conversation: User (rkiloquebec): "EDIT 3:  This thread has grown far beyond what I anticipated.  To those that offered advice on the subject matter, thank you.  To those that offered relationship advice, thanks but no thanks, I can head over to /r/relationships, and some of y'all need to stop with the negative outlook on life and relationships.  It ain't all that bad!\n\nI'll preface this by saying that I've read some articles on the matter at hand, but I was hoping to get some opinions from /r/personalfinance on the matter.\n\nI have been with my SO for about 18 months now.  She's an all around great girl, sharp (two bachelors) and a great job as an ICU RN.  She has an income that's about 2x the mean for the area, and i'm about 1.5X.  I myself do alright as well.  If we were to get married today, we would have a combined income of about $130K, plenty of income to pay off student loans, buy a house and live comfortably.  \n\nBut we're not getting married today, instead, she is leaving the workforce for two years to attend an accelerated program in anesthesiology at a school/hospital about an hour away.  It's a stressful program that requires 60-70 hours a week of classroom and study time.  \n\nWe came to the conclusion that it would be best to live together.  We decided on a city/neighborhood about 10 minutes from the hospital and 55 minutes from my office.  I'm OK with commuting for two years (it currently only takes me 5 minutes to get to work!), we plan to move back to the area when she is done with her program as her field is in high demand and the company I work for is growing rapidly.\n\nWe started preparing for this over the past few months.  We came to the conclusion that buying out her auto lease was a good decision as it would be damn near impossible for her to get financing next year when her lease came due.  We started putting aside some money, individually, for moving expenses.  But we haven't figured out how we're going to divide the costs.\n\nWhat kind of options do the fine people at /r/personalfinance propose when it comes to a couple moving in together.  She will have no income other than student loan money (the program automatically budgets living/travel expenses into the tuition as they do not allow students to work during the program), and we can manage anything else just fine on my $60K/year.  Do we get a joint checking account for common expenses/bills?  Has anyone had success with doing a 60/40 or 70/30 split on expenses?  Our rent at our new place will be $850 and I have no problem covering up to $600 of it as that is what I currently pay (thanks mid-west!).  What about saving, new purchases?\n\nI'm honestly pretty lost on how to join finances with someone, something I'm not proud to admit at 32 years old.  Maybe some of you with experience in this matter can provide some advice.  \n\nedit: words\n\nedit 2:  Just to be clear, I'm hoping this doesn't turn into an /r/relationship post.  I was really hoping that I could just get some good ideas of how to make this happen.  We're moving in together, that's happening.  My commute is increasing, I signed up for this so I know it's not ideal.  At this point, I'm hoping for different ideas on how to split costs when she will have a fixed income (loans) and I will have a salary.  "
  Self: "together, separately."
  