Splitting Household Costs with Non-Farming Partner

deeplume

deeplume

Member
Mixed Farmer
How does everyone split their household bills? I have recently taken on a farm tenancy and my partner (who doesn't work on the farm) and I are wondering about the fairest way to split household costs. No kids (at the moment). We currently earn about the same, but they are likely to earn more than me one day. How do others in this situation deal with things like rent, utilities and other household costs (e.g. where the farmhouse is in need of some renovations)? My accountant shied away from the question as obviously some of the household costs are put through the business and apportioned to business / personal at the end of the tax year.

Would be interested to hear from others in a similar situation!
 
F

Flatlander

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
Lorette Manitoba
Depends a lot if your partner is money conscious or spends like her pockets are bottomless. Or does she see you like that. If you both don’t share the same goals concerning the farm and everyday life having a joint account would be tough. Splitting bills is just a ticking time bomb in my opinion. I’d say have a joint living expense account that would cover normal day to day bills but nothing farm related. both pay in the same amount and have all the money accounted for. Outside of that you have your independence.
personally I hate the thought of trying to figure out who owes what and controlling anyone else spending.

joint account here. Wife will help on farm if needed and does the book work too plus usual wife and family duties. It’s not with out a few sit down talks about spending on both sides but way better than dealing it every pay day. After all if your living common law here in Canada the accumulated wealth is divided in the even of a breakup.
 
Zippy768

Zippy768

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
Dorset/Wilts
My partner out earns me by about 30/70. We have now started to split things proportionally. Used to be 50/50, but we were doing/spending on things I couldn't really afford.
Have 2 kids so makes things harder to work out.
She ain't shy on spending her money so, happy to have separate monies. A joint bank account for family/life admin that is added to monthly 30/70.
 
H

Hampton

Member
BASIS
Location
Shropshire
Barleycorn said:
If you've got to ask this question I would question the strength of your relationship.
Click to expand...
Nonsense, keep it fair.
We don’t really worry about who pays for what, but do try to keep tabs on what we are able to save and try to balance that bit out.
If one is putting loads away per month and the other is into the overdraft than it’s worth a conversation.
 
S

Spud

Member
Arable Farmer
Location
YO62
Simple here. Joint account pays household bills like shopping, council tax, any bills that don't go through the business.
I pay into it via standing order.
I see my role to put a roof over my families head, food on the table and any other basic living costs.
My wife doesn't work on the farm, but does have a responsible professional job, albeit part time. Her earnings pay for the extras, holidays, kids school trips, garden etc. The rest is hers to spend/save as she sees fit. She does by far the majority of the chasing about after the kids.
I couldn't give a fig how many % each pays, it's just not important, I'd give any of them the shirt off my back if they needed it!
We're fortunate I guess to have similar attitudes to money (and life really). We do discuss big expenses like holidays or changing the car but life is far too short to stress over how many pennies each is spending where.
It's worked just fine for 18yrs, I don't see any reason to change it
 
M

mo!

Member
Mixed Farmer
Location
York
Spud said:
Simple here. Joint account pays household bills like shopping, council tax, any bills that don't go through the business.
I pay into it via standing order.
I see my role to put a roof over my families head, food on the table and any other basic living costs.
My wife doesn't work on the farm, but does have a responsible professional job, albeit part time. Her earnings pay for the extras, holidays, kids school trips, garden etc. The rest is hers to spend/save as she sees fit. She does by far the majority of the chasing about after the kids.
I couldn't give a fig how many % each pays, it's just not important, I'd give any of them the shirt off my back if they needed it!
We're fortunate I guess to have similar attitudes to money (and life really). We do discuss big expenses like holidays or changing the car but life is far too short to stress over how many pennies each is spending where.
It's worked just fine for 18yrs, I don't see any reason to change it
Click to expand...
Surely the business is paying some of the council tax? Or do you have a separate office?
 
deeplume

deeplume

Member
Mixed Farmer
Thank you for the thoughts, all. Going to figure it out with him this week, but I think he agrees it's fair that I pay the rent and then we pay for the household stuff (incl. utilities) out of our joint account. We've been doing it that way for the last 7 years in our old house, so probably easiest to continue that way and review if one of us wildly out-earning the other. I try to keep everything as equitable as possible with our finances, I don't want him to feel like he has to provide for me in a kinda archetypal gender roles way, but with farming ever-uncertain we might need to change how much each of us contributes to the joint account in the future.
 
4

4course

Member
Location
north yorks
when mrs 4course and I got married twas in the day nearly 50 years ago when we said our vows mine was to her ..all my worldly goods I thee endow ,hers to me where to love honour and obey , ive kept mine and so far for her since that day its been two out of three and im sure you all can guess which is the one she hasnt ,ho ho
 
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