How do you and your spouse resolve "small" money disputes?

[BeatingtheOdds]

I'm really curious to get opinions here about how you and your spouse resolve "small" money disputes. I'm obviously not talking about things like buying a new home/car or making large purchases....just little things that tend to pop up in life. For example, you get some extra cash from a yard sale, and DH wants to put it towards vacation fund and you feel the money needs to go towards new clothes for the kids for fall ( not a real example in my life ,I'm just thinking things like this). Or, your spouse wants to spend more money per week "eating out" than you do because you feel the money would be better off in savings.

So, how does it work in your family? Does someone have the "final say" ? Where and how do you find the compromise?

 

[worm761]

I'm really curious to get opinions here about how you and your spouse resolve "small" money disputes. I'm obviously not talking about things like buying a new home/car or making large purchases....just little things that tend to pop up in life. For example, you get some extra cash from a yard sale, and DH wants to put it towards vacation fund and you feel the money needs to go towards new clothes for the kids for fall ( not a real example in my life ,I'm just thinking things like this). Or, your spouse wants to spend more money per week "eating out" than you do because you feel the money would be better off in savings.

So, how does it work in your family? Does someone have the "final say" ? Where and how do you find the compromise?

No one has a final say or it would not be an equal partnership. We compromise. In your examples, I would ask DH why he thought the money should go to vacation fund and how he expected to pay for fall clothes. From there we find a place where we are both happy.

 

[Pigeon]

I've been married over 30 years and I can't think of such a dispute.

In your garage sale scenario, the person who did the most work on the garage sale would decide how to spend the money. If one of us was griping about the money we spent eating out, the griper would be free to do more cooking or shut up about it.

Maybe I'm just lucky in that dh and I are on the same page about the big stuff and tend not to sweat the small stuff.

 

[Elleshoodat]

I'm really curious to get opinions here about how you and your spouse resolve "small" money disputes. I'm obviously not talking about things like buying a new home/car or making large purchases....just little things that tend to pop up in life. For example, you get some extra cash from a yard sale, and DH wants to put it towards vacation fund and you feel the money needs to go towards new clothes for the kids for fall ( not a real example in my life ,I'm just thinking things like this). Or, your spouse wants to spend more money per week "eating out" than you do because you feel the money would be better off in savings.

So, how does it work in your family? Does someone have the "final say" ? Where and how do you find the compromise?

Citing the two examples you gave...

If/when we have a yard sale, we typically talk in advance about what to do with the money we make. Usually "found money" like that goes toward our vacation fund.

We have a predetermined budget for eating out (we have a predetermined budget for everything). Once we've "eaten" our way through that budget for the month, we don't eat out anymore.

No one gets the final say. We communicate openly about our finances, whether that's changes to our monthly budget or what to do with a tax return or profit sharing.

 

[eliza61]

I'm really curious to get opinions here about how you and your spouse resolve "small" money disputes. I'm obviously not talking about things like buying a new home/car or making large purchases....just little things that tend to pop up in life. For example, you get some extra cash from a yard sale, and DH wants to put it towards vacation fund and you feel the money needs to go towards new clothes for the kids for fall ( not a real example in my life ,I'm just thinking things like this). Or, your spouse wants to spend more money per week "eating out" than you do because you feel the money would be better off in savings.

So, how does it work in your family? Does someone have the "final say" ? Where and how do you find the compromise?

LOL. my dh and I were the opposite.

A yard sale is going to generate what? an extra 400 bucks. I'm definitely not going to sweat the small stuff. same with eating out, generally for us we're talking pizza or fast food. 50 bucks. Nope, definitely not going to get bent out of shape on that one.

Talk to me when your dh wants to take out a 300K small business loan or mortgage the house to start a new business Now that's the type of money disputes dh and I use to have. LOL

 

[purpledisneyprncess]

We communicate and also bend and give a little with each other. For example: If I feel adamant about saving the yard sale $ but he wants to spend it on dinner, I will bend/give and next time whether it's getting extra $ for over time etc, we will save it for our vacation fund or general savings account.

