For the last decade or so, my SO and I have been more or less dividing our expenses, and Venmo/ PayPal-ing the other as needed (rent, etc).

I know a lot of couples use a shared account that they both contribute to via direct deposit. How many of you do this? Any drawbacks or other options I haven’t mentioned?

  • LemoineFairclough
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    6 days ago

    There was an interesting experiment that suggests that couples who have similar objectives regarding money are fine with using a joint account (or even using only one spouse’s account rather than using two individual accounts), but people who have a spouse who has a very different attitude towards money will avoid using a joint account (and will avoid depositing money to their spouse’s individual account) even if their individual account has a lower interest rate.

    More information is at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p5ro4x1r16Q&list=PLUl4u3cNGP620R91K4KP_fO4l3eeK5lDn&index=19&t=3707s

    In general, I think that asking your spouse to use a joint account for income and a joint account for expenses is a good idea since it provides transparency: that gives both partners a record of what the income of the partnership was, and makes it equally easy for both partners to check whether bills have been paid. As long as that happens, it’s probably okay if you want to split up the income to individual accounts when the money isn’t needed to pay bills and later redirect it to the account(s) used to pay bills when it’s needed.