DR CHET SPEVENS | Finance Expert | CONTACT
I work with clients who are in deep financial trouble. Sometimes it’s because they’ve been retrenched or they’ve had an accident and are unable to work. But usually it’s because their spouse has divorced them and their life has blown up into a million problems.
But it doesn’t have to be that way for you if you do some basic forward financial planning. And one of the best ways to financially plan is to never spend a cent of your own cash. Spend your spouse’s income instead.
Forget love, forget friendship. These are temporary, ephemeral ghosts that – like your spouse – can come and go on a whim. Long-term relationship and money success is therefore best measured through other means.
Like how much money you can save together, how many assets you can accumulate, and how much status you can attain as a result. It is these measures that let you know if your spouse is worth the trouble or not.
But to reach such awesomeness, you need to remind yourself that even when your relationship is going well, you are not a multinational corporation. You are human and so you are taxable.
This is why you must never spend your own money but your spouse’s.
So, while in a relationship with your significant other, very carefully and over a long period of time work them over. Start small. Borrow some cash to buy groceries, forget your wallet at the restaurant, get direct debits happening out of their accounts. Things like that.
After a few years this becomes normal. Then you level up. Help your spouse to decide that your income should be for savings. Every dollar you earn is saved in your own high interest savings account. And block off access to the account from your spouse, not because you don’t trust them, but because ‘it’s the only way we’ll really get ahead together’.
Planning your finances like this will allow you to make any purchase guilt free, because you’ll know that you’re saving 100% of your income. And when your relationship fails, which let’s be honest it will, it will be your spouse who looks like the fool for being in a far worse financial position.
Remember, love is strong. But forward financial planning utilising your spouse’s income as the expense account is far stronger.
