. Don’t hide anything. You cannot come up with a great solution that you’re both committed to if things remain hidden. Pull out all of the bills, even the ones you’ve tried to hide from your partner, and allow your complete financial state to be an open book for both of you.

Don’t swallow the whole bite at once. Quite often, when couples sit down and begin to address their financial issues together, they find that the rabbit hole goes much deeper than they thought. Instead of trying to address everything at once, break it up into pieces. Focus on optimizing your spending during one conversation, then coming up with a debt repayment plan together during another talk, then tackle retirement planning later. If you’ve clearly hit a stalemate in a talk, back off for a while with just a pledge that you’ll both think about the problem and talk about it again later. Remember, it doesn’t all have to be done at once.

Talk about goals FIRST. Before you start digging into details, you should make it clear what you both want out of the conversation – and also what you both want in the long term from your situation. Establish the purpose of your conversation as clearly as you can so you have something to work toward. At the same time, talk about where you want to go in the future as a couple. Do this before you do anything else – not only is it a great way to open in a positive fashion, but it also gives you a nice framework for the rest of your talk.

Be realistic. You aren’t going to make diamonds out of coal. You’re also not going to make truly radical changes in your life, particularly if your partner’s not deeply committed to the change. Instead, look for smaller steps you can make to achieve the goals you want. Don’t expect to change everything in one conversation – if you do, you’re likely wasting your time. Focus on a handful of realistic, smaller things that you can do to head in the right direction. Then, if those work, have further discussions and add more changes to the mix.

Share your thoughts asynchronously. You may find that a face-to-face talk simply isn’t helping you get past a particular stumbling block. If that’s the case, try using email or another written form to help you work through the situation. Each of you should simply write down your thoughts on the situation and give them to each other, then respond to those thoughts, then respond to those responses, until you’ve reached some conclusions. This can be easily done over email. While you lose the face-to-face advantages here, you do gain the ability to carefully and calmly gather and organize your thoughts and share them in a way where the conversation can be followed later.

Develop very specific, clear, and tangible tasks for you both to follow. If you both commit to spending less, find ways to make that reduced spending specific and tangible. Agree that you’ll both live with a $100 allowance for “free spending” this month, for example. If you’ve decided to set up retirement plans together, you should both be charged with getting the information needed from your respective places of employment. If you’re trying to dig out of debt, you should both commit to tossing your credit cards. A one-sided sacrifice or one-sided task is a sure recipe for resentment – you should both be involved in the solution.

Good luck!

I was… wrong.

My wife was pretty upset with me. She had thought carefully and put together a really thoughtful gift for me, which she sprung upon me that evening. When I told her that I didn’t have a gift for her, she thought I was kidding, but eventually she realized I wasn’t. And it wasn’t pretty.

Since then, we’ve adopted a policy of getting each other very simple but thoughtful gifts for our anniversary – books, journals, simple trinkets that clearly represent that we’ve been paying attention to each other.

This is the custom that we’ve established within our marriage. Neither one of us feels that an anniversary calls for a huge, ostentatious gift of any kind. Instead, we view it as a day to recall our wedding vows and our pledge to combine our lives together, and we’ve found that simple and thoughtful is the way to go for us.

Having said that, I’ve observed many different patterns in different marriages that I’m familiar with. One marriage, for example, seems to revolve around absurdly huge gifts given by the husband to the wife, and I know from outside conversations that the husband really resents this pattern.

In another marriage, the couple sticks very carefully to the “traditional” list of wedding anniversary gifts – paper, wood, and the like. They try to think of thoughtful gifts for each other that center around the “theme” of the anniversary. I can tell from both of them that this is a tradition that they both value.

Another marriage seems to involve spending a lot of money on something frivolous that they’ll both enjoy. Recent gifts include a week-long trip and a Lexus.

In yet another marriage, their sole remembrance of their anniversary is a kiss for each year they’ve been married.

Why am I reporting all of these things here? There is no established pattern for anniversary gifts, so don’t get caught up in trying to chase something that’s an illusion. From what I can see, anniversary celebrations are as varied as the marriages they represent.

If you think that there’s something “expected” as an anniversary gift and you don’t like it, talk to your partner. It’s likely that you’re harboring an expectation that may or may not be real – and that expectation can be very expensive in the short term – and can establish a very expensive pattern over the long term.

The key to celebrating any personal event is to find a way to celebrate it that’s in line with your personal values. For us, the most valuable thing in our marriage is the fact that we know each other almost as well as we know ourselves, and we focus on celebrating our anniversary in a way that represents that.

Remember, it doesn’t have to be about frivolous spending at all. Instead, it needs to just be a remembrance of a key moment in both of your lives – and it should reflect on both of you in a way that fulfills you both.

How do you celebrate your anniversary? Share your tactics in the comments.

What advice do you have for a frugal wedding? We’re getting married in the fall of 2010. Since we are both in our early twenties and don’t have a lot to spend we were hoping to keep our wedding as small as possible. We were thinking no more than six to eight people including ourselves.

Glad you asked. My wife and I were married in the summer of 2003. Our wedding was actually pretty frugal, but afterwards we recognized several additional factors that would have made it even less expensive. Here are eighteen tactics worth trying to cut the costs of your wedding event without diving into cheapness.

1. Avoid guest list bloat.
For some people, it can feel very tempting to invite hundreds of people to the ceremony. Howver, with each addition to your guest list, you’re adding a person that’s of lesser importance to you compared to the people you’ve already invited. To a degree, this was a trap we fell into with our own wedding – our guest list grew and grew to the point where we invited people that we didn’t know well simply out of a sense of obligation. Instead of just adding more and more people, consider inviting fewer people and making the event more intimate. Try cutting your list in half and see if you’re happy with it.

2. Ask for wedding help instead of wedding gifts.
We were lucky that several of our friends and family had musical talent, so they were able to provide musical accompaniment for our ceremony. We also have a close friend who is an extremely skilled amateur photographer and he was willing to serve as photographer for our ceremony as our wedding gift – after the ceremony, he provided high quality digital images of everything.

3. Have the ceremony at home, or outdoors.
You may find that the cost of renting a building for your ceremony and reception is expensive. Instead, consider using your own home (or the home of a parent) for your ceremony, or perhaps a public park with a beautiful view. In each case, you can also have your reception outdoors, often eliminating the cost of renting a place as well as creating a memorable ceremony.

4. Do the catering yourself, or hire a family-owned restaurant.
For our wedding, we handled our own food preparation and catering with a lot of help from my wife’s family. This drastically reduced the food costs for the ceremony. If this isn’t your forte, look around your community for a family-owned restaurant and ask the owners directly to cater your wedding. Family-owned restaurants are always the first place to check – they will almost always go the extra mile to make your wedding special and will also charge a reasonable rate.

