How involved are you in the finances?

[alison]

Perhaps a wee bit indulgent but just think of all the soothing you are doing with the aromatherapy. I have one Mrs. Meyers product and loooooove the way it smells. It makes me want to clean. Can't put a price on that!

Does the stuff actually clean?

In my opinion, yes. But I had sprouts growing in my sink so maybe I'm not the right person to answer this question.

[alison]

Nellie, you're too hard on yourself!

[DCJenn]

To the original question- I took over when we were dating and haven't relinquished it yet, or possibly ever.

To the personal indulgences? Cleaning supplies? OMG. I buy whatever the hell I want to in cleaning supplies because dammit- I'm the one cleaning. It's no savings to clean with crap that smells bad...

Jenn

[houseelf]

I do it all. It allows me to stress, overanalzye, and obsess better.

Kelly

I am the CFO and dh just wants cash for lunch and he uses te debit for books and other things--he is just not good at keeping up with this stuff and I like doing it.

[ides]

It used to be me doing 100% until last year when dh finally took an interest. Since then I do 90% of everything financially related but we review our reports (I create four different reports in excel) that show us what were spending, where it's going, etc. and plan purchases and saving together. I have to say it's nicer with him being more concerned about our money. It keeps him spending less, which I like!

[Vishenka69]

My dh knows nothing. I do everything and handle everything with our finances. Even though he makes the money and his name is on some things, I am the one who deals with them and am the account manager. If he were in charge we would have no water, electricity, or possessions because they would have all been taken.

Same here. DH never knows if we have one dollar or one million. He would have no clue how to do the bills if I were hit by a bus tomorrow.

Same here. I work in Finance, so got this by default. Or rather couldn't bare to watch DH struggling to do anything on time and he couldn't give it up fast enough. He'll complain that he has no say in anything but his ideas run along the lines of "This new attending in the hospital said to put everything in gold," or "This book says to maximize pension plans, so we should dump all our savings into an IRA."

I pay the bills. I tell him what's left over and he tells me how much he wants for the month. I either agree and transfer to his checking or we "compromise" and he gets what NEEDS. I use the rest for household and family related things.

I do it all. DH asks my permission to buy anything.

[mommax3]

I did it all during residency, but DH took it back over when he was done and we haven't looked back. He is much better at it than I, and all I care about is that I know how to do everything in case something happens to him, so I hang out with him once or twice a year when he pays bills (online) to remind myself of that process, and we sit down and talk through the other stuff (savings, debt repayment, short term/long term goals) about 3 or 4 times a year, too.

Sally

[Rapunzel]

I was in charge of everything financial for the first half of our marriage. We walked a thin tightrope those days!

About halfway through residency I just lost the will to keep up with the finances. DH swooped in and took over and has been the main financial person in our marriage ever since.

At this point he pays the bills and I handle groceries and necessities (like shoes for the kids). For large purchases (car, children's curriculum for upcoming year, etc.) we consult each other - with one of us researching to be the "expert" on the subject and the other one generally making it a point to be devil's advocate. :P

Anyway, being only in the first year out of residency (and, with a year of fellowship coming up) we are still not really on an even keel financially, yet. I'd say it will be a couple more years before we have truly caught our breath money-wise after all of this training/school.

[Deebs]

We're at the same place. I always took care of all of the finances until mid-point in residency when I simultaneously lost any memory I ever had and we started having bigger expenses (I started to feel totally overwhelmed and like we'd never catch up). Now that we're almost at the end of the residency road, I'm ready to take them back on, but this seems like a natural point to wait until we move and then I'll take them all back over. I'm way better at money and understand investing better than DH.

DH pays the bills/balances the accounts once a month because I hate doing it, but I make most of the big financial decisions.

[poky]

I've always managed our money (I <3 Quicken and autodeposit and auto-bill-pay). I can't see DH wanting to take it over while he's in school or residency. He looks over my shoulder occasionally to at least get a feel for how much savings we have, and he spends pretty much what he wants to (and usually tells me after the fact, which is OK now, but when things are tighter, could be a problem!). Big stuff's decided together, at least. Two decent salaries up until now has pretty much spoiled us.