Money?? Budgets?? Bills?? Savings??

I being from a joint family never knew how many bills we have to pay each month. I knew basic ones like Phone, Electricity & Gas but nothing apart from these. I never knew the amount of any of the bills. I never knew when & who received those bills & who paid those bills in my family. Milk, newspaper, gardener, maids etc too, I did not knew how much we pay them & when & who.

Dad use to give me money for petrol, for pocket-money & for keeping some spare too – that too unlimited, it was not capped that you will get this much every month. Just ask for money & Dad will give without even asking why I need it. Mom used to scold Dad, “at least ask the kids why they need that money” I never over-spend unnecessarily, you can say I was not spoiled child. Just spent on food and little bit of shopping like make-up or accessories or gifts for loved ones. Clothes & shoes were bought with Mom.  This is all when I was working as a teacher. My salary was just deposited in bank, I never used it because my Dad did not allow me to.

Now, after wedding, most of the bills are sent to PK on his email. He checks all bills, makes reminders on his mobile on what date which bill is going to be direct debited & which he himself has to transfer. Internet & phone bill, our mobile bill, gas, electricity, phone line, council, loan payments etc etc are all looked after by PK. I did not have any habit of making budgets for the month, paying bills, savings & all and PK?? PK likes to take all the control of finances himself. I have seen this, when responsibility of making payment for rent was given to BIL, PK was freaked out. He himself said he feels his responsibility is taken away by someone and he wants it back!!

When I was not working for first year after marriage, PK was looking after all finances and I was not at all interfering, as I did not have habit. I started working 2 years ago, till now also PK looks after finances. PK looks after my account balance as well, he keeps the necessary amount in my account so that whenever I am alone, if I am buying anything, I have enough dollars in my account. I sometimes myself transfer money, no restrictions from PK’s side.

We do our finances as most of the couples do. We have joint account. We both transfer salaries in that account & keep the necessary amount in our account. Yes, the bills are now paid by combining our salaries. It is never like – you pay this bill & I will pay that bill. Decision of buying anything is taken mutually, if one of us does not agree on certain expense, we just wait for a while & think about it later again.

The different thing with us is that he belongs to working(job or service) family & I belong to business family. Now the problem is, I still don’t understand when is the right time to shop or splurge because I don’t know our budget of spending & saving. I never knew our(my Dad’s) budget before my wedding, it was like buy what ever you want.

PK & I do splurge on things and buy luxury items. PK always wants to buy best of things for me, he never says no but I cannot deny that there has been few times when I find something absolutely necessary for me while shopping and he says we should control our spending now, we are spending too much!!!! I think because I have never heard NO for spending, I don’t like it when PK asks me to control the spending for a while 🙂 Now, please note that before I started working and earning here & after I started earning, nothing has changed!! It’s just that after I started earning we thought let us invest and buy our home.

But I have changed myself a lot now. it has been 4 years & now I somehow understand the budgets & everything. I wish I could have known all this before marriage, I wish my parents would have taught me about making budgets. I know, I should start looking after our finances to know more about our budget & bills 🙂 Will do surely 🙂

I had this post in my drafts since 12th December 2012 but then I was thinking will it be too personal thing to share if I share about finances ??? But after reading Pepper, LF & R’s Mom’s posts on financial independence I thought let me post this. To each his/her own, this is what I want to share.

Are you confused after reading?? I am too.. So, what do you think?? Am I financially independent or dependent on PK ?? I don’t know about this but I know I am happy 🙂

Happy Friday friends.. Hope you all have an amazing weekend 🙂