5. Go minimal with the flowers.
Instead of having huge piles of flowers everywhere (something that will only really last for an afternoon), instead simply go with a single rose for each bridesmaid and a very small bouquet for the bride. If you know someone with a rose bush, you can actually easily make your own bouquets the day before the ceremony by cutting the roses yourself and trimming away the thorns.

6. Choose very personal books for groomsmen/bridesmaid gifts.
It’s often customary to give gifts to one’s bridesmaids or groomsmen. One very effective (and frugal) gift is to give personally important books to each person. Choose one that expresses something personal that you feel is appropriate for each member of the wedding party and hand-write an inscription on the inside, noting that the gift is for the wedding and why it’s an appropriate book.

7. Make your own invitations.
With a quality home printer and some time, you can make very classy invitations on your own. My wife and I picked up a simple blank invitation kit on sale at Staples and made our own invitations to our wedding. No pictures or anything – just a very classic font and simple text. It looked stylish and didn’t cost us much at all.

8. Use a good home stereo system for the reception music.
Rather than hiring a DJ, just use your own home stereo (or the stereo of a close friend). Put speakers around the dance floor area – there’s no need to spread them around the reception room. Then just create a few mix CDs from your own collection – there’s all the music you need.

9. Have “vendor cards” in exchange for reduced rates.
If you’re hiring people to provide services for your reception (musicians, a DJ, florists, caterers, photographers, etc.), offer to advertise for them in exchange for reduced rates. At the reception, put a small card in each person’s place that lists the businesses responsible for each service at the wedding, along with their contact informationc. Since this tends to be very effective advertising, many businesses will happily provide services at reduced rates in exchange for this opportunity.

10. Contact the local university for musical accompaniment needs.
If you’d like live musical accompaniment for the ceremony (and perhaps for the reception), one place to look for low-cost musicians is at the local university’s music department. Contact them and ask if there are any students who are studying a particular instrument or vocal work and see if they’re available to provide music for your wedding. It can help them with their resume and save you on this part of your wedding.

11. Patiently shop for any decoration needs.
Michael’s, Paper Warehouse, and Hobby Lobby all have sales somewhat regularly throughout the year – and they all sell supplies that can be helpful with your wedding. Know what you’re looking for as far in advance as possible and let the sales come to you. Michael’s in particular is a good place to shop, since they often have very strong coupons in the Sunday paper that are perfect for wedding decoration supplies.

12. If you’re getting married in the church you’re a member of, ask the ladies’ auxiliary for help.
Most churches have a women’s organization that is very happy to help with wedding preparation in exchange for a reasonable small donation. Get them involved – they can take a lot of worry off your shoulders for a relatively low price. At our wedding, the “church ladies” were a great help with church decoration and other helpful things on the day of the ceremony.

13. Buy dresses together when a sale is on.
Similar to the tip for shopping for decorations, you can often save a significant amount of money by shopping patiently for dresses as well. Many dress stores have sales on holidays such as Memorial Day – keep an eye out for such sales. You may also want to shop together so that you can all save during the sale.

14. Rent tuxedos as a group.
Unless you have a specific reason for owning a tuxedo (and few people do), you should rent one. It’s often useful to rent the tuxedos as a group through the same business, as you’ll often get a group rate. It’s often useful to rent through a place that’s fairly close to the site of the wedding so last minute adjustments can easily be made.

15. Make a simple honeymoon, not an ostentatious one.
A huge, over-the-top honeymoon might sound fun, but it’s far, far cheaper (and often more enjoyable) to have a much more laid-back honeymoon. Instead of planning a big trip, just hop in the car and spend a week or two together just driving around and enjoying being married. The fewer plans, the better – and the cheaper.

16. Involve your closest friends and family in the preparation.
As you’re developing plans, you should get your closest friends and family involved with the details. Quite often, they’ll have surprisingly good ideas that can save you money and effort – perhaps they’ll know someone that can cut you a deal on a certain part, or maybe they’ll just volunteer to help out with that piece. Good friends and family are always there to help, so you might as well use it.

17. Plan, plan, plan.
List everything you can think of and walk through these items step by step. The earlier you get started – and the more things you think about early on – the less “last minute stress” you’ll have and the more time you’ll have to find sales and discounts and other good ideas.

18. Don’t stress.
Something will probably go wrong at the last minute – a little detail of some sort won’t work out. For us, the pastor almost missed our rehearsal dinner, so we barely rehearsed. Don’t worry aboout it – just assume something little is going to go wrong and don’t respond by throwing cash at it. Most likely, no one will even notice the little issue, and quite often someone in your wedding party (or someone helping out) will come up with a pretty good solution to fix things.

Good luck!

Why did this take so long? A lot of people were surprised that we didn’t just do this by default when we got married, or even earlier. There were several reasons why we did not.

First, we didn’t have genuine conversations about our personal finances before we got married. As our relationship grew, we had deep conversations about almost everything except for our money. It wasn’t until three years after our marriage (and some serious financial troubles along the way) that we finally started talking seriously about our money decisions.

Second, we kept many bills separate from each other. There were simply some bills I paid and some bills she paid, carried over almost directly from our dating days. In short, we just let inertia carry us, instead of rethinking things. This worked really well most of the time, but it made a clear accounting of our financial situation almost impossible. If one of us had a larger bill than normal, could we rely on the other one’s income to pull us through? This was never clear, and we often just muddled through.

Third, we were both fairly concerned about privacy. Not so much in the sense of directly hiding things from each other, but in the sense that it gave the other person free reign to leaf through our spending, likely making judgments on our individual spending choices. It was something that we were both very uncomfortable with for a long time – and something that we’ve become more comfortable with as we’ve talked more and more about our finances.

How did we come to this decision? Mostly, we came to realize that we were simply in a different place than before. Instead of each of us handling our own bills and not really paying attention to what the other was doing, we were pretty clear on what we both were doing. We watched each other grow more careful and frugal with our spending and we came to trust each other’s spending habits more.

We also began to realize all of the little ways our separate accounts were costing us. Instead of having a complete financial picture whenever we needed it, we often strained and stretched to cover our individual bills ourselves. We also realized that some of our banking choices were still dinging us with fees, and there was no better time than the present to start over and choose a better account.

How did we choose a bank? We basically did a canvas of all of the banks within a fifteen mile radius, comparing their basic checking account offerings. We wanted a free basic checking account with free checks and free online banking, plus reasonable hours. Ideally, I wanted one that I could easily reach on a bicycle ride.

Basically, we wanted easy access to a real live teller for services such as check cashing and change redemption, plus a paper checking account that had no maintenance fees, online banking access, and a wide ATM network. Since we planned on keeping most of our money with ING Direct, we didn’t care about interest rates much at all – we mostly sought to avoid fees.

Knowing this, I just perused the websites of every bank in the area, gathering information about their checking accounts, and we found four that had all of the criteria we wanted. We decided to simply select the one of the four with a branch closest to our home.

