Not sure how this happened to me...

You have to know the other could walk away to keep you honest.

You have to both commit to not walking away to make it work.


This obviously excludes an abusive situation. Nobody should accept physical or other abuse. But that’s for a different thread.
 
Airplane account is a plus. An agreed amount each year and then all the bills get paid out of it. My wife is OK with the budget amount, but would go nuts if she saw every bill. Nothing hidden, just not the constant drip of $100 fills and 1,000 mx bills
 
We combine our money. It’s all tangled up together. We are both responsible and accountable for all of it. We each spend as we like without checking with the other unless it’s an expensive non-essential. Then, we inform the other, and the retaliatory purchase agreement kicks in. That is, the other is then entitled to purchase something of equivalent value.
 
If you both are from Mars......I don't even want to ask....

You mean like if you’re a gay couple?
I wasn't implying that, even though there's nothing wrong with it...

I actually relate to men better than to other women. In general, that is. But it's more like a "friend zone" relate. :rofl:

There was someone here that liked that term.
 
We combine our money. It’s all tangled up together. We are both responsible and accountable for all of it. We each spend as we like without checking with the other unless it’s an expensive non-essential. Then, we inform the other, and the retaliatory purchase agreement kicks in. That is, the other is then entitled to purchase something of equivalent value.

I think I like that system except for the RPA. I'm not sure how that's supposed to work (or why). If I decide I'd like to buy a new heli, does she then need to find something she wants to buy that is similar in price (or vice-versa if she wants... a keyboard)? That seems like it would just make us spend more in lump sums than we otherwise would.

Right now, we're only buying essentials (trying to let the account recover after wedding expenses) but we're also reviewing the budget every weekend. We will probably relax on the budget after a couple months or so.
 
I think I like that system except for the RPA. I'm not sure how that's supposed to work (or why). If I decide I'd like to buy a new heli, does she then need to find something she wants to buy that is similar in price (or vice-versa if she wants... a keyboard)? That seems like it would just make us spend more in lump sums than we otherwise would.

Right now, we're only buying essentials (trying to let the account recover after wedding expenses) but we're also reviewing the budget every weekend. We will probably relax on the budget after a couple months or so.
We've been married 35 years, we combined money when we got married, too much work to figure who got what Bill. We don't RPA, we generally agree on expenses. My flying addiction definitely trumps any discretionary spending she does. I work hard to fight every whim to buy stuff. Not so much that it's an issue to spend the money, but more to keep from filling the house and garage with junk.

Once again, just be reasonable and realistic. Money does not make you happy, but it can be a cause of misery if you let it be.
 
I think the recommendation is down to 45. I still have a few more years, but not at all looking forward to it!

FOLLOW all recommendations. I did and even then got scared ess-less on my first when the polyps they found were categorized "pre-cancerous." Glad they are gone, things looking good ever since. Prep has gotten much better, and flushable wipes are so very nice.
 
I think I like that system except for the RPA. I'm not sure how that's supposed to work (or why). If I decide I'd like to buy a new heli, does she then need to find something she wants to buy that is similar in price (or vice-versa if she wants... a keyboard)? That seems like it would just make us spend more in lump sums than we otherwise would.

Especially considering that most of the time, my discretionary spending isn't lump sums - put together, my "hobby expenses" could be quite a bit, but I rarely buy enough at one time so that it would trigger the "expensive non-essential" clause, so even if he didn't have anything expensive he wanted to buy, technically I could just keep buying my stuff and it'd "fly under the radar", so to speak.

Obviously we don't have the years of experience to prove this will work for us, but I like approaching finances as a team so far. We're trying to figure out how to make the money work best for *us*, instead of thinking only or mostly of ourselves as separate entities that happen to be sharing a bank account. And when we find ourselves both wanting something very expensive at the same time, hopefully we'll remember it's a team effort and not get too testy over it! :)
 
We're trying to figure out how to make the money work best for *us*

That’s the key. I’m an accountant so my wife has me do all the money stuff. I’m also the sole bread winner these days. Over the years we’ve built the trust that I’m not going to go do anything stupid other than buy an airplane. Now that I’ve owned an airplane 5 years and our net worth has continued to go up, she doesn’t even ask how much the plane costs.

