When it comes to having a successful relationship, you have to be on the same page about a LOT of things. Unfortunately, personal finance is an area that many couples struggle with. A common question we see is, “What should I do if my partner won’t budget?”
The knee-jerk response is, “Leave them”. Thank God Dannie decided to kick me into shape instead of kicking me to the curb. I wasn’t on board with managing our money early on in our marriage but that has all changed.
“My Partner Won’t Budget. What Should I Do?”
The first step to finding a solution to this problem is realizing that there is a problem to begin with. I had no idea that I had poor money habits. In fact, I thought that having $0 leftover at the end of the month was fine as long as you didn’t overdraft. 🤷🏽♂️
*Smh*
Financial problems plague thousands of couples and we were well on our way to becoming one of them. Luckily, Dannie brought it to my attention before it even got to that point.
Communicate. Communicate. Communicate!
Whether you’re married or dating, communication is imperative to a successful relationship. But, you have to remember that the only way your partner can know if you think something is wrong, is if you tell them.
Contrary to popular belief, husbands STILL haven’t learned how to read minds.
Seriously, we haven’t…
Dannie has never been one to hold her tongue and that is something I have always loved. I’d much rather hear that we have a problem to fix rather than she has a problem to leave.
Make It About “We”, Not “Me”
If you’ve never talked about money with your partner before, you should know that things could spiral out of control. Personal finance is exactly that, personal. When couples talk about money it can often bring up an vast array of emotions.
It can be helpful to phrase things in a way that indicates that it is a “we” problem and not a “me” problem. As a couple, you’re a team, and your partner needs to understand that they aren’t alone.
Dannie took the approach of, “let me show you how we can fix this”. She could have just as easily taken the approach of, “You need to get your sh*t together and let me know when you’re done..”
That would have been ineffective and the problems would have only gotten worse.
Make A Plan
The first thing we did after talking about the problem at hand was figuring out what to do next. We gathered our financial information together and figured out exactly where we were. After that was done, we started making a plan of how we were going to get where we WANTED to be.
Creating a budget was the cornerstone of our solution. We realized that if you don’t focus on your money and tell it where to go, it will just go wherever it wants.
And that’s usually into the hands of other people.
We devised a plan and a schedule to check back in on our progress each month. This helped me stick to the task at hand long enough to make following the budget a habit.
Make It Fun
Depending on your partner, they may need an extra nudge to keep them motivated during this journey. This was definitely important for me so we did two things:
- Made the journey a game
- Left room for fun
We chose to use a variation of the debt snowball method to pay off most of our debts. I was able to stay motivated while we attacked our debt because I could actually SEE the progress we were making.
Each time we crossed a debt off of our list, that was another hurdle we had cleared. I gained more self-control over my spending because I wanted to see the next debt fall off of our list. This kept the journey exciting because of the emotional effect that paying off our debt had on me.
Also, we budgeted a small amount for leisure and allowance each month. Yes I know, some people believe that a “$0-Based Budget” should leave NO room for fun. That’s fine and all, but that type of budget was NOT going to work for me. It’s important to remember that you’ve got to make decisions that are right for you. Avoid following one-size-fits-all advice. Making our own plan is a huge part of the reason of why we were able to pay off $130,912 worth of debt and become debt free!
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In my experience, I was the definition of the partner that won’t budget. Some of the things that we did might not work for everyone though. Regardless of that fact, I wanted to share this because it might still be helpful to someone else.
— Dj