One big piece of advice If we learned one lesson from our experience, it’s this.

Communicate with your partner about money from the beginning, and don’t leave anything hidden when you talk about it.

Complete honesty and regular, deep communication about your finances as you begin to merge other parts of your lives is vital. My wife and I now have very regular talks about our personal finances and we’ve moved to a complete open door policy of looking at any statements or material that comes in the mail.

This communication opened the door to financial success. We set goals together. We learned what we needed to do to reach those goals together. We created microgoals to help us get started along that path. We talked through our important decisions.

And now, our financial future is completely linked.

Financial infidelity – in other words, the situation in which dishonesty creeps into a relationship due to money – is probably the most common source of emails that I receive. I’ve heard some incredibly devastating tales of woe – suddenly discovered five-figure credit card bills, closets full of clothes still in their sacks, huge purchases done without discussing things with the partner, guilt about little white money lies, and so on. These issues are ones of dishonesty, ones that can be the earliest cracks in the foundation of a marriage. A little withheld truth about a credit card debt can be the first pebble in an avalanche.

What can you do if these little things are creeping into your own relationship? That’s the topic of Financial Infidelity by Dr. Bonnie Eaker Weil. The book focuses in on both preventative and responsive solutions to relationships where dishonesty and money are an issue – or might become one in the future.

Is the advice solid and distinct, or is it just three hundred pages that can be boiled down to one word – communicate? Let’s dig in and see what the good doctor has to say.

Part I: What Is Financial Infidelity?
The opening section lays out the basics: what is financial infidelity, are you susceptible to it, and how should you react if you discover it (or decide to confess to it).

Understanding Financial Infidelity
Financial infidelity is a pretty wide umbrella term, including any situation where anything less than the full truth about your money situation is shared with your partner. This not only includes outright lies (from the big ones down to little white lies), but also deception by omission and deception by misdirection as well. In short, any time you actively manipulate information to give your spouse a false impression of your personal financial situation, you’re committing financial infidelity, and since it is an act of dishonesty, it interferes with the trust in your relationship.

Financial Infidelity: Are You At Risk?
Unsurprisingly, this portion of the book revolves around a self-assessment – how honest are you with your partner about your money? Weil is actually more forgiving than I actually feel is appropriate – you could be awfully dishonest about money (from my perspective) and her self-test would indicate that you’re doing just fine. My expectation is, though, that many people will either ace these self-tests (meaning they’re pretty honest about their money) or do devastatingly poorly – most of the items here seem pretty interconnected.

Facing Financial Infidelity
Weil focuses on communication technique here, a key piece of the puzzle if you don’t want things to erupt into an angry, resentful shouting match. In short, even if you think the other person is sincerely the one at fault, ask yourself if you’re bringing any faults to the table at all, then mention those when you start discussing it. If you thrust the burden of blame on the other person, they will react emotionally and you won’t get the resolution you want, and it’s because of that fear of a bad resolution that people let these wounds fester. Don’t. A truly excellent chapter on communication.

Part II: The Seven Steps
The next part provides a seven-step plan for healing the wounds of financial infidelity.

Step 1: Calculate the Cost
In order to get honest, you need to sit down and look at the full picture together. The first step is to do a real and thorough calculation of your combined net worth, exposing the complete truth of all of your assets and all of your debts to both of you. From that, you should also talk about a budget and, more importantly, the goals you both have and how your individual spending choices fit into that goal. If one (or both) of you is spending money like it’s water, it will be very difficult to achieve the dreams you share. The real key is to revisit this regularly and look at the change. Sitting down once and setting goals is great – revisiting everything in three months by recalculating it again, seeing each of your contributions towards the big goal, and taking stock of the situation will really show how things are going.

Step 2: Examine Your Power Dynamic
Does one member of your relationship earn more – and thus use that fact as a power trip in your relationship? Quite often, this can cause continual problems revolving around mistrust – one partner feels powerless about money and thus tries to exert power by spending foolishly, for example. One tip (among many good ones) is to spend some time seriously trying to put yourself in the other person’s shoes. How would it feel to be the low wage earner, knowing every day that you’re not contributing as much money as the other person? Be honest and sincere about that perspective – and share what thoughts come to mind – and you’ll likely find that you have more empathy and common ground than you think.

Step 3: Divest Yourself of the Past
For many people, their past – both their personal experiences and the lessons learned from family and friends in childhood – defines how they think about money. They take the lessons from their childhood and repeat those moves in adulthood. They also fall in with the status quo bias, repeating the patterns they’ve been following their whole adult life, only making changes when circumstances pushed them into it. When you’ve reached a point of understanding that things have to change, it’s worthwhile to look at the patterns of your past and separate the wheat from the chaff.

Step 4: Break Up with Your Money
Many couples allow money to become the focal point of their relationship. It becomes the glue holding things together – hey, we both have money to do the things we each enjoy, so even though there are other problems, we use money to whitewash it (or greenwash it, I suppose). What, then, do you suppose happens if the flow of money goes away? That’s why it’s important to compartmentalize your money discussions and interactions. Have a scheduled, regular money meeting, talk about your finances then, and follow it up with something fun to do together that doesn’t involve money at all.

Step 5: Define the Currency of Your Relationship
Instead of letting money be the fundamental currency of your relationship, base it on something else. Figure out the elements of life – the values – that are most important to each of you and let those be the foundation of your relationship, not money and things. Sit down together and talk about those other things that you share. Focus on those commonalities and let everything else fall into place behind those key things. Because, in the end, you didn’t marry each other for the money (hopefully).

Step 6: Refinance Your Relationship
The next step is to focus in intensely on the non-financial mechanics of your relationship. It really can be hard work to get along with someone for years and years, even if it’s someone you care deeply about. Put in some time and effort to do nothing more than make your partner happy. Look for the little things – go out on dates, give in to some of the things that they want, plan little surprises here and there. If your relationship is clicking, it’s a lot easier to make the money click, too.

Step 7: Invest in Your Future
The final step is, in effect, maintenance. The previous steps are all great at getting you back on track, but if you just do them once and walk away, eventually events in your life and your relationship will bring back all of those nasty patterns. Don’t let it happen. Work on maintaining the positive state you’ve built. Weil offers a ton of little suggestions here, but they mostly revolve around being continuously mindful of the other steps and going back to them very regularly to keep things together.

Part III: The Biochemical Component
The book closes with a pair of short pieces on related topics.

The Brain-Body Connection
Sometimes, these steps won’t work, due to the result of other interpersonal and biochemical factors. If you’ve tried sincerely and honestly to work on these issues and found that the same nasty things keep repeating themselves, you may need professional help. Addictions, psychological issues, and other things may be at work, and no matter how hard you try, you’re always facing an uphill battle against such things. Seek professional assistance if these kinds of things are in play.

