A weekly thread to discuss financial matters - from personal all the way up to global.
Ground Rules
- Remember that we're all just Internet randos. Don't bet your life savings on a hot tip from this thread.
- Keep culture war in the culture war thread. Yes, global events may impact our personal finances, but that does not mean we have to incessantly harp on culture war aspects here. If you are going to discuss it, please stick to the practical impacts of it on an individual level.
- Be kind. Remember that everyone here comes from different circumstances. We all have different resources available and different risk tolerances.
- Don't let the perfect be the enemy of the good. Better is better. Celebrate people when they take a step up and work to move their finances in the right direction. Don't flame out because they haven't followed what you consider the optimal path. Everybody has to start somewhere.
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Notes -
How do you balance FIRE with not wanting to be a miserable tightwad? Most specifically interested in if anyone has thoughts on that in context of marriage + children + income gap (let's say 4 me:1 her). A particular potential (pun intended) Mrs. Lagrangian likes travel and activities more than I do and I have trouble thinking about that, especially in context of the income asymmetry.
We didn't have an income gap but that would have been irrelevant because it was all our money.
We were mostly on the same page with child costs. I am the cheap one but I wasn't going to deny my kid art or music lessons when she wanted them even though my husband could have covered the art and I could have covered the music. My husband would have let her redo her wardrobe at every whim through teenage years but was fine when I said no, she needed to make do and augment. Or get a job.
We were not on the same page with saving until we had several years of marriage under our belts. My husband would joke when we got married we both thought we were broke. Me because I only had a few thousand in savings (had sped run through paying off student loans) and him because he couldn't get the last few cents from his bank acct through the ATM (anything he could get out he spent on Magic cards or computer games). So for every "frivolous" thing he wanted we would save an equal amount. Did that until he realized saving was beneficial, and there was enough stashed to feel like "real money" to him. It helped that we held off on kids for the first decade of marriage, so even though I am a tightwad the dink life is pretty sweet.
Why are you thinking about income asymmetry? Do you keep separate finances?
These seem in contradiction to me. How can you consider separately whether to cover things if it's all "your" [combined] money?
It's hard not to at a FAANG vs good-for-not-being-FAANG ratio. Less glibly, because when I consider the tradeoff of being single, or at least not married, vs a marriage in which I have less control over spending, and much more to spend it on (square footage, children, travel), it is a hard sell. I feel a strong need to be in as much control as possible of how much/why the FIRE timeline slips. More control, easier sell. Five years easily, more likely ten, especially if the goal is to be so FI as to remain that way in the event of divorce.
Largely a hypothetical consideration. There's a candidate in mind, but it's early. I'd certainly want to, and a strong prenup to boot.
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