My significant other [27/M] and I [25/F] have been together for a bit over 3 years, living together for 2, and have every intention of spending the next forever together.
We’re at a point where we’d like to be more intentional about our finances to ensure we are spending and saving wisely for our future together. Aside from our general concerns about intertwining finances (because what if we break up, right? that’s a whole mess to sort out.)
we want to ensure we’re doing things in the smartest way. We’ve both only ever been in charge of ourselves, and we currently split things 50/50 (for the most part).
We make fairly similar incomes (~$2000/month for him, and ~$2125/month for me). Our monthly bills include:
- Rent: $850/month (all utilities included)
- Internet: $50/month
- Netflix: $17.48/month
- Car Payment (shared): $980/month
- Groceries: ~$500/month (that’s definitely higher than our actual spending, but we’d rather budget for more and have leftover money!)
- Petrol: ~$80/month each ($160/month total)
In addition to bills, we have student loans. He has about $20k left in multiple loans from undergrad. My undergrad is paid off, but I’m in a graduate program that will cost me about thousands each semester for the next 2.5 years. At the moment, the only loan I have is for this semester, $1500, already accruing interest.
We’ve thought of several approaches but aren’t sure where to go next. Our first thought was to live like a single-income family: I take on all the household bills and rent, and rather than stashing his entire paycheck into savings, we use it to pay down loans.
We also need to factor in savings – I’m currently putting about $500/month into a general savings account (out of my $2000 monthly income), and we want to continue this practice and/or increase our savings as much as possible.
How do you all split your incomes, PF? We want to combine finances and split bills in the best way possible. Any and all advice or anecdotes are appreciated!!