The Case for Financial Fidelity and Lasting Love
Financial fidelity is just one piece of the puzzle of lasting love. If you commit yourself to actually working hard on your relationship and doing it consistently, you’ll find that love can remain all throughout your life. It’s not easy and it takes consistent effort, though – don’t let it slip through your fingers.

Some Thoughts on Financial Infidelity
Financial infidelity is just a surface issue. Weil more or less makes the point here that financial infidelity is usually the result of a deeper issue in the relationship – money issues are just a symptom. That’s why most of the steps revolve around brushing away the money issues themselves and figuring out what’s really going on.

Relationships need (and deserve) nurturing. It’s very easy to get caught up in what we want without thinking about what our partner wants and needs. I usually avoid relationship advice, but I’ve found one thing works really, really well for my marriage: spend one hour a day focused entirely on what your partner needs. Forget what you need or want, focus on your partner entirely for one hour a day and you’ll be fine. Sometimes that need manifests itself in household chores. Other times, it’s just sitting together near each other watching a movie. Once in a while, it’s a back rub. Quite often, it involves some kind words and support after a hard day’s work. But one thing’s for sure – that one hour a day is well worth it.

Is Financial Infidelity Worth Reading?
You probably know from the title whether you need to read Financial Infidelity. From my perspective, it absolutely nails the problem – financial infidelity is usually just a symptom of something else going on. Weil does a great job of providing tons of easily workable steps for piecing out what exactly that issue is – and what you can do together to solve it.

If you don’t trust your partner when it comes to money, Financial Infidelity is essential reading. This review really only scratches the surface of the wisdom within. Financial Infidelity is an excellent book that really hammers down on something that is a real problem in many, many relationships.

It’s always going to be hard if you set clear personal goals and then later find out that your spouse, either intentionally or otherwise, has been taking actions in the opposite direction of your goals. You feel betrayed, let down by the person you care for the most. You often feel angry that all of your efforts have been tossed aside so effortlessly. You feel helpless – after all of your efforts, you’re right back where you started.

This moment is make or break time. It’s one of those times in your life when you figure out what you’re made of – and what your spouse is made of, too. Here’s how I would handle it.

First, take a breather
As soon as you find out that your spouse hasn’t been on the same financial page as you, you’re going to be upset in some fashion. You might be angry. You might be sad and disappointed. You might want to just walk out and not come back.

Don’t.

Sit back and breathe for a while. Don’t say or do anything about it for a day or so, but don’t let it boil up, either. Instead, find another medium to vent. Write down what you’re feeling. Punch a pillow if you need to. Go for a long walk. Just don’t start discussing this when emotions are overwhelming you or else it won’t end well.

Think about what caused the situation
It’s also important to give some consideration as to what caused this situation. Obviously, if you’re upset right now, you’ve got a different vision of your finances than your partner. This leads to some important questions.

Are you sure your spouse was aware of your feelings about money? In many relationships, a partner might adopt a new set of ideas about money without ever properly discussing it with their partner. If you’ve turned over a new leaf of frugality without really discussing it with your spouse and they’ve just done like they’ve always done – spending money if it’s in the checking account, etc. – then you need to communicate with your partner a bit more. Your partner’s probably completely confused as to why you’re so upset right now.

Is your partner actually on board with financial progress? Another potential situation is that you talked things over with your partner, but without your partner’s buy-in. You might have had all of these big plans, but if your partner wasn’t really invested in all of these plans or if they felt like you were just preaching ideas at them, they probably have no real motivation to change anything.

Did your partner simply make a mistake? Everyone is human and makes mistakes, and overcoming a pattern of spending is a very difficult thing. Perhaps your partner is committed, but their will faltered a time or two. It’s a very human mistake, and forgiveness is always the correct path to take here.

If they were intentionally lying to you or misleading you, deeper marital issues may be involved. You may want to consider seeking a counselor, or at the very least address these concerns face to face. If your partner is being deliberately misleading, there’s likely a deeper problem that needs to be addressed.

Have a rational discussion about it
Once you’ve calmed down and reflected on the situation, have a discussion about it. Explain why you were upset and listen to the reasoning that your partner gives to you. Most of the time, the problem is the result of a lack of communication or confusion in communication, so make sure you both understand what the other is thinking.

The key is listening. Clearly, if you were shocked and surprised by a financial choice that your partner made, he or she is thinking differently than you are. Sit back and listen to your partner’s perspective without comment and make an effort to understand their perspective.

Don’t get angry. Anger solves nothing in a long-term relationship. Save your anger for later when you have a healthy channel for it. If you find yourself getting angry, excuse yourself and deal with it in another room, then return when you’ve calmed down.

Re-evaluate your shared dreams and goals
One common problem that often triggers such a divergence in behavior is that you’re not on the same page with your goals and dreams. You might think your partner has the same dreams that you do, but in fact in their heart they want other things. Or, perhaps you feel a goal can be achieved pretty quickly, but your partner feels that the goal is far off in the future.

Be honest, and ask your partner to be honest, too. If you’re planning things that he or she is not fully committed to, they’ll undermine those plans, whether consciously or otherwise. A long term shared goal doesn’t work unless you both want it, and you won’t know whether your partner truly wants it unless you’re committed to being honest.

Recognize that your partner may have different dreams than you. You might desperately want a bigger house, for example, but your partner might have no interest in such a thing and was simply acknowledging your dream. Instead of dragging your partner along for the ride, look for big dreams that you both share.

Let your partner lead. Let your partner identify the goals he or she finds deeply valuable, then identify the ones that you can share. Letting your partner lead in this process gives him or her a sense of ownership over setting the goals and defining the plans, and that means more commitment and emotional investment in success.

If all of this fails…
If you try all of these things and nothing seems to help the situation, a marriage counselor might be in order. Long-term relationships are built on trust and communication, and if either of those two aspects are failing without a clear root cause, you need to find someone who can help you find that root cause.

Good luck.

My first temptation was to buy her some sort of gift to “make up” for my mistake. I know what sorts of things she likes, so I browsed through some sites and found a couple of great items that I could give her that would patch things over.

But then I came to my senses.

Buying my wife something won’t make up for a mistake I made. In fact, buying her something right now would just send a message to her that I view her love and respect as something that can be bought.

The only way to deal with a poor decision or with a marital rough patch is through communication. If your partner is upset with you, especially if you really can’t understand why, don’t get mad. Listen. Talk through the problem. Ask questions. Figure out what you can do so that the mistake doesn’t happen again. Let your partner know that you truly do love him or her, and that you aren’t a perfect person, and that you made a mistake. Then, try to take all of that into your own heart and make improvements within yourself.

Buying a gift and not talking about the problem? That just paints the wrong kind of picture. It merely shows that you view your issues as something that can be wiped away with money. And they can’t.

