My husband and I spent the first few years of our marriage using seperate bank accounts and spending as we did when we were single. Every month each of our paychecks went into our respective accounts and we found that when it came time to pay the bills, we had to divide them up based on who had enough money left to cover them. It was paycheck-to-paycheck living all the way. Unfortunately we found ourselves dipping into the little savings we had to cover our mortgage and other bills. As the months went on, our savings was getting smaller and smaller. Something had to be done.

We decided to open a joint account and put all of our money in together. This worked great for the first month but then we found that each of us would spend money with our ATM cards without the other knowing and then the bills came and we were in trouble again - worse than before. We needed a better plan or we would always be struggling.

Our new plan needed to protect our money from our bad spending habits. Our first task was to figure out how much we spend and on what each month. When we looked at how much was wasted on food and drinks out - for each of us individually and in total - we were shocked. I couldn't believe that I spent more than my husband - and he is not letting me forget it. :-)

Our next step was to build a budget for each of us for the month. Gas, dry cleaning, a smaller amount for food and drinks, and general spending for each of us for the month. We believe in the idea of paying oursleves first so budgeting our spending before anything else seemed like a good idea. Then we listed our monthly bills, taking into account seasonality of utilities, etc. Unfortunately when we added it up, we were over our income by about 25%. Obviously there are some things we just can't cut like the mortgage, utilities, etc. But there are some creative ways to work credit cards and other interest accounts.

On my next post...Until next time. :-)