How do you split your finances?

[bucknekkid 0]

How are women like hurricanes?

When they are coming they are loud and wet, and when they are leaving they take the house and car...

[Mr. Big Dog 10,747]

How are women like hurricanes?

When they are coming they are loud and wet, and when they are leaving they take the house and car...

Well, I suppose I'm blessed to have stayed clear of this type so far.

[rebeccajo 14]

A military pension split might work that way, but civilian household pension splits don't. The spouse who didn't EARN the pension gets half the portion that accumumulated during the marriage. It doesn't keep growing like some big cash cow from the future paid efforts of the person who was the employee.

So how do you define EARNED then? Does only the person who toiled for the money deserve something for their retirement? What about the wife who stayed at home, raised the kids, paid the bills on time, washed the clothes, cooked the meals, cleaned the house, mowed the grass, played taxi, etc. etc get? Did she EARN nothing? While her husband was spending all his time piling up those dollars and she was raising his children, does that mean when they finally split she deserves NOTHING?

I'm gonna stop before I get really p i s s e d here.......

Edited May 7, 2006 by rebeccajo

[terri o'neale 0]

A military pension split might work that way, but civilian household pension splits don't. The spouse who didn't EARN the pension gets half the portion that accumumulated during the marriage. It doesn't keep growing like some big cash cow from the future paid efforts of the person who was the employee.

So how do you define EARNED then? Does only the person who toiled for the money deserve something for their retirement? What about the wife who stayed at home, raised the kids, paid the bills on time, washed the clothes, cooked the meals, cleaned the house, mowed the grass, played taxi, etc. etc get? Did she EARN nothing? While her husband was spending all his time piling up those dollars and she was raising his children, does that mean when they finally split she deserves NOTHING?

I'm gonna stop before I get really p i s s e d here.......

Amen! I couldn't have said it better.

[Tegan 0]

my husband and I have always, since I moved here and even before hand shared money. If either of us needed money the other would help out, and now we have a shared checking and savings acct.

[Welshcookie 17]

A military pension split might work that way, but civilian household pension splits don't. The spouse who didn't EARN the pension gets half the portion that accumumulated during the marriage. It doesn't keep growing like some big cash cow from the future paid efforts of the person who was the employee.

So how do you define EARNED then? Does only the person who toiled for the money deserve something for their retirement? What about the wife who stayed at home, raised the kids, paid the bills on time, washed the clothes, cooked the meals, cleaned the house, mowed the grass, played taxi, etc. etc get? Did she EARN nothing? While her husband was spending all his time piling up those dollars and she was raising his children, does that mean when they finally split she deserves NOTHING?

I'm gonna stop before I get really p i s s e d here.......

I wholeheartedly agree with you.....I am not even against ex spouses of military memebers getting their share of military 'pension' if they have spent their time doing the same. My gripe is ONLY with how the military pension is dealt with . By the time my other half retires he will have done 24 yrs of service and a woman he was married to for 3 of them will be getting a whole chunk of the money we will using to bring up a child, pay our morgtage and live off, will go her for the rest of her life even if she remarries (which I am sure she will seeing how she is only 35 and already been married 4 times ). He is now going to stay in as long as possible to make up that money we will be losing....but of course that will increase the amount she ends up with also

On the bright side....if my marriage turns to shi!te at least there is the other 50% left for me to take....yes, that does happen too....(joke btw....just in case ppl don't get that )

But no, I am not against pensions being dealt with in a fair way at all......

Edited May 7, 2006 by welshcookie

[JenT 0]

half of HIS retirement? that would be a crime.

He was entitled to half of mine as well... they were relatively equal and in my case, it meant that each half would have been frozen in time at the point of the divorce. The half that was not frozen would have continued to build. I was 'more whole' by leaving things alone.

Every circumstance is different. I'm sorry to be finding a lot of judgmental people on this site.

[Fandango 1,440]

A military pension split might work that way, but civilian household pension splits don't. The spouse who didn't EARN the pension gets half the portion that accumumulated during the marriage. It doesn't keep growing like some big cash cow from the future paid efforts of the person who was the employee.

So how do you define EARNED then? Does only the person who toiled for the money deserve something for their retirement? What about the wife who stayed at home, raised the kids, paid the bills on time, washed the clothes, cooked the meals, cleaned the house, mowed the grass, played taxi, etc. etc get? Did she EARN nothing? While her husband was spending all his time piling up those dollars and she was raising his children, does that mean when they finally split she deserves NOTHING?

I'm gonna stop before I get really p i s s e d here.......

I wholeheartedly agree with you.....I am not even against ex spouses of military memebers getting their share of military 'pension' if they have spent their time doing the same. My gripe is ONLY with how the military pension is dealt with . By the time my other half retires he will have done 24 yrs of service and a woman he was married to for 3 of them will be getting a whole chunk of the money we will using to bring up a child, pay our morgtage and live off, will go her for the rest of her life even if she remarries (which I am sure she will seeing how she is only 35 and already been married 4 times ). He is now going to stay in as long as possible to make up that money we will be losing....but of course that will increase the amount she ends up with also

On the bright side....if my marriage turns to shi!te at least there is the other 50% left for me to take....yes, that does happen too....(joke btw....just in case ppl don't get that )

But no, I am not against pensions being dealt with in a fair way at all......

ita

I think the 'you get half; scanrio should not work if you don't have kids & have been married only a very short amt of time.