It has not always been that easy and we did bicker over finances but we've learned to compromise. I'm sure DH will tell you that I manage/control the finances and I have the last say.. LOL But then again there have been times where I want to go out to eat and he'll say "Lets order in it's cheaper" and I agree with him. We both "help" each other to make smart financial decisions.

 

[verleniahall]

I've been married for 5 years, and we have never had a dispute abotu finances.

BUT citin gyour examples, this is how it would work in our home

Garage Sale:
Before hand, we would decide where the money was going to go. Normally, we treat ourselves to a dinner from McD's or something quick, and the rest will go either into a gas gift card or into our vacation savings.

As For the Eating Out, we put everything we d oin the month onto a calendar on ou rlaptop, and we pick two day s(one a week) that are SUPER busy and we only eat out those two nights. Other busy nights will be a crock pot dinner or cold cuts. Otherwise, either the DH or I cook.

 

[tvguy]

I've been married over 30 years and I can't think of such a dispute.

In your garage sale scenario, the person who did the most work on the garage sale would decide how to spend the money. If one of us was griping about the money we spent eating out, the griper would be free to do more cooking or shut up about it.

Maybe I'm just lucky in that dh and I are on the same page about the big stuff and tend not to sweat the small stuff.

Married 31 years, and I can't think of such a dispute either.

Now, we have had "discussions" about DW remembering to write in the amount when she uses the Debit card.........she fails to understand that when a merchant says they are running it as a "charge" that is the same on our end as if they run it as a debit card.

 

[happyleesh]

it goes to the needs (clothes) vs. wants (vacation) first, but I am a spender and DH is a saver, so I usually default to him if it's really an issue as A. it stresses him out and B. He's usually right....don't tell him I said that though

 

[wiigirl]

I really can't think of any either....maybe discussions...but those discussions are usually short.

 

[AndreaDM]

I tell DH what we're doing with the money and he says ok! No, it's not that I'm controlling, he just knows I'll take care of necessary expenses first and we're both on the same page than most excess goes to travel.

 

[RitaE]

I win.

I was ready to put the kids into Private School about a year before he saw the need. In that case we waited a year and then he came to my way of thinking about it. Recently, he wants to gut our kitchen and improve it much more than I do. It really isn't a disagreement though, just more of a negotiation on which house projects should be tackled first.

We've never really fought over things like clothes and shoes or eating out. I have a budget for it and we do it. Sometimes we'll hit the last week of the month and he'll want to go out and I'll say "We've used our budget up" but otherwise, it just never comes up.

 

[stayhomemom77]

I was wracking my brain to give a real example of something like this so I could accurately talk about it. The only thing I could think of was that one year, our income tax refund was $300 more than we thought it was going to be. The money had been allocated to pay for something (I forget what) but then we had the extra money (about $350 total) left over afterwards.

He wanted to splurge with it (as we had no other debt and money in the bank) but I wanted to add it to our savings.

After a week of debating back and forth, we split it. We "blew" $150 of it on a date night out and then tucked the remaining $200 away in the savings account.

I pay all the bills and handle all the day to day finances so DH pretty much lets me do as I want. We talk about the big stuff and I tell him when the budget deviates from the norm but usually he's comfortable leaving the small things up to me. We each take $100 a month in spending money/pocket money and that usually covers our wants and we budget some dining out/date night money/family fun money each month and stay within those dollar amounts. As long as we have money in the vacation fund, emergency fund and savings account...he's good!

 

[stsomewhere]

I tell DH what we're doing with the money and he says ok! No, it's not that I'm controlling, he just knows I'll take care of necessary expenses first and we're both on the same page than most excess goes to travel.

Same here.

 

[powellrj]

We have been married 35 years and we have never had any of these discussions either. If we have a garage sale, I pretty much do what I want with the money. I pretty much always do what I want with the money because I have never gone crazy with found or extra money.

