Debt solutions become increasingly harder to solve when you are not just responsible for your life…but the life of your loved ones. A lot of couples fight about debt solutions, and that is normal. It can be hard to have an authentic and loving conversation about something so touchy as debt..
It’s all to easy to be emotional and unable to communicate clearly. Here are some tips to make sure your debt solutions meet everyone’s needs.
1) Don’t make any one partner responsible for the debt. Even if it’s clearly their fault. Why is that? Because often you and your spouse may have genuine disagreements about the role of debt in your life and what is a want versus what is a need.
Usually a single partner enters the marriage with more debt than the other partner. And this is normal. And once you have married someone who is in debt, guess what? That debt becomes your debt.
Sure you don’t have to pay their credit card each month, but your JOINT CREDIT will plummet if they don’t get their act together. Think about it.
2) Know the difference in your spending patterns. Often the dynamic in a relationship fraught with debt problems and not enough debt solutions is the accusation: “You spend TOO much..”
The truth is, is that most couples spend ROUGHLY similar amounts of money each month, they just have different values. In a typical relationship fallacy, they blame the other and fail to look at themselves.
Another factor to consider when accounting for debt solutions is that women tend to spend more on smaller items, whereas men save for large expenses. It’s just a different spending pattern, no better and no worse than the other.
3) Don’t Jump Ship: Couples often respond to the threat of debt by simply deciding to manage their own finances and hoping the debt will go away. Bad move. It can be tempting. And how do you decide if it is smart to have joint finances, or individual, or both? As you are getting to know your partner, it may make sense to keep a separate account. But if one partner has a high amount of debt, it will affect the other. And it’s time to put your thinking hats together and come up with creative debt solutions.