[Leafgal 3]

half of HIS retirement? that would be a crime.

He was entitled to half of mine as well... they were relatively equal and in my case, it meant that each half would have been frozen in time at the point of the divorce. The half that was not frozen would have continued to build. I was 'more whole' by leaving things alone.

Every circumstance is different. I'm sorry to be finding a lot of judgmental people on this site.

You are right every circumstance is different and everyone was giving their opinion, nothing wrong with that.

[Lou Lou 1]

Mr Lou's divorce from his wife was nasty. They had no kids and equally good incomes. He wanted to have a 50/50 split with her keeping the house and car as extra as she wouldn't have such great health insurance. In the bitter end she ended up with 75% of everything. She even tried to claim 50% of his pension that HE earned despite her having an equally good pension of her own and a rather substantial inheritance from her mother that he didn't touch (we're talking millions here). He still has to pay the deductable of her health insurance until she is 60. Now that sucks BIG time in our household as we have no disposable income, whereas she happily sits on the interest earned on her pile of money without needing to go to work. This may sound all pretty crazy, but that is how the law worked in this state.

As a result of this we have an unofficial pre-nup. Of course if things got bad it wouldn't be worth a jolt but we both agreed that we would never do what his ex did. Naturally, I don't expect it to happen at all but he never envisioned getting screwed in such a fashion either. Anyway, we have both joint and seperate accounts. Joint is for bills and dual expenses and our own accounts are to do what we like with them. I have a few in the US and one in the UK. It works for us.

[*Robert* 2]

Hmmm.... let's see...

What's hers is hers, and what's mine is hers, and if I need money, I go to her!!!

That's pretty much it!

hahahaha Anya!!! I take it you approve?!!

half of HIS retirement? that would be a crime.

He was entitled to half of mine as well... they were relatively equal and in my case, it meant that each half would have been frozen in time at the point of the divorce. The half that was not frozen would have continued to build. I was 'more whole' by leaving things alone.

Every circumstance is different. I'm sorry to be finding a lot of judgmental people on this site.

What responces were you expecting? You keep raising very polorizing issues, such as your poll on prenuptual agreements. Of course people are going to feel strongly about this, because most people are here to marry the love of their life, and going through all sorts of emotional and finacial stress to do it. The last thing on most peoples minds, is thinking how they can safely get out of their next marriage. If you go into a marriage worried about what will make it easier to get out, then you've already set yourself and relationship up for failure. Just MY OPINION. Geez... our parents and grandparents didn't have prenups and separate bank accounts, and they seemed to be just fine. Divorce had been used to many times as an excuse to give up. I see no reason to make it any easier to get one.

[Fandango 1,440]

Hmmm.... let's see...

What's hers is hers, and what's mine is hers, and if I need money, I go to her!!!

That's pretty much it!

hahahaha Anya!!! I take it you approve?!!

half of HIS retirement? that would be a crime.

He was entitled to half of mine as well... they were relatively equal and in my case, it meant that each half would have been frozen in time at the point of the divorce. The half that was not frozen would have continued to build. I was 'more whole' by leaving things alone.

Every circumstance is different. I'm sorry to be finding a lot of judgmental people on this site.

What responces were you expecting? You keep raising very polorizing issues, such as your poll on prenuptual agreements. Of course people are going to feel strongly about this, because most people are here to marry the love of their life, and going through all sorts of emotional and finacial stress to do it. The last thing on most peoples minds, is thinking how they can safely get out of their next marriage. If you go into a marriage worried about what will make it easier to get out, then you've already set yourself and relationship up for failure. Just MY OPINION. Geez... our parents and grandparents didn't have prenups and separate bank accounts, and they seemed to be just fine. Divorce had been used to many times as an excuse to give up. I see no reason to make it any easier to get one.

YOU GO BOI!

[KarenCee 3]

*claps loudly*

I agree with you roi aggie!!!!! if you dont want varying opinions, don't post a thread or create a poll!

[JenT 0]

Umm.... If I wasn't seeking other people's opinions, I wouldn't have posted. That's what this forum was all about, or so I thought... looking for advice, sharing experiences, supporting each other.

The first response to this question asked why I couldn't share this with my SO? Where, in my original post, had I even IMPLIED that I hadn't? Someone else chose to comment on the splitting of retirement during divorce, taking this thread in a totally different direction than my original question. All I was trying to do was explain my circumstances thinking that some others might be able to relate and provide relevant feedback... It's easy to become defensive when one feels as if others are making assumptions without knowing the facts.

I've seen several threads where this has happened... someone posts an innocent question, or asks for advice, and instead gets judged for the direction they're taking. I'm not going to give any examples because this thread has gone far enough, but that was the basis behind my comment about 'judgmental people'.

Many thanks to those who kept the integrity of the question intact and answered accordingly. I appreciate your sharing your personal thoughts.

Jen

[tom&tata 2]

IMHO, it is all going back to each person.

It's our 1st marriage, so both does not have experience handling finances through divorce. Additionally, we are both broke so nothing to protect except for the property (in Indonesia) that my parents is giving to me and we intend to keep as we are thinking about living there in future (no definite plan yet).

Because of the above factors, we did not think about the prenup agreement.