Budgeting as a Couple - Advice

[Tsumitate Wrestler]

How does your family approach budgeting?


My wife an I have not bothered budget in the past because we saved over 50% of our income. Investing is automatic, Nisa/ideco sweeps.

However we have highly subsidized housing through her work. This is amazing but our family of 4 has outgrown the space, and it not a very comfortable space due poor insulation.

My concern: In realistic terms once we get a mortgage our income will "drop" about 20%.

Current setup: All account in Money forward. Zero budget.

Other concerns: Going forward big expenses, trips, etc will need to be budgeted and planned in advance.

My approach: Mapping out salaries and bonuses. Large yearly expenses, monthly reoccurring expenses on an excel sheet to actually get a better idea of how much we have in saving (after investing), each month on average.

Question: What's the best way to set aside "pots" of money? I.E a holiday fund, a house repair fund?

Banks: Mizuho, Yucho (have but not utilized SBI Net and Shinsei)

[RetireJapan]

Mostly it's about communication and being on the same page. A substandard plan that both of you are happy with will be better than a perfect one that one person has not bought into.

My approach has alwasy been to save and invest first, then not worry about spending much after that. But it's harder to do if your income goes down (or fixed expenses go up).

[Beaglehound]

I agree that being on the same page is important. My wife would hate me if I tried to involve her in budgeting and as we probably only spend 70% of what we bring in it's not strictly necessary. I keep track of earnings and outgoings, we both invest in IDECO and any surplus goes into NISA. That's all really.

From your figures it seems like you will still be comfortably in surplus, so in your shoes I would consider your wife's attitude and whether the budget would be something you managed together (how interested is she?) or your baby (scope for resentment).

[Tsumitate Wrestler]

I agree that being on the same page is important. My wife would hate me if I tried to involve her in budgeting and as we probably only spend 70% of what we bring in it's not strictly necessary. I keep track of earnings and outgoings, we both invest in IDECO and any surplus goes into NISA. That's all really.

From your figures it seems like you will still be comfortably in surplus, so in your shoes I would consider your wife's attitude and whether the budget would be something you managed together (how interested is she?) or your baby (scope for resentment).

She's on board, but has enjoyed not having to budget in the past. However, we both really want to move so that's the price I suppose.

I'm a bit too adamant about treating investing like a monthly bill, I might have to back off the monthly Nisa tsumitate to 5man. But I think the 68,000 ideco is mandatory.

Her income is higher than mine though! So it'll impact her less individually.

It's less of a day to day concern, more of a realization that we cannot (for example ) just decide to visit my folks abroad without budgeting and planning in advance.

[Beaglehound]

In that case, 'budgeting' might be as simple as your idea of an account predicated for 'nice things' like travel and 'essential things' like house maintenance/property tax/insurance. If you both paying an adequate amount into that ends up reducing the amount available for NISA, so be it.

You could also follow up your other idea of looking at your day to day spending, trying to reduce fixed costs and remove anything unnecessary, but in your position I wouldn't be thinking of taking an axe to things you and your family enjoy.

[Eventlessdrop]

Hey there Tsumitate Wrestler,

I actually wanted to share my experience as was a bit of turbulence when my wife and I were surprised with the arrival of my daughter. Currently we are using YNAB to track all budgets (manually monthly which is no fun) but on top of that the question is how to we plan for goals eg holidays and make sure we are on a shared vision.

For that I use Ynab in a weird way to try make sure that my wife and I are aligned on goals on top of paying for daycare etc etc.

I would love to hear a little bit more about your experience as I am thinking to create a budgeting software that tackles the particular challenges of shared budgeting (taking into account that JP does not have shared bank accounts as far as I know,) Would you be open to dm'ing?

Cheers in advance

[Tsumitate Wrestler]

Hey there Tsumitate Wrestler,

I actually wanted to share my experience as was a bit of turbulence when my wife and I were surprised with the arrival of my daughter. Currently we are using YNAB to track all budgets (manually monthly which is no fun) but on top of that the question is how to we plan for goals eg holidays and make sure we are on a shared vision.

For that I use Ynab in a weird way to try make sure that my wife and I are aligned on goals on top of paying for daycare etc etc.

I would love to hear a little bit more about your experience as I am thinking to create a budgeting software that tackles the particular challenges of shared budgeting (taking into account that JP does not have shared bank accounts as far as I know,) Would you be open to dm'ing?

Cheers in advance

My wife and I were sorted with Moneyforward and Excel. Apps were too restrictive, but a custom excel sheet was infinitely customizable.

The biggest issue, was tracking monthly/yearly reoccurring expenses, and setting general guidelines for monthly Spending, with weekly and daily averages.