‘We Can’t Even Stop Fighting At Christmas’
“We had the worst Christmas ever,” says Tracy, 40, the mother of two preschoolers and part-time pediatric nurse. “I bought Mike two beautiful designer shirts and he flipped out because he thought I spent too much money. So naturally that triggered another of our colossal arguments over finances.”
Mike and Tracy have been married for four years, and though she’s tried to make it work for the sake of the boys, she doesn’t think she can and doesn’t want to go on pretending. While these two quarrel about anything and everything, their most heated arguments are over money. “Mike is insulted because I don’t want to pool our finances,” Tracy explains, “but I’m convinced that if we do, the things that are important to me would go way down on the priority list.”
She has past experience to prove her correct: After they married, Tracy assumed they’d use some of their wedding gift money to pay off her credit card and IRS debts. Without asking her, Mike put that money down on a house. Even now, Tracy says, Mike nickel-and-dimes her to death: “We have no real system for paying for things. I usually take care of the household expenses - food, clothes, the boys’ gym classes - and Mike pays for the mortgage and the car.”
But it’s never smooth, she says, and she always feels she has to beg him for money.
Mike, 38, who owns a kitchen design business, isn’t any happier: “If she’s so miserable, let her get a divorce,” he snaps. “I don’t know if I want to stay married, either.” Mike agrees that their biggest problem is money management, but, he claims, it’s all Tracy’s fault. “I’ve been trying for years to get her to draw up a simple budget and she refuses.”
Besides, there’s a very good reason he takes control of their finances: “If I didn’t, we’d have nothing. Tracy uses credit cards for everything and worries about paying for things later. She thinks that when I want to save for retirement or the kids’ college education, I’m pinching pennies.”
Mike has no patience for Tracy’s ridiculous notions about money. “What’s wrong with pooling our finances? That’s what married people do,” he says with exasperation. He thinks paying for a full-time baby-sitter when his wife works only part-time is absurd. “Why should she have it both ways? ” he wants to know.
Top four money mistakes
“This couple’s relationship was so soured by power struggles over money that they lost sight of the fact that they shared many of the same goals,” says Jane Greer, a marriage counselor in New York City and Douglaston, N.Y. If money is an emotionally charged issue in your house, chances are you’re making at least one of the following mistakes:
1. You haven’t set financial goals. Sit down and make individual lists of your future goals. Dream a little: Would you love to travel? Buy a cabin in the mountains? After you’ve compiled your wish lists, make a second list of goals that can reasonably be attained in a five-year period. Are any of your goals in sync? If not, can you negotiate so they are?
2. You haven’t hammered out a realistic budget. Tracy was particularly negligent in this area. Keeping a tab of everything she spent for several weeks, down to the penny, gave her the true picture she needed to discuss money with Mike. Once he knew that the basics were covered, he felt more comfortable giving Tracy the freedom to buy what she wants, within reason of course.
3. You have a poor credit rating or none at all. As a single woman, Tracy’s credit had been abysmal. Using credit cards as freely as she did was one of the problems, since it can create the illusion of an unlimited supply of money. She had to clear up that record by forcing herself to pay cash and reserving credit cards for emergencies and writing checks only to pay bills.
Women who have no credit need to establish some for themselves. The simplest way to do this is by opening an individual savings or checking account in your own name.
4. Your financial records and receipts are haphazardly filed, and you have no idea where. Appoint one person to do the monthly bookkeeping (or rotate each month). Keep receipts, stubs and credit card statements in one place. Do the same with other important financial records such as insurance and mortgage papers.