Find what works for you. I’d recommend using a program like Quicken, but again, I’m an accountant and do my personal finances like one. But the wife has full access to it and can see where our money goes if she wants to. Most of the time she just looks at the savings account number and the 401k number. :)
 
We combine our money. It’s all tangled up together. We are both responsible and accountable for all of it. We each spend as we like without checking with the other unless it’s an expensive non-essential. Then, we inform the other, and the retaliatory purchase agreement kicks in. That is, the other is then entitled to purchase something of equivalent value.

We have maintained separate checking/savings accounts for 24 years. She puts a little of her paycheck in mine. I pay all the bills, contribute to the IRAs etc. She pays for vacations, Christmas and big stuff she wants. All our investments are together in Fidelity except her TSP that will rollover to her IRA after we retire.

It's worked for us and as long as you both agree to whatever it is and it works it's good.
 
I never combined finances with Mrs. Steingar, I never wanted to tell her how to spend her money. She contributes a proportionate amount to the household, and I'm good with it. I suspect there are lots of different paths to a successful relationship.
 
We combine funds, but maintain his-n-hers slush funds[1]. The amount in the funds varies depending, but either can spend up to the max in the slush fund for discretionary purchases.

[1] Yes, on a spreadsheet[2], because I'm an engineer geek

[2] One of many to track various things...
 
My gut says the finances may depend on when in life you got married.
Married young . . . Combined. Older and a bit established . . . Separate.

2nd or greater marriage . . . Separate.
 
I think I like that system except for the RPA. I'm not sure how that's supposed to work (or why). If I decide I'd like to buy a new heli, does she then need to find something she wants to buy that is similar in price (or vice-versa if she wants... a keyboard)? That seems like it would just make us spend more in lump sums than we otherwise would.

Right now, we're only buying essentials (trying to let the account recover after wedding expenses) but we're also reviewing the budget every weekend. We will probably relax on the budget after a couple months or so.

You guys review the budget every week? You have a budget already? Pfffft, you’ll be fine.

The RPA is kind of a joke. I should have put a smiley face in there. We don’t literally follow it all the time. But the idea behind it is real. The term came about after a couple of incidents early in our marriage such as when he came home one day and announced, “I bought a sailboat.” I believe the purchase price was $14,000 and that was circa 1986 dollars. Newlyweds are so cute, thinking they can just go unilaterally do stuff as if they were still single. :D In his defense, he did only make a down payment and said he could withdraw from the deal if I didn’t approve. Well even in my twenties I had already figured out that men, or at least my man, need “big toys” so I said he could have it but the point was made that big purchase decisions like that should be made jointly.

Having the RPA in the background makes us thoughtful about purchases of frivolous expensive stuff, mostly the $500~$1000 range (not huge ticket items like boats) because it effectively doubles the price, so we don’t do it unless we really want it. The other person doesn’t always go out and get something, these days usually not. It’s become more of a joke. Stuff that used to be points of conflict have now become sources of amusement.

We've been married 35 years, we combined money when we got married, too much work to figure who got what Bill. We don't RPA, we generally agree on expenses. My flying addiction definitely trumps any discretionary spending she does. I work hard to fight every whim to buy stuff. Not so much that it's an issue to spend the money, but more to keep from filling the house and garage with junk.

Once again, just be reasonable and realistic. Money does not make you happy, but it can be a cause of misery if you let it be.

Yes, if both are reasonable and realistic then it works. If one is irresponsible with money you’ve got a problem. But likewise if one is a real tightwad and tries to impose that on the other it’s just as big a problem.

Especially considering that most of the time, my discretionary spending isn't lump sums - put together, my "hobby expenses" could be quite a bit, but I rarely buy enough at one time so that it would trigger the "expensive non-essential" clause, so even if he didn't have anything expensive he wanted to buy, technically I could just keep buying my stuff and it'd "fly under the radar", so to speak.