Fortunately, I’m a lucky enough man to have a wife who is very forgiving of my inequities. In fact, if she’s reading this right now, I wouldn’t be surprised if she were scratching her head, trying to remember what exactly I’m talking about. At least, I sincerely hope that’s the case.

Marriage isn’t easy. No relationship is truly easy. There are always going to be times when you do something stupid and rash and make someone else upset by your poorly-considered actions. What makes a relationship work isn’t how you avoid such mistakes, it’s how you handle them.

Whenever you’re in a situation where you’ve made a mistake and you’re trying to patch things up, don’t spend your time buying flowers or making grandiose promises about great things to come. Instead, remember just four words:

You can’t buy love.

Then head home, sit down, and have a real conversation. Instead of trying to buy away the problem, try to solve it with real understanding, love, and compassion instead.

After a long stretch of focusing in on Born to Buy, I’m looking forward to writing a whole lot of book reviews over the next several months. And I’ll start off with a book that both my wife and I enjoyed, Sharon Epperson’s The Big Payoff.

The Big Payoff is subtitled 8 Steps Couples Can Take to Make the Most of Their Money – And Live Richly Ever After – and that’s quite a good description of it. It’s pretty obviously intended to be in the same vein as David Bach’s Smart Couples Finish Rich, but rather than focusing on the relationship aspects of things (which Epperson really only devotes a chapter to), the book quickly moves on to nuts and bolts personal finance issues like how to invest your money and so forth.

Does this make for a worthwhile personal finance book? Let’s dig in and find out!

A Deeper Look at The Big Payoff

Introduction
Right off the bat, Sharon Epperson notes something that I’ve felt very strongly about personal finance – in fact, this idea was the reason I started The Simple Dollar:

Good financial planning isn’t just about numbers on a computer screen. Good financial planning helps you get control of your money matters so you can stop fretting about cash and start focusing on your life.

Personal fiance is about more than figuring out which option will pay out the most pennies. It’s about relationships. It’s about psychology. It’s about being able to wade successfully through the challenges that modern life presents to us in countless forms. For some people, it’s easy – for others, it’s a real challenge. For some, cranking numbers is an obsession – for others, it’s a quick route to falling asleep.

The goal of any good financial plan should be that everyone involved with it understands it completely and is committed to it. For some people, that might mean a spreadsheet full of numbers. But for others, it might just mean imagining a real world goal and knowing the steps it takes to get there. In either case, the part that really matters is the goal and the commitment to get there, because without that central commitment, those pages of spreadsheet data don’t really matter one little bit.

1 – Energizer Bunny Money
After that introduction, the book quickly turns to the nuts and bolts of personal finance, starting off with a detailed discussion on how to build your first budget, construct a debt repayment plan, get your credit report, and practice basic frugality. In other words, the real basic stuff that people need to do to get themselves heading in the right financial direction. For most people, if they simply read this chapter alone and acted on it, they’d find themselves in significantly better financial shape.

2 – Prescription for Financial 911
Epperson devotes the second chapter to emergency funds, arguing that everyone needs to have a significant emergency fund in order to handle the “just in case” situations in life. She encourages readers to stash the cash in something fairly liquid and not very risky but offer at least some return – online savings account or CDs work quite well for this.

She recommends that everyone have three months’ worth of living expenses in the ol’ emergency fund and encourages calculating up your real living expenses so you know what they are. Personally, I believe in even more – I think two months’ worth of living expenses for each dependent you have is the right amount. So, for our family’s emergency fund, we have eight months’ worth of living expenses. Regardless of this quibble, Epperson’s right on the money – an emergency fund is a great thing for everyone to have.

3 – On Golden Pond
Here the focus is on retirement and, again, Epperson offers solid basic advice – start saving young, max out a Roth IRA if you can, and contribute up to at least the matching amount in your employer’s 401(k). What I found most refreshing, however, was the very offhand mention that Epperson and her husband have a couple percent of their retirement savings tied up in an insurance policy that has a cash value to it, though she doesn’t seem to recommend this anywhere in the text.

That little tidbit reveals a big truth about personal finance writing and makes me like this book even more. The reality of each person’s life is different and no plan is perfect for more than one person. Sure, in the average situation, it’s best to sock your money right into that Roth IRA or that 401(k), but if your parents started you a whole life insurance plan when you were a newborn, it might make more sense to keep funding that versus putting money in the Roth IRA. Decisions like that are the ones that a good financial advisor can help you with. If you’re not sure, ask a professional, one who recognizes that all financial situations are a little bit different and one who is not trying to sell you a product (yes, that means hire one that you pay a one-time fee to rather than one who gets a commission).

4 – Feathering Your Nest
What about buying a house? From the perspective of a first-time homebuyer, this chapter is loaded down with good information – it covers basically everything I yearned to know about the home buying process when we were going through it for the first time. I also thought the input on the rent versus buy debate was particularly levelheaded – neither answer is the absolute best one for every situation.

One key piece of advice: shop around for your mortgage and don’t forget your local credit union. We wound up getting our mortgage through a credit union because their rates were stellar, it was easy to stop by and ask questions because they were local, and the person handling the mortgage did manual underwriting, which is generally more forgiving than the automated processes that big banks use.

5 – College Savings
This chapter is mostly filled with planning for your child’s college education, one of the standard things that many parents with children worry about. I’m lucky – living in Iowa not only means that the stellar Iowa 529 (managed by Vanguard) is available to me, but it also means that any contributions I make to that 529 is deductible in terms of state taxes, saving us $90 on our tax bill for every $1,000 invested for our kids. Those features add up to a no brainer.

In other areas, though, there are a lot of options to consider, and Epperson walks through all of them. The key thing to remember about college funding, though, is that it’s more important to start early than anything else – even if you don’t make the best investment choices immediately, you’re better off having started on your savings now rather than later.

6 – Healthy, Wealthy, and Wise
Here, Epperson tackles health insurance and spends most of the chapter walking through the nuances of it. Health insurance is frankly an unclear and boring mess for most people, but it’s something that pays off if you figure out the best solution each time you go through a significant life change. For example, my wife and I originally found it cheaper to have separate health insurance plans. When our first child was born, we again recalculated and we again found it was better to keep us separate and just add our son to her insurance. When our second child was born, we recalculated a third time and found that our best option now was a family plan.

However, the real decision to be looked at is disability and long-term care insurance. As Epperson puts it on page 144: “You probably think your biggest asset is your house or your 401(k), but it is really your ability to earn money.” In other words, if you have house insurance but don’t have long term care or disability insurance, you’re not insuring your most valuable asset. This is one portion of the book I really read and thought about – I need to look into these kinds of insurance simply to protect my family.

7 – Get a Life (Jacket)
The following chapter is also about insurance, but this time the focus is on life insurance and property insurance. For me, life insurance is pretty simple – if you don’t already have a whole life policy that someone set up for you as a child, your best option is term life insurance, and this is a stance that Epperson largely agrees with. How much? She suggests 6 to 10 times your annual salary, but I think it varies a lot depending on your situation. If you’re single, you certainly don’t need that much, if any at all. If you’re married with young children, it should be huge – you don’t want their options while growing up to flounder.

