Discuss your finances with your partner!

When thinking of relationships, we often consider several factors, especially compatibility.

Food preferences, whether you and your partner enjoy similar activities, whether you have the same priorities in life regarding travel or parenting etc.

A discussion we often tend to avoid is – expenses.

In the Indian set-up, finances or handling expenses and making investment decisions is often considered a domain of a particular gender.

Finances are not discussed much, but it tends to be more of one-sided communication, generally from the person who is the primary breadwinner or earning higher.

Why should this change?

Considering the rising costs, managing finances efficiently has become very critical.  

One cannot simply assume that methods used in the past may continue to serve one well for handling finances.

Discussing finances with your partner can help ensure that both of you are on the same page regarding money.

This discussion could include how much of your total income you want to invest, the amount of your emergency corpus, and what your annual budget for vacations should be. One can also discuss how much they want to spend on rent or EMIs.

It will include long-term goals such as retirement planning or buying a house, children’s education, and short-term goals like your monthly household budget.

If you have never had this discussion with your partner, now is a great time to start! It will not only help strengthen your relationship, but also help you to regularly review your progress on your financial goals.

An important thing to remember though – is that one needs to be patient when discussing this subject. While it is important, it is not more important than your relationship itself.

Also, try and avoid unnecessary conflicts. You and your partner need not agree on how every rupee needs to be spent, and hence, it can be useful to keep aside a certain amount for each partner on something they like to spend.

We hope you decide to have this conversation with your partner if you have not already!

For a few options which you can consider for investing, click here.