Obviously we don't have the years of experience to prove this will work for us, but I like approaching finances as a team so far. We're trying to figure out how to make the money work best for *us*, instead of thinking only or mostly of ourselves as separate entities that happen to be sharing a bank account. And when we find ourselves both wanting something very expensive at the same time, hopefully we'll remember it's a team effort and not get too testy over it! :)

The bolded sentence is very well put. Whether you have separate accounts or pool the money is less important than the need to think of yourselves as a team rather than independent entities. Legally in most states your assets are considered shared anyway. Whether in separate accounts or merged, your combined worth and combined bills are the same.

It’s really just a matter of how you track it, and how you allow each partner to retain some sense of identity. That’s important too. I’m not implying you should give up your individuality and independence by merging accounts. We spend as we like without asking 99% of the time. This only works if the combined expenditures do not exceed income!

Because accounts are together we get around the issue of what the balance is at any moment by using credit cards for almost all purchases and paying them off every month so we don’t pay interest. That way the checking account never gets overdrawn, plus we get reward dollars back. And we don’t have to check with each other to see if there’s enough money in the account to make the purchase that day. Of course, using credit cards this way requires discipline. I can see where for some couples having separate checking accounts for your own fun money works better.

As for “flying under the radar”, shhhhhh! That was secret! :D Seriously, this was very true during the kid years, but most of the small purchases I made were related to children and household, not my own personal desires. But I did probably spend more than he did all total, not counting the airplanes! And maybe car related expenses.

Flying and airplane expenses are a separate subject, as was rental property. Now you’re creating jointly held business accounts and you really do work as a team. At least we did. But you should know the law again, even if only one of you owns the business or plane you both might be liable.
 
I’m late to the party, but congratulations anyway!

Maybe we need a forum for “singles”, then maybe after that some of those participants will move to a sub forum called “twins”.

We'd run out of lady pilots kind of quickly, dontcha think?

One of the things single people get told to do to try to meet a partner is to participate in a hobby or activity, where they could possibly meet someone who has the same interest. In some activities, this works, tennis for example. (Disclaimer, this is how I met my wife.) For other activities, they tend to be heavily male or female heavy, mostly male heavy. My favorite thing in the whole world is sports car racing, it's very male heavy. I'd say at the average sports car race you could count how many unattached women there are on the thumbs of one foot. Somehow I think that aviation is closer to sports car racing than tennis, male to female ratio wise.

Hey, I can look that figure up. According to the FAA airmen statistics, there are 469,062 rated pilots, excluding students, and of those 26,864 are women. Geez, what a sausage fest.

Relationship advice from a rock band? Yes!

 
Congratulations, @SkyChaser and @2-Bit Speed!!! Just skimmed this thread and saw your story. SkyChaser, just realized we're the same age. Are you a new pilot? Wishing blessings to you both on your new life together!

Sent from my SM-A515U using Tapatalk
 
Congratulations, @SkyChaser and @2-Bit Speed!!! Just skimmed this thread and saw your story. SkyChaser, just realized we're the same age. Are you a new pilot? Wishing blessings to you both on your new life together!

Thanks for the well wishes! I got my certificate the first of June this year, so I think I qualify as a new pilot. :)
 
I said my congratulations earlier. Now, some advice that you can take or leave (nice thing about advice on the internet, it's worth exactly what you paid for it)...

When my wife and I got married we were still in college. My high school sweetheart and the only girl I ever dated. I was 21 and she was 19 when we got married and we had been engaged for just over 2 years. One bank account and checking account. It's always been that way. And never was an issue for us. Like you, we married young. I have no idea what my brother does (he's married to his second wife after losing his first to illness) and that's his business, so I haven't asked. Oh yeah, we have now been married for 48 years.

We're in what Rushie calls stage 3. Our oldest just turned 45 and our youngest (we only had two) is 41. 5 grandkids. We still haven't killed each other and sleep in the same bed. We have exercised one of the marriage vows very heavily - in sickness and in health - over the years. We take them very seriously, the vows we exchanged at the wedding. They aren't just words, they have deep meaning.

