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Which practice to keep finances after getting married: joint, or separate?
This particular topic has probably been beaten to death already.  But from the other comments, it seems that splitting finances them is a popular solution on this forum.  I can see the individual benefit of this - makes it easy to go buy whatever you want.  But it can hurt too.  What if the situation changes, and you are no longer employed?  Your setup will cause stress because now you are having to ask your spouse to pay for everything.  If this works for you - congratulations.  But, fights may ensue - divorce may follow. I would like to offer an alternative.  In my situation, I bring home a paycheck, while my wife does not.  In this case, each of us paying 50% would simply not work.  Not to say my wife doesn't work - she works her butt off cleaning house, raising kids, etc. What we do is have any money that comes in go into a pot.  We budget (Oh no, the B-word!) out regular expenses (lights, gas, rent).  Anything that isn't allocated goes towards retirement savings (In the US, an IRA is an Individual Retirement Account), or towards a war-chest for big project (such as home ownership).  And each of us gets the same "blow money" allowance every week that we can do with as we please. Keep in mind, using this mentality allows the possibility of me staying home at some point in the future when my wife goes back to her dream job.  And there is no financial stress about "whom owns what", or "who paid for what".  We own it because we decided to pay for it.