8 – Good Will Hunting
The Big Payoff closes with some discussion on estate planning. Basically, if you’ve got a net worth of less than $2 million, Epperson advises drafting a will, a revocable power of attorney, and a living will; if you’re worth more than $2 million, add a living trust to the mix.

For most people, these documents are simple – think about where you want your things to go, have it prepared, sign off on it, and rest in peace. The biggest trick is actually doing it – it requires thinking about matters most of us don’t want to think about it. Just set aside the time to get it done, right now – you’ll be glad you did it.

Should You Read It?

The Big Payoff is basically Personal Finance 101 for couples who have just woken up to the fact that they need to get their finances in order. It summarizes the key facts and has sensible stances on what exactly a couple should be doing with their money, and Epperson explains them in a personable fashion, often using herself and her husband as examples.

I actually found this to be a good complement to Smart Couples Finish Rich. Smart Couples focuses more on issues of actually talking about money, making sure you’re on the same page with decisions, and focusing on reducing spending. The Big Payoff is more of a couple-oriented education on how things work – what can you do with your money and how can you protect it? Different focuses, but they complement each other well.

If you’re in a couple and you’re just beginning to realize that you need to focus on your finances, this is a good book to read alongside David Bach’s Smart Couples Finish Rich. Snag them both from the library or from PaperBackSwap.

And these meetings have become a big part of the financial glue of our marriage.

These conversations keep us on the same financial page and ensure that we both are open and clear about our goals, our dreams, our mistakes, our challenges, and our shared path in life. They let us constantly be a check against one another, making sure we both stick to our better behaviors and use each other as an inspiration for making good choices. If you’re in a long-term relationship with someone, I can’t possibly recommend a monthly financial meeting more highly.

What Our Meetings Look Like

Our meetings are really pretty simple. We go through any credit card statements and bill statements that we have, talk about any changes we should make, plan for anything that’s coming up, and set some goals for the next month, mostly along the lines of limiting unnecessary spending and deciding where our budget leftovers will go for the next month.

For the most part, we don’t need any sort of specific agenda or meeting time – we just do it every once in a while on roughly a monthly schedule. Some keys:

Everything is an open book. There should be absolutely no secrets in such a meeting. If your spouse wants to know about a specific spending choice, be completely open about it, not defensive. If you’re getting defensive, that means you have something to hide – and that means there’s a problem that needs to be addressed together.

Make goals a big part of the meeting. Not only big, long-term goals, but the shorter goals over the next month that will help you get there. Set goals together, even if the goals are very individual in nature. Then, throughout the month, offer each other encouragement. It’s hard to break a bad spending habit or to make new financial choices – use the motivation of goals and the constant encouragement of a loving partner to make the changes easier.

This is a great time to work on a simple budget together. Sit down and talk in detail about your spending plan for the coming month – and also where your challenges and successes were over the last month. This discussion can provide a lot of insight into where you’re going – and where you’ve been – and that information together can help you to make better financial choices.

Love and respect each other, even if you have differences of opinion. Money brings about strong feelings – don’t let these strong feelings overshadow the more important things in life. One good way to do this is to hold your partner’s hand during the meeting.

Involving the Kids

I am a big advocate of involving children in these meetings as early as possible, by age seven at the latest. Allow them to bring their own financial picture to the table – pay them an allowance, have them budget the money, and have them talk about their own successes. Here are some thoughts on how to incorporate kids into this picture.

Keep the open book philosophy. Everything should still be wide open so that your kids can see the financial reality of being adults. They need to know how much you’re spending each month to keep the roof over their head and the food on the table – as well as giving an idea of all of the little expenses that eat away at the big pile of money.

What about privacy? Many parents like to hide behind a veil of privacy, saying that it’s none of their children’s business how they spend their money. My argument against that is twofold: first, it makes a great educational opportunity for your kids impossible and second, it says that there’s something in your spending that you’re ashamed of. If there’s shame, that means that there’s something you personally need to improve in your life.

Naturally, I see no problem eliminating a few items with black highlighter in order to hide an upcoming gift or something, but if you’re sealing away most of your spending from your children, they’re missing out on a big learning opportunity.

Let them offer input towards goals – and have them set their own. When you’re making large financial choices, let them have a voice in the decision, but don’t let them run the show, either. Where you should allow them a lot of control is in setting their own goals, both over the long term and over the next month. Help them identify good things to save for and encourage them to work towards those goals. This goes hand in hand with the idea of splitting an allowance into pieces for spending now, sharing with others, and saving for later – in effect, budgeting for kids.

Make some of the economic choices you have available to them. This is a concept heavily advocated by David Owen’s excellent book The First National Bank of Dad. In it, Owen advocates that you should create a “virtual” bank for your kids with a very high interest rate – say, 5% a month – to teach them the value of saving very early. In other words, let’s say they have $20. They have the choice of putting that $20 in the “First National Bank of Dad” where it will earn $1 in interest every month, or they can spend it immediately. All they have to do to earn that $1 each month is simply not spend it. It’s a real choice for a young child and it introduces them to the dilemma of saving versus spending – and offers plenty of encouragement to make the “good” choice.

In The End…
At its core, the idea of a monthly money meeting is really all about communication. The more we talk about money with our family and the more we encourage each other to make good choices, the more likely we are to make good choices over the long haul. Even better, it’s a splendid opportunity to use ourselves as examples for our children, teaching them how to be financially responsible adults.

One of the most difficult topics to discuss was money issues, largely because of the taboo nature of it. In fact, it took us years to break down that final wall, even though we had found a very strong and deep comfort level when it came to other topics, and we both found that when we finally started communicating about money, it was incredibly valuable.

What did I learn from this experience? Without a doubt, it is far better to talk about money sooner rather than later when your relationship gets deeply serious. Here are some guidelines – and some specific topics to discuss – for when the time comes to talk about such things. You’ll be glad you did.

Before You Get Started…

First of all, realize that total honesty is the only answer here if you expect to have a long, lasting, and loving relationship. Once you finally get up the courage to address these issues, don’t hold anything back. If you find yourself biting your lip or tucking away a little piece of information or two, you’re creating a relationship of mistrust. I’m not talking about things like not telling your partner about their Christmas gift, either – it’s rather obvious where the line is in this case.

Expect some disagreement as well. You’re likely going to have very different feelings on how money should be handled in your relationship. If you find yourself being truly honest and meshing well, consider yourself lucky. Very lucky.

Don’t expect to answer these questions immediately, either. Often, fundamental financial decisions aren’t made in an afternoon. If something seems like it’s building to a serious disagreement and you’re not making any progress, let a few weeks pass before talking about it again. During that time, try hard to see the situation through your partner’s eyes and understand why they want things to be that way.

