Fighting over money with your partner? These experts have some advice

By Jeanne Sahadi, CNN

(CNN) — Money can be a fraught issue for most couples.

And no wonder.

“We tend to have rule books around money. And we get upset when someone doesn’t have the same game plan,” said Thomas Faupl, a licensed family and marriage therapist who specializes in financial therapy.

Not to mention that everybody’s money behaviors are influenced by their experiences around money growing up.

But you can defuse your disagreements so that they are not perpetually difficult — or fatal — for your relationship.

How?

Start by recognizing that money fights are usually about something bigger. Then explore what those bigger issues are so that you each can better hear where the other is coming from.

That’s just some of the advice Heather and Douglas Boneparth — an attorney and certified financial planner, respectively — offer in their new book “Money Together: How to Find Fairness in Your Relationship and Become an Unstoppable Financial Team.”

The married couple — both 40 and now the parents of young children — examine their own issues around money and those of other couples they interviewed — to learn how to handle money conversations better.

Most common showdowns

The specifics of couples’ disputes differ. But Faupl finds the most common types of money disagreements revolve around:

Saving and spending: One partner may have a much higher bar to feel financially secure, while the other may prioritize living life for today.

“Both perspectives are right,” Faupl said.

The question is whether each partner can appreciate where the other is coming from and find a middle ground that works for them both.

High levels of debt: Whether a couple gets into a lot of debt together, or one partner amasses it, it is fertile ground for a fight over how to manage it and how long to tolerate it, he said.

A couple with kids, for instance, has to make a lot of ongoing money decisions around that debt: Should we take a family vacation? Should we get a bigger house? Where should we cut back? Who should give up what?

Disparities in wealth: One spouse might come from wealth or may have amassed it in their career, while the other hasn’t. Or there could just be a big disparity in partners’ salaries, which can lead to a lot of uncomfortable discussions about divisions of labor and who has more say over money decisions.

Reframe how you view disagreements

When you’re on the verge of a money fight with your partner, try asking yourself the following questions before going off:

Question 1: Is this something we need to figure out right now? Or can we schedule a better time to talk about this constructively?

“Time, place and environment matter. Couples fight the most when they choose the wrong moment,” said Heather Boneparth. “We were culprits of bickering over money at 5:30 pm when our babies were throwing food across the room.”

Question 2: Is what we’re arguing about really the issue?

Douglas Boneparth recalled one couple they interviewed where the wife had a meltdown after her husband bought an extra croissant at a 7-Eleven. Turns out, the croissant was innocent. The problem for the wife was that she felt her husband was not living up to their years-earlier agreement to split expenses evenly. The blowup taught them that the old arrangement wasn’t working for either of them.

They realized “what was fair before really wasn’t fair anymore,” Boneparth said.

Understanding the current context for your partner’s actions can help too. Why did the wife lose it at that particular moment? Her outburst coincided with her concerns that she might lose her job.

Question 3: What are we doing right?

Going in to a contentious money discussion with criticisms about your spouse — or you as a couple — isn’t a winning approach.

“Don’t start with what’s not right or what is broken,” Douglas Boneparth said.

Instead, he suggested, start with what your spouse — and you together — have been doing right. “You’ll have a much easier time staying engaged.”

Getting to a compromise

While you and your partner may always approach money differently, you still need to make joint financial decisions you both can live with. To get there, keep your eye on the prize.

Take investing, for example. If one of you is risk averse and the other isn’t, consider what your shared goals are.

Maybe it’s that you both agree you want to retire at 60. The trick is to figure out based on your current circumstances what it would take to reach that shared goal.

There are a lot of ways to get there. And what works for you as a couple may not be as binary or extreme in risk-taking as you expect. “It could be incremental — maybe not as much as one partner wants but more than you ever would do,” Heather Boneparth said.

Lastly, she noted, remember that while the unknown is scary and appetite for risk is individual, “our capacity for risk is joint because we’re together.”

The-CNN-Wire
™ & © 2025 Cable News Network, Inc., a Warner Bros. Discovery Company. All rights reserved.