Americans are waiting longer to get married, and women are making—and investing—more money than ever. That has had big implications for romantic relationships, including when it comes to how couples talk about their finances.
In the past, marriage invoked images of a young couple starting out with next to nothing and building a nest egg together. That arrangement has become less common as the median age for a first marriage has risen to record highs—age 28 in the case of women in the U.S., and age 30.5 for men. Meanwhile, the share of people getting married for the first time in their forties and fifties quadrupled between 1990 and 2019.
Tom Thiegs, senior leadership and legacy consultant at Ascent Private Capital Management of U.S. Bank, says these trends mean new dynamics for household finances. He points out that it can be more complicated for those who marry in their thirties or later to combine their money, since one or both people likely have more income and assets than if they had married earlier. Plus, each newlywed will have had more years to become accustomed to calling their own shots when it comes to things like investing, saving, and spending.
"Your living situation prior to a serious relationship or marriage is a big change if you haven't experienced that before," Thiegs says. "It can feel weird to have that accountability to someone else."
And while women making more money is a step forward for them and society, Thiegs says some men struggle with this dynamic, leading to potential tensions that couples must address frankly.
Another source of marital friction for older couples: one partner making significantly more money than the other. This can lead to situations where one partner feels they need to ask the other's permission to buy anything—an unhealthy dynamic, says Thiegs.
"You want open equalness. Finding middle ground is very important. It shouldn't be the person who makes more money who gets to make all the decisions," he says.
These dynamics can affect how honest each spouse is about their finances and goals—and not for the better, he says. In fact, 30% of Americans say they have lied to their partner about money, according to a recent U.S. Bank survey about challenging money conversations. Almost 40% do not agree with their partners about how to manage their money now, and 60% say they make better financial decisions than their partner.
One of the biggest shifts Thiegs has seen in the last generation or two is couples moving away from commingling all of their assets to keeping their finances separate after marriage. That can hurt the trust each partner has in the other, without them even realizing it.
"To some degree, having autonomy is healthy. But doing that 100%, you’re missing the opportunity to come together and have the conversations," he says. "You can have some control, but it’s important to have something together as well... There’s more accountability to each other, and I think that is a healthy thing. It can lead to more conflict, but hopefully healthy conflict."
One way this could play out is having a joint account used to pay all of the household bills, while each partner keeps their own personal savings account. With each partner being able to see what is paid and when each month, conversations will naturally arise—and each partner is more likely to be on the same page and have a firmer understanding of their household's holistic financial picture.
"Long-lasting relationships are built on trust and that is true of our money habits," he says. "I've seen couples go years without realizing their financial behavior was a negative for their spouse or partner. The sooner you can uncover those potential surprises, the better."
How to start a money conversation
If money talk makes you uncomfortable, Thiegs has some conversation starters that can help ease you and your partner in.
First, it's important to identify each of your values—financial and otherwise—and where they came from, Thiegs says. More than one third, 36%, of unmarried Americans say they're embarrassed to be fully transparent about their finances with the person they’re dating, according to the U.S. Bank survey. But explaining why you feel the way you do—say, money was tight growing up, so it's important for you to have a robust safety net—can help mitigate that.
So ask your partner: What’s the biggest value or rule that you live by?
"If you don’t speak those things, the other person doesn’t know them," he says. "Unspoken expectations are premeditated resentments."
Another fruitful conversation starter, according to Thiegs: Is there a number that you’d be comfortable with me spending without telling you? Put another way, what is your threshold for a money surprise?
Or try: What items that we buy do you see as needs versus wants? He suggests turning that into an activity, with each spouse writing their needs and wants on a piece of paper. While something—say, buying coffee on the way to work or saving for a vacation—may obviously fall into one camp or the other in your mind, your partner could have a different perspective. Understanding each other's viewpoint is critical for financial harmony.
It's also important to pick the right spot to have a financial conversation—bedtime, for instance, is not a good one. Instead, Thiegs says, he counsels couples to have a set time and place to discuss them to limit emotional responses.
Finally, it's hard to be honest with your partner if you're not honest with yourself. Thiegs says it's crucial for each partner to consider their role and reactions.
"I think about this as a partner myself, maybe I don’t make it the easiest to talk about these things with," he says. "They may fear the judgment. So acknowledge your own role or the environment you’ve created for them to fear being honest."