Neither of us has living parents any more (just had the memorial service a week and a half ago for my mother), so we are now the oldest for our kids. Just be a rock and good example for your kids when you have them. Our parents were for us and I hope we have been for our kids. It's important.

Remember, each of you is human and not perfect. You will have disagreements. Work them out and remember why you got married in the first place. You love each other. You will have different interests. My wife still thinks "stupidradio" is one word (I'm a ham and she doesn't care for radios). She loves quilting and subscribes to the statement that "there is no such thing as too much fabric". I don't. But it keeps her happy and that is important. Give each other space to do what makes them happy (as long as it doesn't involve violating those vows you exchanged at the wedding). You'll find plenty of common ground, as well. Nurture that, as well. That's what keeps you together as a couple.

I've probably rambled on long enough. Again, congratulations on the wedding and I wish you a long and happy marriage.
 
When we got married there was no “my money” issue for either of us. Were were both fresh out of college and neither of us had a nickel. And if you count student loans, we were very much negative in the nickel department. We saved up heavily for the wedding, then went from there. So, pretty much from day one, everything was “our” money.

Something else to consider: spread that attitude to other places, too. There isn’t a “you” (singular) now, there’s a new “you” (plural), both with successes and challenges. Enjoy that partnership, it’s been a blessing to us for 36 years.
 
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When we got married there was no “my money” issue for either of us. Were were both fresh out of college and neither if us had a nickel. And if you count student loans, we were very much negative in the nickel department. We saved up heavily for the wedding, then went from there. So, pretty much from day one, everything was “our” money.

Something else to consider: spread that attitude to other places, too. There isn’t a “you” (singular) now, there’s a new “you” (plural), both with successes and challenges. Enjoy that partnership, it’s been a blessing to us for 36 years.
Oof I remember those days. Doing the budget after we moved in to our first house and discovering we were spending more than we made. The first annual net worth statement I did for the bank when I started farming was negative. We didn't argue over spending because it took everything we both made to keep food on the table & the heat on.

It gets better. Then you'll fondly remember those simpler times.
 
The groom is a Dave Ramsey fan, if that tells you anything.

I never learned of Dave Ramsey until later in life, but I kinda fell on some of his ideas naturally. When we got married, my wife had a $1200 balance on her student loan, and writing the monthly $26 check was annoying. So, I took whatever money was left over each month and pounded that out in two months. Then I looked at the lesser of the two car loans, and said what the hell, let's pound that out. That lead to early payoff of the more expensive car loan and ultimately paying off the 15yr mortgage in 7yrs, saving us a ton in interest. To tie it all up, that early payoff plus having paid off all of the other loans allowed us to both save for the next home and for me to start in aviation.
 
I never learned of Dave Ramsey until later in life, but I kinda fell on some of his ideas naturally. When we got married, my wife had a $1200 balance on her student loands, and writing the monthly $26 check was annoying. So, I took whatever money was left over each month and pounded that out in two months. Then I looked at the lesser of the two car loans, and said what the hell, let's pound that out. That lead to early payoff of the more expensive car loan and ultimately paying off the 15yr mortgage in 7yrs, saving us a ton in interest. To tie it all up, that early payoff plus having paid off all of the other loans allowed us to both save for the next home and for me to start in aviation.
Just think if you had written a book....
 
Ha! How awesome. You guys should get in touch with Greg Mink and let him know how he indirectly got you guys married.
 
The promised pictures are here at last! Our photographer sent these to us as a "sneak peek" since it'll be a little bit until she can get the rest of them edited. @NealRomeoGolf - I know you were waiting for these! ;)

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I think there is a 4th phase, though, and I dread it. It’s when “until death do us part” becomes reality. I’ve watched my in-laws and my mom go through it and it’s agony. Especially when there are months or more of failing health and the impending loss of your spouse is weighing on you day after day.

Yes, it is. I've been through that phase in years 5-13 of a 13-year marriage.
 
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