I also don’t believe in combining finances EVER…not even if you’re married. Nobody thinks their husband or wife will screw them over, but it happens. If you have a joint credit card, one person can rack up serious debt and then take off. The other person is left having to pay it off. I don’t think that is the case if the card is only in one person’s name, although I may be wrong.
.-= veganprimate ´s last blog ..I’m doing it =-.

Rationalization of 50/50 doesn’t make any sense in terms of budgeting. If one earner is making 80k a year and the other is making 30k a year, splitting expenses is ridiculously in favor of the top earner. I’ve watched couples tear themselves apart playing the 50/50 rule and it never seems to end well.

In my case, I am the low earner and my wife is the bread winner. Although that wasn’t always the case. Ten years ago it was the opposite, she’s just being nice to me now and keeping me around because I cook, clean and fix things.

What we ended up doing was using my salary initially to bully the mortgage to zero quickly and save what she was making. To have this work in our situation, my awesome wife and I understand we are financial partners, my money isn’t mine and her money isn’t her’s. We pool our resources and direct it. It worked out so well, the house is paid for, she got to head back to school and become a nurse. I hung up my spurs as an Engineer after the house was paid off and she finished school. Now do handy man jobs and day trade when it’s quiet in the winter. I also make sure she and the kids come home to a nice clean house and a decent meal.

So no, 50/50 doesn’t work primarily because it’s a short term solution and still assumes people are living separately while living together. The only long term solution is to make sure you understand your partner is your equal in friendship and use whatever financial solutions at that time to make both your lives better over the long haul. Start cutting the household kitty down the middle and it’s asking for trouble.

I also like the way you factor in housework! When we first moved in together my husband wanted to help me with house work, he really did. He just was woefully unprepared to do it. So at first, it was more work for me to teach him than for me to just do it myself. . .in time, he got better, but PHEW! It was a lot of work at first. At the time, we were unmarried, and we’d just moved to a rather high-rent area following his job. I had planned to go back to school . . . if we wanted to stay together, it meant he had to pay the rent for about a year–I paid groceries and utilities and took care a lot of the household chores. It was basically that or break up so that I could go to school in a place with cheaper rent . . .It worked out for us!
.-= Simple in France´s last blog ..Where would you be without debt? =-.

The man I’m living with now pays for all the bills. I pay for groceries and my car note. I also pay our car insurances, every six months. We did combine our finances, but this is because we have son together and we live as a married couple. And the only reason we aren’t married is because I’m in the middle of going to college, and that’s just too much paperwork to deal with. I do almost 100% of the cleaning and cooking, plus I take care of our son. He works third shift and he works hard, so I don’t see that I’m contributing less to the house than he is. I am now unemployed, but that’s something we also figured out. And because I respect the fact that he is working so hard to pay our expenses, I do as much as I can to be responsible with the money and purchase intelligently and not be frivolous.

I do agree with most situations, not combining the finances and going as close as 50/50 as you can is the wisest choice, so that when the split comes, it’s easy and with less fuss.
.-= Tracy @ Sew what…´s last blog ..Food Waste Friday/Menu… =-.