How to Manage Personal Finances and Not Ruin Your Marriage

Money troubles are one of the top causes of divorce. You have to work as a team with your spouse or partner to manage the budget and plan for the future. This may cause bitter arguments, which results in couples not talking about anything – which can have disastrous consequences. But money doesn't have to ruin a relationship with your spouse or partner...by working as a team, being honest and being flexible, I'd venture to say it can even bring you closer. But it takes commitment and a long-term view. 

Finances have been a continual pressure point in our house and some years were downright miserable. It's taken years for my husband and I to come up with a workable plan, and it's always a work in progress. Yet our goals are the same: save, invest, retire before we are too old to travel and sock away money every month for simple pleasures like dinners out and movies with the kids.

Here are some Do’s and Don’ts to maintain a healthy and profitable financial relationship with your spouse:

DO

Have joint family bank accounts that both spouses can access and view at any time. This builds trust and makes it easier to manage your money.

DON’T

Hide purchases through cash spending or your own secret credit card: hello, that's lying. If you must hide a purchase, you probably shouldn't be making it at all.

DO

Track everything through your online account and minimize cash spending. This helps you know exactly where the money is going, which is key to effective budget management and planning.

DON’T

Nitpick about small things like Starbucks latte’s and beers with the guys. Give each other a little wiggle room.

DO

Manage your money as if it were a business..because it is! Use some type of accounting software such as Quicken or a personal finance site such as Mint.com to track budgets, expenses, and assets. Set regular, weekly meetings with your spouse/partner to discuss your family's income, budget and spending patterns historically and looking forward. The more you communicate, the less chance for overspending and arguing.

DON’T

Give up… If your grocery budget is consistently high like many families today, keep getting creative. There's always room for a new strategy – such as eating more vegetarian foods or creating basic dinners that cost less but are still healthy or shopping less at the organic grocer. Continually review large categories such as insurance and utilities: can you get a better deal by shopping around or calling your providers for a new quote? Probably.

DO

Set money aside for what's important but not "essential" to live: health club memberships, massage, outings with friends or enrichment classes. Prioritize these activities and then determine how your budget will accommodate. You may need to spend less on something else, like clothing. If there is nothing set aside for Fun, you'll both get discouraged and possibly engage in impulse spending to make yourself feel better.

DON'T

Take your kids to Target or Walmart if there's nothing in it for them...because believe me, they'll find something essential you must purchase for them, now. If they must tag along, set the ground rules before getting out of the car and stick to them once inside the store.

DO

Review all assets, investments and savings accounts at least once yearly to evaluate what's working and what's not. Do the same for your expenses. It's enlightening (and sometimes shocking) to understand what were the top categories for spending over 12 months, and this also helps set goals for the next year.

DON'T

Forget to pat yourself on the back for saving more or reducing costs in key areas. It's tough for families to save these days, given the high cost of living, job and career volatility, higher insurance and medical costs, requisite personal technology upgrades, tuition increases, and the pressures of parenting that seem to require more activities, tutoring and enrichment than ever before to prepare your kids for the real world. This is not your parent's world, so make sure not to set the bar unrealistically high for saving and budgeting.

The Big Bummer of a Mobile Society

My parents met at the University of Wisconsin at Madison in 1953. After my dad graduated, they moved to Boston where he attended MIT. Finally, after getting his doctorate, they moved to Texas. They lived in Dallas until their oldest kid, my brother, was 16. In 1977, they moved to the Denver area for my dad to take a job with the Colorado School of Mines and they have been living there ever since.

Their third and final cross-country move in a marriage of now 58 years was voluntary.  They wanted to live in the Rockies and my dad wanted to work in academia. After a few years of teaching, he founded a company with a friend. That was his last major life change, and it was a wise move, since later, the company was bought out by a much larger corporation in Houston. The kind owners allowed my dad to work from Denver.

Conversely, many of us now in the workforce, whether we are 22 or 62, feel rather like feathers in the wind. I completed my undergraduate studies at UCSB in Santa Barbara and then moved home to Colorado to save money for a year. Next up: Washington DC for my graduate degree. Following completion of this milestone, I moved back to Colorado and worked in Denver for four years, at two different companies. The magazine I was working for was purchased and therefore required me to move to Minneapolis. After not quite two years in that city, I began dating my future husband and quickly found a job in San Francisco to live near him.

As the economy began to sputter in 2000, life became quite chaotic for us. Over the course of the next nine years, due to job losses and job gains, we moved from San Francisco to Boulder, back to the Bay Area, to Seattle and then again back to the Bay Area. Finally, we moved voluntarily back to Colorado to bring our two young daughters closer to our extended family.

We've been in the Denver area now for three and half years and I think we're here to stay, but who knows? Meantime, all of these moves since the year I turned 18 have resulted in friends scattered across the country and even the globe. My best friends do not live in my current hometown. Like most people in my age bracket whom are working with kids, I don't have the money to visit my besties on both coasts every year.

The mobile madness of our society means that having close, connected friendships living nearby is no longer a given. We may have casual acquaintances from the kids’ school, the gym or church, but these aren't the kind of friendships we had in college or when we were first getting started on our careers. They aren't the ones you'll tell about your marriage or money troubles, your insecurities about the future or how your daughter is growing up too fast and it's killing you inside.

Nine months ago we moved to a new neighborhood. We know very few of her neighbors, as nice as they seem from afar. Wrapped up in our busy lives, socializing is rare beyond the requisite wave from the car. I keep thinking that I will organize a neighborhood party of some sort, but it hasn't happened. Maybe I worry about being burned again.

In our last neighborhood, my husband and I tried valiantly to befriend our neighbors. We organized cookie parties for the kids and held wine tastings. The neighbors were perfectly pleasant and mostly friendly, yet real friendships never developed. I suppose they weren’t interested or simply didn't have time to expand their circles beyond the occasional Friday night beer at the mailbox. We felt isolated and frustrated, missing the close-knit group of friends from our former life in California when the kids were tiny and playgroups were the tonic for raising toddlers.

I can't help but think that our highly mobile society is a bad sign for the notion of community and the prospects of long-term, nurturing friendships. As my good college friend Michelle says:

“It’s not possible, as my grandparents did, to have all of your closest friends and family swing by on a Sunday afternoon for pot roast, pasta and wine. It will never happen. It’s really sad.”

So, we rely on Skype, e-mail and texting to develop community. Somehow, it doesn't quite compare to my memories of early childhood on Waldorf Drive in Dallas. Nearly every single family living on that long street knew each other well. There were frequent block parties and family dinners. Children ran free between houses. Mothers knocked on each other’s back doors to exchange recipes and talk about their kids.

True, technology helps us stay in touch with our far-flung friends and family like never before. But I miss the irreplaceable face time with my closest pals, which Facebook will never replicate.