Lack of alignment financially is probably the number one cause of arguments, unpleasantness, and fights in marriage. If you're a saver and your spouse is a spender, you're not going to retain anything. If you're both spenders, you're going to end up bankrupt sooner or later.
Part of frustration in marriages arises when one person puts a lot of hard work into earning and the other person mindlessly spends that money or brings additional expenses due to their desires. Whenever the saver talks about this, the spender asks the saver to chill and YOLO.
It's better to financially budget the expenses, and not have any surprises outside of your control. And plan for having surprises outside of your control by saving a rainy day fund. Save first, spend next. Whatever you save shouldn't be touchable thereafter.
Keeping your money in a bank account that you can't touch won't do. You have to lock your savings somewhere where you can't touch even if you wanted to, at the same time easier to liquidate. Most impulsive spendings come from having easier access to the balance/cash.
So there goes credit card. Credit card may be useful to many. But if you're in middle class, Credit card only depletes your credit. Use a debit card and know how much you keep on your debit card account at any point.
Irrespective of whether your spouse is earning or not, keep a joint account, and put a % of your earning every month in there for joint spending, but also make sure you review each month's statement to know extraneous spending and cut on that.
Your first and foremost priorities after marriage should be to get health insurance cover for your family including your spouse, with the potential for including dependents/children when they arrive.
Second, put a budget for every month, allocate a certain % of your monthly income to sections such as groceries, utilities, etc., and segregate them with clear lines of separation that you should live within that particular amount for that month. No exceptions.
Allocate a small % of your income for pleasure. Whatever that small % can afford, take time out of every month to spend that to please yourselves as family. If you don't make time for pleasure, what's the use in earning? But don't overindulge or overspend on this.
Allocate a good % of your monthly income towards rainy day fund. This will help you not be surprised by any event and be ready for it. Whenever something pleasantly or unpleasantly surprising happens, you'd need money to afford the events that follow. Always pays to be ready.
At least early on in your career, allocate atleast 10% of your monthly income towards self-improvement. This could be career skills, or anything you want to pursue, courses you want to take, books you want to read - investing in yourself is the best investment ever.
Have some percentage allocated to medical expenses. If it is not used in a particular month, put it into the account for health insurance premium payment. Once the premium payment time arrives, you can use these savings additionally to pay for the insurance.
Don't get a car or put on a home loan until you have equivalent amount in cash lying idle in your bank account. Early in your career/life, it's way better to invest money in assets than liabilities. If it is your first home and you're going to live there for the
foreseeable future, it makes sense to buy it. But buying it somewhere else and living somewhere else, taking on the hassles of finding tenants, or even considering it an investment is stupidity. Apartments usually don't rise in value that much. If it is an individual home, even
then, the appreciation of value depends on how the area appreciates over next decade or two. But usually real estate as a form of investment is best left to pros. Don't buy a house for investment. You're basically getting an illiquid investment locking huge sum in one place
Try as much as possible to consider gadgets as utilities and not as status symbols. You must be the smart user of a phone. You shouldn't be dumb and the phone smart. Likewise with other gadgets. While marketing convinces you otherwise that you'd feel hollow stupid and crazy to
not buy their product, it's perfectly alright to not join the bandwagon of any trend. I use a 4 year old phone before which I had my first phone for 6 years. I use a 6 year old laptop before which I had my first laptop for 5 years. You maintain things right and show them love,
and almost any product will surprise you by their longevity and the ability to work for you for a long time, letting you extract the most value from it. So, look at gadgets as an investment and not as a music playlist you shuffle everyday, buying new gadget models every year.
Unless you're a technology reviewer youtuber earning money from buying such gadgets (in which case companies will send them to you for free), you have no business shuffling gadgets every year, even if you can afford it. You can very well afford to do this until you can't.
But just because you CAN afford something doesn't mean you SHOULD. If you are attracted by an offer that puts a highly valuable item (an upgrade to what you bought maybe a year or two back) at 30% discount, you'd save 30% by buying it, you'd save 100% by not buying it.
Before marrying, learn about your future spouse's spending patterns, and mindset about money. Most likely, you can't change this once you're married. You'll either have to adjust, or let go of that person. Former and latter, both are costly financially and emotionally.
If you are the saver and the earner, and the other person is spending mindlessly, underreport your earnings, keep a separate account unknown to your spouse, route all of your unreported earnings through that account into savings and investments.
This is a classic jaadi moodi technique that ladies in poor homes with alcoholic husbands use to hide money and keep it unknown/unavailable to their respective husbands, and put it in savings, chits, etc., which they can use later in life.
It is certainly hard to keep these things from the significant other, but if the significant other is rebellious and not understanding of your mentality to save and live below your means to eventually live above your current means while still living below actual means,
this is the only way to go about it. As your income increases, your lifestyle should remain the same, that is how you get to acquire freedom. If you increase your lifestyle to match income, you'll always be a slave to income. Live below your means always, but improve your means.