My DD needed a different car this week because she wrecked hers and she and I went out and bought one on saturday without DH. I am not sure if he has even seen it yet between her work/school/golf schedule and his work schedule. Money is just one thing we have never fought over. We have never had much extra, but what we do have we both spend wisely.

Eating out would never even come up as something we would discuss. If I want to eat out, I do and the same for him and if we both eat out together, we are on the same page about where we go.

 

[mrsabbott]

I am more of the saver in the family.. I used to be a spender years ago but learned my lesson! DH is the spender, although he's finally starting to come around!

Hubs will nickel and dime our money away without realizing it. I'll never forget an argument we had in the early years! We barely squeeked by most months and it seemed like we would never get ahead. Hubs said he couldn't understand where all our money was going and HE certainly wasn't spending it, so it must be me. He only spent a few dollars occasionally.. So, I got 3 months worth of statements and highlighted all of his small expenditures that were only a "few dollars" each. They added up to well over $500!! He was only spending maybe $8 or $10 but to do it several times a week just adds up over time faster then you would think!

So, in our instance, I had to actually show him PROOF! He had to see the numbers in order to get it! Well, temporarily at least!

We still kinda have that problem. We put money in savings and it will slowly dwindle away and he just can't figure out where it all goes.. He's gotten better though and wants to have a separate savings account that isn't easily accessible so it won't dwindle away. He's even starting to talk about getting debt free again!

I'm also the one who pays all the bills.. whenever Hubs gets irritable at our lack of funds and not understanding where our money goes.. I show him. Or let him take a stab at stretching out the dollars and paying everything for a month. He's usually ready to hand it back over to me and does better for awhile.

As for arguing over where money should go (school clothes or vacation) that is a tough one. Things he sees as important (Indy 500 tickets) aren't as important to me.. We try to compromise but there have been a few times where he's ended up in the doghouse!

 

[beck02]

We have seperate banking accounts. This only works because we both make about the same amount of money. We would fund whatever we were most interested in.... For instance, I pay extra towards the house, he pays extra towards car payment & eating out. It's not the best solution--as we don't always act as a team, but there's no arguements, and it works for us. His money is his, mine is mine, AFTER all our minimum needs are met (food, utilities, daycare, house & car payments).

For the exact example used--the garage sale--it would be whoever did the most work for it (probably me!). The other could suggest ways of using the money, but ultimately, it would be that person's decision.

If we truly have shared money--like our spare change piggy bank, it goes to our daughter's bank account. (this was agreed to beforehand). Or tax refund--we either split it or it would go towards a vacation or house repair, etc.

 

[Maggie Lizer]

I do not recall every having a dispute or disagreement over a small amount of money, but if a yard sale made more than $50, I'd eat my shoes b/c no one comes to yard sales in my neighborhood. We don't have a separate budget for vacation versus clothing versus food, etc., so it would just go into the bank. If it was only like $15, we'd probably blow it on a fast food lunch out because what the heck, really, when it is such a small amount.

 

[Marionnette]

I cannot imagine putting money in the bank for vacation if my kids needed clothes. However, our budget was never so tight that I needed the profits from a yard sale in order to outfit the kids for school. It has also never been so restrictive that we had to discuss whether a few extra dollars could be spared for eating out.

OTOH, large purchases are never made without the two of us coming to an agreement. Sometimes I get my way. Sometimes he gets his way. But more often than not, we tend to compromise.

 

[2disneyboys]

I typed this really long answer that had way more info then you prob cared to read, , so deleted it & heres my short answer.

We don't fight about money (anymore - honestly it's been over 5 years since we have had an argument about ANY amount of money)

Our family budget is set so that all found money (bonus,gifts,$ from selling items) goes first to any needs (shelter,food,gas, needed clothing) and then anything left goes to our entertainment fund.

and if for some reason we couldnt agree, our plan is to split it 50/50 and each do what they want with thier 50%. Although, we havn't had to do this at all yet.