‘You don’t just get to be right once and be done’
A Q&A with Heather and Douglas Boneparth on managing money in a relationship
When I speak to groups about budget-free money management, I often hear the same question: “So, I’m totally on board with this, but my partner has the opposite approach to money. How do I talk to them about this?”
You can sort out your own relationship with money all you want, but it becomes a whole new kind of challenge when you add another person to the mix. Managing money as a couple, family or household mixes all the parts of your life with money in a way that truly isn’t addressed enough in personal finance. Which is ridiculous, because managing money in a relationship is one of the hardest parts of managing money — and of being in a relationship!
Heather and Douglas Boneparth are living and teaching this reality: a married couple with kids who run a wealth management firm and write the newsletter The Joint Account to help couples talk about money. Their book Money Together: How to find fairness in your relationship and become an unstoppable financial team is out today.
Douglas is a CFP and founder of their firm, Bone Fide Wealth. He serves on the advisory councils for CNBC and Investopedia and is a CFP Board Ambassador for New York. Heather is a former corporate attorney and the director of business and legal affairs for Bone Fide Wealth. She’s a writer who’s been featured in The Skimm, Investopedia, CNBC, She Knows, Insider and more.
I invited Heather and Douglas here today to talk about their approach to talking about money as a couple and their individual personal relationships with money.
Win a free copy of Money Together!
Please add your comments and questions for Heather and Douglas at the end of this post! I’ve got two copies of Money Together to give away to readers, and I’ll choose the winners next week at random from the comments. Add your comment by 11:59 p.m. on Tuesday, Nov. 4, to enter, and I’ll contact the winners via email by Friday, Nov. 7. (One entry per person.)
You write, “When it comes to the ways that money can impact a relationship, you don’t just get to be right once and be done.” That’s such a summary of what it means to manage money as a couple or a household. Can you talk more about the misconceptions we have about “getting it right” when it comes to money and how adding a partner to the mix complicates that even further?
Douglas + Heather: We’re all conditioned to want to optimize for quick solutions in every area of our lives. We are living in this “life hack” era where one guide, one practice, three steps a day, will help you reach your goals; and maybe they will, but that notion doesn’t account for the fact that we, as people, are changing constantly. Our individual financial priorities and goals and feelings are dynamic and evolving. As we write in the book, “The plot of the story can change. So can you.”
Things get sticky when we try to communicate those changes to our partners, because we’re not always the best self-advocates, for a host of internal and external reasons. We’re also the most comfortable with them, so we tend to project a lot of other feelings along with our attempts to communicate. If you’re both caught in that cycle, you’ll end up in conflict over all the wrong things instead of having the important conversations that move the needle around money to where it needs to be in your relationship.
Heather
What’s the most joyful thing you’ve done with money in the past six(ish) months?
I turned 40 in August and really celebrated that milestone. Douglas threw me a party that was exactly what I wanted: dancing at a dive bar in denim. With tacos. I also purchased a beautiful handbag I’ve been wanting for many years, as I’m a big believer in milestone purchases as part of my overall mindset to spend with intention.
What messages did you get about money growing up? Which have you held onto and which have you let go?
My late grandfather’s last words to me were literally: “All that matters in life is your blood and your money.” I wrote extensively in our book about my skewed perceptions, which I inherited from my personal circumstances as an only child (and grandchild) and product of divorce. For a long time, I associated giving money with giving love, and withholding money as withholding love. After her divorce, my mom developed a scarcity mindset, which created a lot of fear around money in me. In part, it drove me to become a lawyer to chase a big paycheck in hopes I’d never need to worry or need anything from anyone ever again.
I think I’ve done a great job evolving beyond these messages, but likely because my plan didn’t work out (hello, Recession-era millennial here!). That big paycheck didn’t come, and I was left saddling a six-figure sack of student loan debt from law school. Douglas did a lot to help me see that I was still in control even when things felt out of control. More importantly, he showed me that I was worthy of unconditional love, which opened my heart to trusting someone enough to share a life (and money) with them.
How do various facets of your identity impact your work and finances?
I am still hurting from the Recession and how my early legal career went; not only in those tough economic years but through the challenges I experienced as a young mother in corporate law. I promised myself I wouldn’t tie up my self-worth in this book, but I’d be lying to say I don’t feel like I still have something to prove. That’s just the honest truth.
