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Money After Marriage
What You Can Do to Plan for
Your Financial Future
Your Financial Future
By Megan L. Fowler
Ask each other questions like, "When do we want to retire? What sort of home do we want to own and how should it be decorated? How should we budget and spend?" says Sean O'Neill, a certified financial planner (CFP) in Highlands Ranch, Colo. "Be aware of each other's financial health and spending habits."
Knuckey offers 3 "rules for money" couples should live by to help relieve the tension attached to finances: "One: Stay out of debt as much as possible. Two: Try to live on 80 percent of your income and put the other 20 percent toward retirement and major goals. And three: Allow each other some fun money that does not need to be accounted for."
While a number of things in your life will change after marriage, like your name, your social security number and the number of times your mother will beg for grandkids, there are some things you should hold on to.
Keep at least one credit card in your own name, says Tracy Stewart, a CFP in College Station, Texas. This will help maintain your personal credit history. "If she has investments before she marries, she needs to leave them in a separate account with only her name on the title of the account," she says. "If she has the home before she marries, she should keep the title in her own name." Again this will help maintain credit and leave you better suited should something happen later.
In addition to everyday spending and financial habits, couples should discuss their income taxes and get an estimate of what their income tax expense will be for the year they get married.