For some couples, these topics might be very easy and you might find that you’re both in very strong agreement. For others, each question might be grounds for conflict. Likely, you’ll find yourself somewhere in the middle, and that’s perfectly normal and healthy.

Twelve Things To Talk About

Where do you see us being in five years? Ten years? Twenty five years? Try to flesh out as much as you can here, but realize that the future isn’t set in stone. The reason for discussing this is so that you have some idea what the dreams and the goals look like for each other.

What does our complete financial state look like? Lay everything out. Every debt. Every drop of income. Everything. Don’t hide that $4,000 credit card statement, as you’re just building a foundation on top of a lie.

Should we share our money or maintain separate accounts? Who should be the primary caretaker of the accounts? Many people will argue that any married couple should combine all accounts – my wife and I did not come to that conclusion. Talk it out and figure out what’s right for you.

When do we intend to make major shared purchases, like a house? How much do we intend to spend on such a purchase (roughly)? This is one area where people often just assume that their partner sees things the same way that they do. It’s not true. My wife and I, for example, had very different views on when a house purchase was appropriate, and my wife was ready to buy three years before I was even willing to consider it.

Are children a possibility? Although this is a very deep emotional decision, it’s also a financial one as well. Make sure you’re on the same page when it comes to children, because while having a child is a deeply fulfilling endeavor, it’s also a very expensive one, often more expensive than people without children even realize. It also means some significant lifestyle changes, too.

Are we both committed to our career path? Sometimes, the support of a spouse provides a strong situation for one member of a marriage to make a career leap they would not have otherwise considered. This is a great discussion point.

Are we both saving for retirement? When’s the retirement target? This was one financial issue that my wife and I talked about quite a bit before we were married, especially since we both were already putting away a substantial amount into 401(k)/403(b)s. Just make sure that you’re both aware of what the other is doing and that you realize that without putting money away for that inevitable day, you likely will never retire.

Do we want an urban, suburban, or rural life? You might think the answer is self-evident, but it’s often not. Take Kathy’s story from a while back – she and her spouse at first thought urban living was self-evident, but after getting married, they began to talk about things and realized that perhaps it wasn’t the obvious answer that they thought it was and then began plotting a move to a much more rural setting. If they had talked things out first, they might have moved rural right off the bat, saving themselves substantial time, money, and happiness.

What’s our financial risk tolerance? Can we tolerate short term losses to aim for long term gains? For some, losing some money in the short run is completely fine if it means some years of 20% returns down the road. For others, watching the balance of their investments drop like a rock over years is just too painful. Figure out where you’re both at on this, so that if you make investments from your shared money, you don’t wind up with your money in something far too risky for the other person’s tastes – which can result in a very bitter conflict.

What’s the balance between work and leisure? Some couples might consist of two people that are very career-oriented. Other couples might consist of people who could care less about a career, or perhaps some mix of the two. The only problem comes about when one person’s expectations completely miss the behavior of the partner.

Is a prenupital agreement appropriate? Is one of you bringing far more into the marriage than the other, or expecting to earn far more than the other during the marriage? You may want to discuss a prenupital agreement, but there needs to be an air of honesty here – if you feel one is useful, don’t hold back in saying so.

Are there any known burdens that will likely crop up in the future? For example, does one of you have an ailing parent that may need special care? What about dependent pre-existing children? Do one of you have a major illness that may start showing symptoms? While these are not usually make or break issues, they often provide the basis for some deeply insightful conversations.

Two Books Worth Reading

I strongly encourage any couple that is considering spending their lives together to take the time and each read Your Money or Your Life (the book club of YMOYL might be very useful) and Smart Couples Finish Rich, but do it together. I recommend that each of you read a chapter, then discuss it together.

One technique my wife and I found useful was reading a chapter of such a book aloud on long car trips, with the passenger reading and then both partners discussing the topics. We would just stop and start talking whenever an important point came up, and we wound up discovering a lot about each other.

No matter what you do, though, don’t put off these conversations. They can be the key to establishing a strong foundation for your relationship and building a much stronger understanding of each other. In fact, if you’ve never opened such a door with your partner, today is the best day to do it, because tomorrow it’s very easy to find a reason to put this off.

I am 29 years old and I have just recently started to jump into real estate investing part time in my hometown. I currently work a regular full time job that pays $43K a year. Just last month I sold my first “project house” and used the profits to be completely debt free (other than my $110K mortgage, 5yr fixed @ 5.9%). I also now have $40K left over sitting in a high interest savings account (5.05%). My plan was to hold onto this 40K and use it to further my real estate investing career. I would use it for downpayments, renovations etc. Without this money, I really do not have any other way of purchasing my second “project house”.

I have been living with my girlfriend for over 2 years now and I am 90% of the way to having the money saved to buy her an engagement ring (should be there by Nov). She just finished school and is coming out holding a little over 20K (interest of ~6% on both) of school debt. Her current full time job is paying her only ~$30K a year.

My question is this:
Should I use 20K of the 40K that I have saved to pay off these student debts?

Pros:
* 20K will take her quite some time to pay down when she is only bringing in $1500 a month and it will be pretty hard on her.
* She (we) will save quite a bit in interest costs by paying this off completely.

Cons:
* This move would limit my RE investing options, as I would only have about 20K to work with.
* I am worried that she won’t learn the value of being debt free as she hasn’t experienced what it is really like to be frugal.

John’s in a situation where there are a lot of questions about his immediate future that he needs to answer. Let’s move through some of these questions one at a time and see how they affect John’s best move.

First, is she going to accept his marriage proposal? This is a very important question because it may likely lead straight into wedding expenses and other such costs associated with this, meaning that he probably would want to have the cash for the wedding liquid rather than tied up in real estate.

Next, would he still want to pay off her loans if she didn’t accept the proposal? Some people might automatically believe the answer here is “no,” but it depends on who John is as a person and also the type of relationship he has with this woman. If the debt repayment is contingent upon the proposal or upon the marriage, then he should wait to pay it off – if it is not, he should pay the debt off immediately.

Also, how valuable is this real estate investing career? For time and money invested, how much did John actually make on the first house? I would figure up an hourly rate including all time invested and all costs and see how it did. If it’s minimum wage or less, the real estate career should be viewed as a hobby and put somewhat on the back burner compared to eliminating debt and paying for the wedding.

I’m also not sure about the comment about “hasn’t experienced what it is really like to be frugal.” I think that’s an issue you need to talk about within the relationship, as there is no advice that can really be given to address that aspect that isn’t pushy or assumes quite a bit about the relationship. Just sit down and talk about frugality and spending – make sure you both understand that the best way to go over the long term is to always spend less than you earn and the bigger the gap, the better.

