? how many other couples have thier money separate?
I was just wondering b/c my dh and I do keep our money separate. At first it was b/c he was giving bm a LOT of money beyond cs and medical and we went able to pay the bills and he couldn't figure out why and was always accusing me of spending too much. As anyway I separated to show him where the money was going. It worked and he refuses to give her anything beyond support now. YAY. But dh and I have decided to keep it that way. So as a result unintentional we tend to spend our own money on our own kids and sometimes we give each other kids gifts. But at the same time we don;t ever do the your kids vs my kids but the bm tries her best to keep it that way. So the kids are kinda separated even without the money thing b/c bm is always calling to complain about my kids and doing the her vs mine, dh has told so many times that my kids are off limits to her period to even discuss but she keeps it up. Such as she some how found out that ds has adhd and is not on meds so she called screaming about it and saying that her kids weren't coming over till ds is on meds. Dh told her to shut up and that if she kept the kids away he would be seeing her in court. But the reality is my ds has Aspbergers and no he is not on meds, his doc and I have decided this is best for him.So the line is clearly drawn by her. I think my question is really how do I try to erase that line? Or is it hopeless with the way bm is?
Now one last thing is this is just the tip of the crap bm has said and done about my kids so if you want to know more let me know. thanks. 
We keep everything separate.
We keep everything separate. THe pre-nup indicates that and protects me from the BM going after any of my money or my business. He pays for his kids and I pay for mine. Makes everything easy. Any BD gifts for each others kids we give what we wants.
We keep a joint credit card for anything bought for the house. That has worked well for us. As for any savings when we do, it is contributed to jointly. Same amount by each.
As for your son, she can't do or say anything about it unless your DH allows it. I would ignore her about your son. She is stirring up trouble.
Pre-nups are recognised in
Pre-nups are recognised in some court systems and not in others. I will have one if I shift in with SO (because where we live common-law and actual marriage are treated the same after 2 years), so I have researched this!
Separate money saves sooooooo much stress. I currently share a house with a very good friend, and we run a 3 pot system. We each contribute 1/2 the expenses, then get to keep the money we earn ourselves to spend as we want. It works well...and I am saving even if he is not!
I insisted it stay separate,
I insisted it stay separate, end of story. I don't trust his ex Uberskank and I don't trust his kid.
I know she is stiring up crap
I know she is stiring up crap but still he makes me so mad that she has throw kids under the bus the way she does. Like one time when all the boys got in a fight and I sat them all down all got in the same amount of trouble but she got mad and said my ds was the brat and bully and I needed to apologize to her and the boys. uummm NO! First ss14 is 6' and 160lbs my ds is 5' 6" and is about 100lbs and ss14 is the one we have had the problems of being the bully not my son. I can;t begin to tell you all the things that I alone caught ss14 doing to ds and his brothers. Lets just say I told ss 14 that there never a reason to hit and he said "yes there is if I feel like It I will". So who's the bully? Anyway I guess mama bear shows up a lot with this kid. Even for my other ss13 and 10. He just makes me so mad that he thinks he can hit them anytime he feels like it.
Anyway I thanks I will continue to do what we have been doing it works thanks.
Tell SS14 you're glad to know
Tell SS14 you're glad to know that the rules allow hitting when you feel like it, then bring over someone from work who's about 6'3", 220 and let him knock the shit out of the kid and then say "I'd say I'm sorry but I'm not because hitting is okay because I felt like it."
I once saw my Mom hit my Dad. Dad very calmly said "______, for the 20 years we've been together I've been under the assumption that physical violence was not part of the deal. Apparently I've been wrong. If it is okay, let me know now so I can alter MY behavior accordingly."
Boy I never saw someone so contrite and scare in my life. He basically politely told her, "we don't hit and if you ever hit me again I'm going to knock your fucking teeth down your throat. Got it?"
Give the little bastard some of his own medicine and see how he likes it.
