Why some marriages might need Fun Money Accounts

I am a recovering shopaholic. It started in my teens with my first JCPenney’s credit card, which I quickly got maxed out and had a hard time paying back because I wasn’t working.

In a marriage, one of the main causes for arguments revolves around money; usually the lack of it and from one spouse spending before the bills were taken care of. This was me…I’m a tech-geek and could usually find something I really needed to have, some gadget or other, along with good reasons why I needed it now. This lead to a lot of arguments between my wife and I.

As a married couple you really need to set-up financial goals for your future as a team, where you want to go financially as a couple, buy a home, buy a rental property, etc. This lead me to create what we call our “Fun Money Accounts” because I really had a “gadget need” that would come over me from time to time. As a recovering shopaholic I don’t get the itch as much anymore, but if I feel it coming on, I now have my Fun Money Account to lean on.

I came up with the Fun Money Account idea from a breakout group at one of our church’s marriage conference on finance. The conference discussed assigning all of your income into line items. Everything had a line item, even entertainment, going to the movies, date night, etc. I joked that we could set up a line item for a Mad Money Account. I remember saying that this could also fall under the budgetary line of self entertainment expense 🙂 Fun Money Account formerly called Mad Money Account, but “Mad” part was too close to fighting so we changed the name.

There are a few rules that need to be discussed before you look into setting up individual Fun Money Accounts. I could go on and on about this for at least an hour in order for both sides to get a good understanding, but here is a short list of rules…

1. You will need to set-up a direct deposit into joint accounts. One for you and one for your spouse.
2. It’s a good idea to set it up in a different bank, not the one where all your accounts are at.
3. You should both be able to see each others balance and the biggest rule here is that you can never touch your spouses money, ever, EVER! EVER!
4. Set a direct deposit amount you both can agree on, $25 – $150 per paycheck and this must be within your monthly budget. You still need to pay your bills, do not go crazy here.
5. This is not an allowance, this is money that the owner can spend on anything they want.
   1. Nothing that could cause a divorce or illegal, use your brain here!
   2. Example: If you have a shoe problem and like to buy dozens of really expensive shoes, this is what the account is for. Guys, this could be you too, 2 or 3 tennis shoes a month could add up to a car payment.
   3. If you have a bad spending habit on clothing, shoes, outfits, gadgets, electonics, games, etc,… this is what the account is for!
      • the stuff that you usually fighting about spending wise- that’s what this account is for.
      • If you need to get your car fixed, that’s out of the combined income of the marriage (you’re a team – remember that).
   4. Work together here.
6. This is a spend account for yourself, you can also save up for what ever you want.
7. You are allowed to spend on what ever frivolous thing you want, no questions asked by the spouse, check sub-rule number 5-a, use your brain here. You and your spouse need to work out the rules.

Depending on which one of us you ask, money arguments have all but disappeared, going down anywhere between 90% to 98%. I average around $150 to $400 in my account from time to time and my wife would have over 10 times that amount. Obviously, I was having way more “FUN” with my account, but as the saver, she was able to use her fun account on much bigger items when she wanted to, like vacation trips.