She’s Frugal but He’s a Big Spender. How Do They Make Their Relationship Work?
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Here's your Money Briefing for Friday, June 13th. I'm Oyin Adedoyin for The Wall Street Journal. Relationships are all about give and take. But what do you do when your partner is a big spender and you only shop when things are on sale?

It's never fun to be like the person who's policing, like how much money everybody's spending. That kind of voice of the sort of sensible person, even if you're kind of in the right, it's just not very appealing to be that person. We'll talk with Wall Street Journal personal space columnist Katie Roife about how she and her husband navigate being polar opposites when it comes to spending. That's after the break.

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Can you describe your spending style to me and then describe your husband's? I would put myself in this sort of frugal, neurotic category where I'm constantly imagining like cataclysmic financial ruin. I like a sale. I like a bargain. I hate a restaurant where an entree is $43. Like that just does not feel fun to me.

And so I would say I'm just cautious. And my husband is the opposite. There's some like shockingly expensive pair of socks that he absolutely must have. On one of our first few dates, he ran out of dog food and actually ordered a hamburger from a really expensive Upper East Side bistro for the dog.

For the dog.

I don't think I'm necessarily super frugal. It's more in the kind of contrast that I appear to be frugal. And that's one of the things I write about in the piece is just in a marriage, people come to occupy these roles. So he was occupying the role of extravagant person and I was occupying the role of thrifty person.

You described the frugal person in the relationship as drab, boring, lacking in joie de vivre, and the extravagant person as fun and exciting and energizing.

I found that so relatable and I was wondering why you chose those words. I just realized oftentimes you feel like the role you're occupying is actually not one you would choose. Like you don't really want it. It seems kind of a drag. And the person who's always like, well, I don't know if we can really afford that expectation.

extra three entrees with the takeout. Like that person is not very fun. And my husband has this kind of warm, generous, energetic, joyous way of being in the world. And it's contagious. Like it's really fun for everybody. It's never fun to be like the person who's policing, like how much money everybody's spending. That kind of voice of the sort of sensible person, even if you're kind of in the right, it's just...

not very appealing to be that person. I mean, you also talk about some solutions that you guys have worked through over the years, including separate bank accounts. What are some other ways that you two have navigated these two distinct roles that you play in this relationship? I would say the biggest one is that thing of separate bank accounts. We don't have children in common. We have separate children. So it makes it easier for

He can do what he wants. I do what I want. And that's definitely creates a kind of atmosphere of sanity in our household. But other than that, I think one huge thing is humor. And I feel like the jokes that we make about this makes you able to navigate what could be actually disturbing conflicts. Like he's constantly telling me, oh, that steak costs $1,000.

And I just think it's cute kind of and laugh. And like, that's how we get through our days. I love that. There's some debate within the financial world about how best to manage finances as a couple. You know, you talk about separate bank accounts, working for you two. That's this huge debate. I'm curious about whether you and your husband do have a shared account and how you both decide when to use which account.

So we have no shared accounts, literally no shared property. So we really take this to quite an extreme. And I

feel very strongly about financial independence for women. And especially, I think it's very different if you have kids in common. But we got married 10 years ago. We kind of met each other later in life. So for us, it really makes sense to just have these separate spheres and keep the

distinction. And I think just having your own account where if you feel like doing whatever you feel like doing, it's your own business. Like I think that kind of independence in a couple is really healthy. You've noticed that you and your husband over the years have picked up each other's spending habits. How so? It's just funny because I think that neither of us would admit it. And we both really feel like we are 100 percent in the right place.

But I think that kind of unconsciously, without even realizing it, we've just edged closer together. And it's really strange how that happens because as I described in the piece, like he once got me this bouquet of flowers. I don't remember what it was for, but it was like the hugest, craziest, most extravagant bouquet of flowers. My dining room table, which is enormous, did not have space for anything but these flowers and like their glory. It was crazy.

And normally I would be like, why did you spend so much money on the flowers in my head? I wouldn't say it, but I would think it. But I just found myself like, suddenly I was like, oh, this is so great. What a kind of like amazing thing to have these crazy flowers. And I think that I...

I've started to be able to appreciate a kind of burst of extravagance. And likewise, I think he's started to see that actually saving money is fun and useful and there are all kinds of good things about it. And so I see him as,

like looking for the cheaper option sometimes now. And so we sort of have ceased to occupy these roles that were very defining early on in the marriage. And it's hard for me to explain how it happens. It's almost like how dogs come to resemble their owners. Like I think you do just sort of naturally move closer together when you're living together.

That's WSJ personal space columnist Katie Roife. And that's it for your Money Briefing. This episode was produced by Ariana Asparu. Additional support this week from Coleman Standifer. I'm your host, Oyen Adedoyen. Jessica Fenton and Michael LaValle wrote our theme music. Our supervising producer is Melanie Roy.

Aisha Al-Muslim is our development producer. Scott Salloway and Chris Sinsley are our deputy editors. And Falana Patterson is The Wall Street Journal's head of news audio. Thanks for listening.

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