We have separate accounts,
We have separate accounts, but our money is shared. DH has 3 kids and makes about 50 percent more than I do. I have no kids. I'm the budgeting brain in the marriage so he pretty much just goes along with whatever I tell him and forks over whatever I need. I manage most of everything online using both of our accounts. I do all the shopping for the home and the kids and with custody of the 3 and BM paying zilch in CS there's not a whole lot to get stingy with. So far it works. I've probably spent entirely too much of the savings I came into the relationship with on "his" legal expenses, but it was the right thing to do. I know he'll help me build it back up when we can.
See, I don't have that same
See, I don't have that same kind of trust. My BF isn't good with money either, and at the moment he is going through a custody battle. He seems to want to still spend the way he did before he incurred these expenses, and likes to ask me for the funds to do so (ie, eating out all the time, etc.)
Do you live together? DH and
Do you live together? DH and I had to really scale back when we decided for him to get custody. We have weekly cash allowances that we can blow however we want - that's our eating out and alcohol money, heh. I get pretty stingy with mine if he blows all of his in the first two days.
It works pretty well. You've just got to sit down and prioritize and come up with something you both can live with. I'm also very thrifty and good at getting the most out of what we have in our food, clothes and general household budgets.
We do live together, and its
We do live together, and its a full-time job telling him 'no' all the time. He spends his money on his expenses as soon as he gets it and then wants me to buy us pizza for dinner (there are perfectly good groceries at home). Instead of pizza maybe its milk shakes, cigarettes, etc.-if/when I say no he gets all 'Its just $5! Or $20!" Heaven forbid I pay my bills, then its "But you paid $xx on your credit card! Why can't you cover $xx!"
It gets old.
I wish I had made our
I wish I had made our seperate too but I make more money than him and can't figure out how to seperate it now. I have 1 child and he has two that live with us. I pay more for them then he does. how do I do it now????
Our resources are together.
Our resources are together. We only have one kid. Our son (my SS) who is 17.
She does have a separate acct where CS is deposited. This is to prevent the state from retracting money out of our accounts. As soon as the direct deposit for CS is made by the state the money is auto transfered to our accounts.
There is not a snowballs chance in hell that we would allow the state or BioDad to take money out of our accounts.
Best regards.
I wish we had kept them
I wish we had kept them separate. Whenever I bring up going back to separate accounts, DH about flips out & says married couples should not have separate accounts; yeah, right! I wish I could go back have a 'do over'!
There's a lot to be said for
There's a lot to be said for keeping finances separate. But there is also the mistaken belief that married couples have joint credit simply because they are married, not so. You only have joint credit if you have applied for something like a mortgage, credit cards, car note, etc. jointly. Ex. If you co-sign for a car note for your (s)kid, you have joint credit with that (s)kid.
If there are concerns about how much money is being spent then separate accounts, whether they are joint or not, can be used to control cash flow. All are protectionist measures.
My situation is personal and professional since my DH and I were business partners, but we both have kept the bank accounts that we had prior to being married. As measure of protection we are both on each others accounts should something happen to either of us, or should someone attempt to access our accounts without permission. (SS recently attempted to buy an iPhone 4Gs on my credit card which was prevented by pre-set daily charge limits.)
There is an amount of trust involved with shared finances. Some rule setting and all the family obligations need to be known, cs, house & car payments, child car costs, etc.
Best of Luck,
A. Valentine
Small Business Cash Flow & Credit Mgmt. consultant
I currently keep my own bank
I currently keep my own bank account and dh keeps his tho i seriously wouldnt describe our money as seperate.
He is on state benefits (minimal ones) and Im working so I pay for pretty much everything including his son.
I will remain having a seperate bank account mind, cos its my money and its up to me to choose what i want to do with it, not for him to dictate it.
me and my dh just recently
me and my dh just recently got married and we plan on keeping our finances seperate as well and definitely filing seperate tax returns because ive heard of horror stories about filing taxes together! We are going to get a joint account that we will both contribute money in for like bills and such but no way am i going to have my checks direct deposited in it! We are both independent with our money (but we both have the same ideas about spending and saving though) and i think we would both have a problem if we had to 'ask' the other person for money for such and such. but neither of us has a problem giving the other person money if they need it for a bill or something (which is usually me giving dh extra money because I make more than he does, but his child support doesnt leave him empty either. he got lucky with not having to pay so much).
what horror stories?
what horror stories?