Learn to Manage Money Before it Manages You

I remember a time when I told my mother that I had just started dating this guy. I suppose the fact that I was now a college student, I needed to look at dating in a different way...or at least she was doing that for me. Once I told her, her reaction was different than I could have prepared for. The first thing out of her mouth was "Karaska, does he have any debt?!" This threw me a loop! Of course I ignored her and kept talking about other things going on. To this day, this is still something that I keep in the back of my mind. "A bride-to-be would do well to ask herself, 'Can my sweetheart manage money? Does he know how to live within his means?'" When we are considering marrying someone we really need to look at all aspects of life. Money seems to be a major contributor to divorce. Because many of us marry those that did not necessarily grow up in the same income family, we need to understand how each other likes to spend money and figure the best way to manage the incoming money to be had. Also, "management of family finances should be mutual between husband and wife in an attitude of openness and trust." We need to show our trust with each others financial ability to avoid situations where one might want to hang it over the head of the other when someone messes up.