Weekly roundup

Hey Budgeters! Here’s what happened this past week

TikTok was a flop this week - I’ll be real with you, there’s nothing I’m so proud of that I want to post. But that’s ok, it’s a new week.

What Triggered the Conversation

A few years ago Katey and I stopped saying “my money” and “your money”.

But when she would send me a Venmo at the start of each month for our mortgage…

(Yes we “split” the mortgage payment)

It made me feel like we were still living a life of “mine” and “yours”.

And with a baby due in August, I knew that we were going to have a lot of various expenses come up where one us was either going to feel like they were buying everything.

Or..

We were going to be using Venmo very frequently.

So we decided to get ahead of it. Rip off the band-aid. And open our first joint checking account.

Why open a new one you ask?

Because we both have had the same checking accounts for 10+ years.

TD Bank & Wells Fargo.

Not great banks. So we wanted to do a bit of a reset.

An Emotional Money Shift

It took a lot of work and trust for us to get to this point.

There was a point in time Katey would have felt that I’d be judging all of her spending.

Or that I might be too controlling with our money.

Something that has really helped us is Monarch Money.

Monarch is a budgeting app that we’ve been using because it was easy for us to connect both of our bank accounts.

That means I already see what Katey spends money on.

And to be clear, she’s incredibly frugal. Except for when it comes to health :)

And also to be clear, we used to fight a lot about money because I was very controlling.

But that’s something I worked on and was able to demonstrate how far I’ve come by using Monarch.

Following a budget helps us understand when we should be concerned with our spending, and when we shouldn’t.

I have a Free Budgeting Template, but if you want to sign up for Monarch, the code GETMONARCH will get you 50% off.

Two Practical Benefits

Now, for us, we had already made that mental shift to “our money” a while ago.

But if you are married and haven’t, I’d strongly consider.

Having an “Our money” approach makes your marriage a team sport.

It shifts you from keeping score to building together.

Now, the additional benefits that Katey and I are going to get out of this are as follows:

1. Simplifying bills

Our system before was, Katey Venmo’s me the mortgage, I handle all the insurance, utilities, and other bills. Katey gets groceries.

Asking your wife to Venmo you feels weird, at least for me.

And when Katey would forget her wallet (this happens a lot) I would feel frustrated that I’m buying the groceries this time.

You know you. You know your relationship.

Ask yourself, what would change about how we pay bills and spend our money if there was just one checking account?

2. We’re investing more!

Katey and I don’t keep a ton of money in our checking account. But we each would have anywhere between $10k-$15k at a given time.

Let’s call it $25k total.

With one account, we plan to keep that balance at $12k which means we’re earning an additional 7% on that $13k. That’s $900 a year!

It may seem odd to you, but having $6k in each of our accounts feels very different than having $12k in one account.

What Account Did We Choose

As I mentioned in the beginning, we weren’t a fan of our current checking accounts. TD and Wells Fargo.

We had some frustrating experiences when trying to wire money, buy a home, and deposit money that made us want to work with a bank that is online-first.

And I’m going to be straight up with you, the bank we went with is great, but when people tell you this is the best bank, they’re blowing smoke.

The reality is that all good banks are about the same.

The good bank we used is SoFi.

They offer .5% on a checking account, which I didn’t really know was even a thing. And 4% on a HYSA.

We also got $300 deposited in our account after our first direct deposi,t which makes the pain of switching over a little less painful.