Fighting and arguing over money is one of the biggest reasons for breaking up a relationship. The Superjob.ru portal, having interviewed two thousand Russians, revealed that in almost every second pair in Russia there is an acute financial issue. 41% of respondents admitted to disagreements.
How to avoid this? The key to preventing money conflicts is turning dangerous and harmful conversations into productive and useful negotiations. Therefore, in order not to transform money into a mine that undermines your relationship, it is necessary to discuss your common long-term and short-term financial goals.
Personal Capital Michelle Brainstein talks about the three main challenges couples face and how to reconcile their relationships and money..
1. Talk about costs and savings
You can often see couples who talk about their plans for the future, but do not specify how they will pay for these wonderful plans. And, by the way, the coincidence and understanding of the “money style” of partners is a very important part of communication. First of all, these are schemes or rules of savings and expenses. Introducing each other to such things is the first necessary step to build effective short and long term goals..
It is necessary to discuss what “savings” are for each of the couple, and how they usually approach the creation and distribution of the budget. Since savings occur only in the context of expenditures, it is also important to discuss the main spending habits of each other, to determine which part of them is determined by actual needs, not desires.
With a basic understanding of the “money style” of each, it is much easier to create plans and goals, plan their step-by-step implementation, etc..
2. Lump of happiness – a lump of money
Having children brings financial responsibility, which may be higher than you expected. As a rule, when couples talk about adding in a family, they dream about how many children they will have, about how they will look and what names they will bear. And the costs of developing and raising a child in such conversations are less often affected. For example, in Russia, families spent in 2017 only on preparing a child for school about 12.745 rubles. (according to VTsIOM reports).
Couples should expand the topic of talking about children and talking about the costs that they will inevitably have to face. These are fees for kindergarten and school, diapers, various baby supplies and equipment, training in a private or public school, college, providing habits and hobbies, etc..
It is important to remember that there is no concrete and guaranteed successful scenario, and everything may not go according to plan already in the process. Therefore, when planning, you need to think about the future. Discussion at an early stage helps a lot to set priorities and identify basic tasks. In addition, they help to prepare in advance for the possible disagreement of one of the parties, to mutually examine the point of view of others and thereby preserve relations and money.
3. Rent or purchase?
Record and discuss all rental or purchase expenses. Relocating to a new home can make the couple closer to each other, however, the emergence of new types of expenses can reduce this attempt to rapprochement to “no.” As a rule, there are two stages in which couples most often actively discuss where to live and how to pay for it: either in the early stages of a relationship or before retiring.
When deciding to live together, list all the costs associated with renting and buying (real estate or necessary things). It is very important to be frank and honest at this stage about biography facts such as debts and credit history. All this, in any case, comes to the surface during the acquisition or further residence, but preliminary honesty and openness will protect against conflict.
Do not forget that becoming a homeowner or tenant means taking on a lot of additional costs and responsibilities. For example, real estate insurance, mortgage, property taxes. A good rule to maintain a healthy financial situation is to spend no more than 28% of your income on housing and everything related to it.
Any, even small, information about the preferences and requirements of the partner (location, infrastructure, neighbors, etc.) is very important. A compromise depends on its consideration, which, without exaggeration, will make people happy.
Love should be in the heart, not in the wallet, but even the strongest relationships will be checked by financial realities. And premature preparation for financial problems and unification in their face help couples to focus on what is really important – on each other.
Remember that strong relationships and money are built and accumulated not in an instant. You need to work regularly on both.
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