What Financial Advice Is Appropriate For Engaged Couples?

 

    It might help you to know that I no longer cover financial issues in either of the pre-marital options that I offer couples.  I found that directing their attention to far more crucial and fundamental issues minimized the need or benefit of covering this prior to marriage.  I am more concerned about how they relate to and treat each other as they work through their differences than I am with their financial conclusions or decisions.  Contrary to pop psychology, marriages are neither made nor destroyed by money nor the lack of it.  I discovered that arguments over money reveal a pre-existent and far more serious foundational issues.  As a result, I now focus on these more fundamental issues in pre-marital counseling.

    When I did cover this topic, I offered them some exercises, some of which they did alone and some together.  I also highly recommended that they complete the financial program offered by Crown Financial Ministries, but generally couples came in to pre-marital counseling too close to their wedding date for such an extended course as that one.  My hope was, and still is, that they would take it after the wedding.

    One thing I invited them to do alone was to make up a budget that covers one year and then had them compare their budgets for the first time in my presence.  It was humorous sometimes, and always educational.  Sometimes a budget was overly simplistic and pointing out what was missed was sobering.  Sometimes they come up with quite different budgeting limits for the same expense category or savings and this pointed out to them how the values they each assumed to be "normal" or "right" might, in fact, be quite different from those of their mate's.  This too was sobering.

    Another option that I offered them was a financial madness program that, among other things, walks them through the advantages and disadvantages of borrowing money or paying cash.  It uses two hypothetical couples who have identical paying jobs, get married the same day, and buy identical houses right next to each other.  One couple is big on borrowing while the other uses a combination of short term borrowing and paying cash.  Both couples have the same material possessions but one of them is soon left in the dust by the other in terms of standard of living, spendable income, and savings.  Going through this exercise drew out many issues that would come out later when they have no one to guide them and the stakes are much higher.

    In summary, the primary focus was on drawing out those subconscious values and fears that each would not give a second thought to because they are "normal" or "right" and shared by everyone(?).  Seeing how they differed from their mate was often an unpleasant wake up call that there might be other premarital issues they should discuss.  The secondary focus was on areas where they were naive to see how they react when they realized there was more to something than they thought, and how they dealt with it as a couple.