Let's share

1 - DH's salary goes for
- household expenses
- mortgage.
2 - my salary is for
- savings
- any extra towards mortgage
- savings for college (Madison will start before training is over!),
- and retirement.

We only have mortgage debt and want to pay it off quickly. DH flipped when he saw how much we would pay in interest. He threatened to buy an airstream and have us live in that! Ha. DH is a little nutty about money. We call him "Jonathan Greenspan".

Okay, should I be getting the impression that when we buy our house this winter ( in the middle of his first year in Med school) that it should be in my name, along with the utilites and other stuff?

[Sheherezade]

We haven't done this either -- we are probably going to set up a trust with our money and house in it. I think that gives you lawsuit protection as well, but I am honestly not sure. (I just know what Suze Orman has told me! ) I think someone here set up a trust -- was it Heidi? What costs are involved in that? Does putting the house in the spouse's name protect it? How does that differ (good and bad) from a trust?

[SuzySunshine]

I'm not sure since we're still in training but we haven't taken things out of my DH's name...yet. We most likely will after training but there is protection through med school and residency if I understand things correctly.

I'd be interested to hear what anyone finds out about this. I would agree that you are probably ok during med school and residency.
A trust sounds like an interesting option. I think a possible problem with having it all in one persons name could be estate taxes (if those come back and depending on how much you have in one persons name).

[Meenah]

My initial reason for putting the house in my name only was so that if anything happened to DH his ex- wife couldn't say half my house belonged to her kids. The house was purchased with the sale of my house before we got married., he did not have a dime. (I wouldn't get married until after the closing so it would be a premarital asset!). My DH was fine with all of this. Now he is negitiating with the IRS and it is a good thing house is in my name and we file separate tax returns. (Can't tell you how ugly the divorce was) TMI ?
Luanne

That does sound ugly! I hope he is getting to the tail end of it.

[Cumberland]

Shot term: spend less than what we earn each month

Long Term: become a real estate tycoon and live off of our numerous rental properties and real estate investments

Long Term: become a real estate tycoon and live off of our numerous rental properties and real estate investments

You go!

I think it's a good idea to put the house in your name only instead of your spouse's in case of a lawsuit, but depending on what state you live in it might not be necessary. In NC, our house can not be taken away from us if we lose a lawsuit. Neither can our 401ks and certain other retirement accounts. For extra protection we are looking into forming an LLC. The cost of doing this is $2500, but it may vary from state to state.

I've heard that it's also good to set up a trust fund for the kiddoes because when we die that money will not have to go through probate (but I could be mistaken). This reminds me that we really need to meet with our financial planner again to get all of these things ironed out.

Let me just clarify on the probate thing from recent experience. Even with a will and trust and all that, you still have to go to probate court but it is much, much easier than without those documents. Sort of a fast-track file papers get a letter from a judge versus a long drawn out process. For us, the easier with a will route looks like it will take 4-6 months or so.

[Rapunzel]

Short term goals (within the next year or two):

1) Improve our credit (it's bad from some baaaad mistakes made during the medical school timeperiod) by keeping all bills uptodate and not accruing any credit debt (we've only got one that has anything on it right now).

2) Pay off the one credit balance we currently have

3) Open a savings account and have a bit of money in it (but, it will only be a bit at the rate we're going)

4) Get good disability insurance on dh.

Long term goals (next ten years and beyond):

1) Save and invest like maniacs (goal is to retire with about $5 million).

Jennifer

[Vanquisher]

It wasn't me who set up a trust, sorry! It is something to look into though. We were told that our house could not be put in just my name because dh was the one getting the loan based on his income. Is that wrong? I wasn't too worried about it for residency, but our next house, I want in my name only.

[DCJenn]

We have everything in both names but at this point there's not too much to worry about. That's why we have the Army JAG. (Right Kelly?!)

Actually, it's my credit that's carried us through. My dear old dad drilled it in to our heads that even if all you could do was pay 5 bucks on a debt, pay it. And of course he then would explain all about the evils of credit- not that I listened to that one, unfortunately.

Once we're out of the Army and he's practicing as a civilian in between making beer and training for the IronMan....we'll see.

Jenn

PS- just opened our 529 for the little dude, had to wait for his social security number to arrive.

Let me just clarify on the probate thing from recent experience. Even with a will and trust and all that, you still have to go to probate court but it is much, much easier than without those documents. Sort of a fast-track file papers get a letter from a judge versus a long drawn out process. For us, the easier with a will route looks like it will take 4-6 months or so.

Just read an article about this sort of thing and what I said isn't entirely correct. Apparently, planned for properly, you can completely avoid probate. I should have known, as the phrase "planned for properly" and my in-laws are something like polar opposites. I'm going to have to find out more about this.
http://www.marketwatch.com/news/story.a ... 50A8B74%7D