My perspective is this: if you are sure that you are going to be married in a year or two and you’re not in the middle of a real estate boom, your best bet is to pay off her debt immediately, then pay for the wedding without incurring more debt. If either of those assumptions are in question, then the situation requires a lot more detailed thought.

Of course, with a situation as complex as this, I’m sure my readers will have some additional ideas.

If you’re about to get married, I would strongly encourage you to take a few hours and discuss these ten questions with your spouse-to-be, just so you know what’s going on.

How much money do we have? What’s in all of your accounts? Hint: if you’re hiding things here, then it doesn’t speak well for the level of trust that will be in your marriage.

How much debt do we have? This needs to be completely honest, with all cards on the table, or else you’re just begging for a big fight after you get married. You will be much, much better off if you both reveal your complete, true financial state, because if you do not, you’re hiding a major skeleton in the closet that will someday jump out and really, really disrupt the tranquility of your life.

How much income can we expect? What do you both make in a year? Will that grow in the future? How steady is your employment? Will there be enough money to pay for the standard of living that we’re envisioning together, or will we have to make an adjustment?

What are our known and required expenses? You’ll find yourself saving money on most of these things when you get married, but you need to touch base on all expenses. Perhaps one of you has alimony payments, or else has several maintenance prescriptions that need to be kept up. These financial requirements are important and need to be specified right off the bat so that both parties know what’s required and you don’t have an argument about them later on.

How much do we frivolously spend each month? If you’ve been burning through money to put on the impression of being wealthy to impress him or her, you need to come clean about this now. If you’re a shoe addict, or have a thing for your DVD collection, be honest about the cash you’re burning on these pet projects, but also be realistic about how much you’re going to cut down (if at all) when you get married. If this will cause problems, it’s best to talk them out before the marriage than after.

Should we use an allowance system for frivolous spending? You need to specify how you’re each going to be realistic and fair about frivolous spending. It’s not healthy for any marriage for one person to spend like crazy while the other one doesn’t have a dime, and it’s also not healthy for both people to spend a certain amount, but one person “spends” more with the help of a credit card.

Will we combine our money? For most couples (but far from all couples), combining your money is the best choice. Many argue that not doing so indicates a lack of trust between the two sides, but there may be reasons for keeping them separate. Talk about this in detail and plan for the best move for you.

If combined, who will be the primary money wrangler? In most marriages, one member handles most of the financial decisions. Be clear on who that is going to be so that you aren’t caught in situations where you’re both making moves and the right hand doesn’t know what the left hand is doing. Who’s going to make sure the bills get paid and also keep track of the money that needs to be in each account?

How will we combine our physical assets? Figure out what items you’re going to keep after marriage and figure out a fair way to get rid of the excess so no one is upset with anything. I recently heard about a wedding where both people had houses before marriage, but in the month before the wedding, one of them sold their house and went on an $15,000 shopping spree. From what I hear, the “honeymoon” period was quite short in that one.

When we marry, what will happen to our estate? Obviously, in the event of one of you passing, all assets should go to the other, but what if you’re married and you both pass on? If you’re about to marry someone that just assumes that everything will go to her niece, then you may want to clarify things before you even jump in.

Trust is the key to any marriage, and money can be one of the hardest parts to build trust on. Take the time to do it right.

My fiance and I are considering marriage. However, it seems like financially, marriage is a mistake. We both work full time and it seems like a greater proportion of our incomes would now go into a higher bracket. Are there any tax benefits to being married that might offset this?

If your salaries are very similar, then yes, you will pay more income tax as a married couple than as singles. If your salaries are far apart, however, there is a tax benefit for getting married and the wider the gap, the better.

However, marriage comes with many other financial benefits. If one of you has excellent health care coverage and the other has mediocre coverage, you can likely both be able to have the higher quality coverage for little cost to you. Insurance rates, particularly for auto insurance, are lower for married couples (significantly lower in our case). Plus, if one of you meets an early end, the benefits of being married are tremendous: the longer-living spouse gets Social Security survivor benefits, automatic inheritance rights (if you’re not married and one of you dies, you’ll lose a lot of money dealing with probate), and you don’t owe any estate tax, either.

My wife and I were making very similar salaries when we got married, but after combining our auto insurance and indicating we were married as well as combining our health insurance, we ended up saving money over the course of a year even with slightly higher income tax.

Also, when we go to buy a house, should we put both our names on the mortgage application? How are you and your wife handling this?

If one of you has terrible credit and the other has really good credit, then just one of you can apply for the mortgage, but lenders will only lend you an amount that could be repaid with annual payments equal to 28% of the combined salaries of the people on the mortgage. So, if you’re both making the same salary, having only one of your names on the mortgage means you can only borrow half as much as you otherwise could borrow. My wife and I both have very good credit ratings, so we both put our names down, enabling us to borrow pretty much any amount we wanted.

The only time I can think of when marriage isn’t financially beneficial is when you think there’s a good chance that divorce may follow it.

What are wants and needs? In a nutshell, needs are the things that you absolutely have to pay in order to live and avoid bankruptcy: housing payments, taxes, groceries, commuting costs, and so on. Wants are the things that you spend money on that you don’t explicitly need, like dining out or music.

As a rule of thumb, my wife and I allow each other a certain amount of wants in a given month, because life isn’t fun if you can’t have anything that you want. My wants are usually books, food, and occasionally music; hers are much more varied. By capping our wants at a reasonable level each month (and also with the peer review process on such spending), we often find ourselves saving quite a bit of money each month.

The tricky part is determining whether some of your spending is a have or a want. For example, let’s say we have beef burgundy for supper and in order to make it, we have to buy a new bottle of cooking wine (we generally buy pretty cheap wines for cooking wines, like “two buck Chuck”). It’s not explicitly a need, as you can prepare food at home without it, but it also really stretches the definition of want as well, as things like cooking wine enable us to prepare delicious meals at home that encourage us to eat at home instead of getting takeout or eating out, so in the long run buying a bottle of cooking wine is a money saver for us.

Here’s the process we go through to determine if something is a need or a want:

First, we list all of our spending that isn’t strictly essential in a month. Things that are essential are housing bills, most gas costs, staple foods, medical bills, insurance, and so on. These are things that we have to pay no matter what.

After we’ve made that list, we list everything that’s clearly a want. Entertainment and hobby expenses, dining out, and so on go under this category and immediately go on the want list.

This leaves us usually with a handful of things that we talk about – things like the cooking wine and so on. This process is more organic, but it usually comes down to the following question: would we have spent more money than this had we not purchased the item? With a bottle of inexpensive cooking wine, the answer is usually “yes,” because we likely would have eaten out more often without tools like that in the kitchen, thus costing us more in the long run. We use a similar philosophy to mark things such as CFLs as needs.

After this process, reviewing the list of wants helps us keep our eye on the financial ball each month. We usually strive to keep ourselves within our self-imposed allowance – and thankfully, we’re both usually way under the limit.