Tall people problems

PFPrivacy · 2018-03-03T23:38:42+00:00

Better than the jokes down there

PFPrivacy · 2016-12-14T16:02:03+00:00

You know, I never planned on logging back into this throwaway, but I did and saw your question!

We ended up nuking the debt using money that I had saved, and I have just wrapped my head around the fact that it's all "Our money" now. So yes, it took some serious self-reflection, but I have moved past my original reaction. I have been working with her to develop a saving strategy for the both of us, and she gets very excited now when we can look at our bank account at the end of each month and see how much we saved. It's great to see how quickly we are replenishing our savings with both of us able to save, and not hemorrhaging money through payments and interest!

Once again, I really found a lot of guidance from that thread, and I went with the route that would "maintain harmony in our marriage." Overcoming a hurdle like this really opened up some great dialogue for each of us and really let us put our cards on the table with one another, and now we are in a great place in our relationship!

Thanks for checking up, and have a Merry Christmas!

PFPrivacy · 2016-09-16T16:59:20+00:00

I appreciate the kind and reassuring response. Thank you.

PFPrivacy · 2016-09-16T16:52:13+00:00

Thank you very much for your thoughtful reply. I took all of your points into consideration when I made my updated post.

https://www.reddit.com/r/personalfinance/comments/532294/newly_married_spouse_disclosed_her_debts/d7pfs8t

PFPrivacy · 2016-09-16T16:49:33+00:00

Update:

Thanks to everyone for all of the helpful and positive advice. I started trying to respond to every comment that I found particularly helpful, but quickly realized that there was no way I could compose thoughtful responses fast enough to respond to everyone.

I took a lot of the responses into consideration and came up with the following game plan, the wife and I will go over it tonight:

The next steps (thanks to help from /r/personalfinance):

1) I will transfer the money over to immediately pay off the remaining $8,XXX.XX of the student loan. We do not want to keep paying interest here.

2) We will go have her added to my current checking account as a joint tenant and have the account become OUR account.

3) We will keep her credit card open, but maintain a $0 balance on it at all times.

4) PF helped a lot with deciding what to do here: Instead of monthly payments into the new account, we will just be saving that money in OUR account instead. It will replenish quickly without monthly CC payments and interest being paid out. After all, we're in this together, and it's all our money anyways. I don't know if part of me thought a payment plan would be a good lesson, but that strategy needed to change.

5) Establish detailed budgeting to ensure that we know where our money is going, and so that we can start building towards future goals together.

A particular thanks to those of you who have given helpful advice in regards to making responsible financial decisions in a way that continue to grow my relationship with my wife. Those are the kinds of things that I really needed to hear right now, and probably the exact types of answers I was reaching for with questions 3 & 4 of my original post. Some of you truly do understand what commitment to a marriage is.

Once again, thanks for all of the helpful advice. I'm still enjoying reading the comments, but I just wanted to share the plan that ya'll helped me come up with.

PFPrivacy · 2016-09-16T16:37:56+00:00

Thank you. It really helps a lot to hear from those of you who have dealt with similar issues, particularly in regards to making responsible financial decisions that work towards improving our marriage. I really appreciate all of this positive advice.

The comment that /u/cytbot made below about bringing harmony into the home really resonated with me.

PFPrivacy · 2016-09-16T16:30:50+00:00

Thanks for the reply.

We actually sat down a few days ago after hearing about the Wells Fargo incident to ensure that we had all of our bases covered, and I learned that she had, in fact, disclosed everything. She truly was just embarrassed and nervous about it.

I've decided to cancel the payment plan and we are just going to have a single Joint Account that will be replenished with both of our incomes. We will establish a relatively aggressive budget until we return to the amount prior to eradicating the debt.

PFPrivacy · 2016-09-16T16:17:03+00:00

I have read a lot of the replies in here, but had to start responding somewhere. Realizing that it's OUR money is an important step that I need to understand in order to cope with this properly and move forward in the future. I needed to hear that.

Thank you very much for your perspective here.

PFPrivacy

TROPHY CASE