We asked every couple we interviewed whether they have “enough.” I am just proud that the choices I’ve made over the past several years are the most authentic to who I want to be and attune with helping me find my way there. I’m almost there.
What’s one financial decision that frequently causes you stress? How do you work through it?
It’s not so much a financial decision but the issue that rears its head in our relationship now. Ever since I forfeited my corporate salary and benefits to join our wealth management firm full-time, I worry a lot about my ability to create continuity for the business and our family should something ever happen to Doug. We’re not just salaried W-2 employees. We earn and spend money in various ways. We also have business expenses and personal expenses to reconcile. It’s more complex than your average household’s financial landscape. I often insist on touching base more than our typical quarterly money meetings just to clarify things as they come up, and I become more educated piece by piece. It’s been a process and will continue being a process.
Besides yours, what personal finance book, newsletter or blog do you most recommend and why? Who is it best for?
Lindsey Stanberry’s The Purse, right here on Substack. She is truly doing the work to offer women not just accessible financial education but entertainment, support and unique points of view on current events impacting our wallets (err, purses). I can’t recommend it enough.
Instead of talking about the weather, what do you wish strangers would ask you about when you meet on the street?
I want to talk about documentaries. I watch almost every documentary that lands on our streaming channels and am a repository of facts on random stories and topics because of this!
Douglas
What’s the most joyful thing you’ve done with money in the past six(ish) months?
We booked some family vacations. Our kids are now at the age where traveling is actually fun and we love sharing experiences together. Honestly, this is better than any material possession they could ever receive. Creating memories is what life is all about and we will talk about these trips forever!
What messages did you get about money growing up? Which have you held onto and which have you let go?
“Know the value of a dollar.” My grandpa always wanted me to know what money could do for you, like buying your time back in the future. I was too young to really understand what he meant at the time, but I knew enough to know that not understanding the importance of money was frowned upon. I didn’t like that feeling at all. So, I held onto that. And fortunately, I was able to figure out what it meant to me as an adult. I worked hard on myself to shed those negative feelings from that original lesson. My dad also taught me how to use money to my advantage, which sometimes meant borrowing. However, I firsthand saw the dangers that come with leverage. I saw the damage it can do. It left an impression that I still wrestle with today.
How do various facets of your identity impact your work and finances?
I grew up in Boca Raton, a well-to-do town in South Florida associated with old people and money. It’s easy to get caught up in the “wealth effect.” Fancy cars and big homes everywhere can really distort your sense of work and money. At some point I stopped thinking everyone just had these things and asked, “What did this person do to be able to afford this?” I started to assume it was hard work, and I reframed my thinking around it. Ultimately, this has served me well when I think about my own work ethic and financial goals. However, my experience in my family business had some rough moments that made me more financially conservative than I’d like to be. I wish I could shake those feelings for good and take some bigger swings without feeling like the world will end if I mess it up.
What’s one financial decision that frequently causes you stress? How do you work through it?
Upgrading our house. We really want to move in the next few years, but given the current economic landscape, and how much we’ve been investing in ourselves and our business, I am skittish about significantly increasing our fixed expenses. I also worry that I will say this even when we are objectively in a financial position to pull the trigger. Heather and I like to plan, and we value the importance of communication when it comes to our money. (After all, we wrote a book together on the subject.) But it’s taken a while to get me to come around to mapping it out together. We’re there now, though, and it’s becoming more exciting than scary. I think we’ve done a good job of setting the right expectations.
Besides yours, what personal finance book, newsletter or blog do you most recommend and why? Who is it best for?
The Psychology of Money by Morgan Housel. This book has become the gold standard for understanding how to think about money. It’s for everyone to help understand why they behave the way they do around money. He’s a brilliant storyteller, and you can read the book in one setting, as well as over and over again. His new book, The Art of Spending Money, is a wonderful follow up as well.
Instead of talking about the weather, what do you wish strangers would ask you about when you meet on the street?
What an awesome question! I wish strangers would ask me what one thing I did that improved my life in the last year, because I am a fixer and I love helping people fix things. Selfishly, I want them to answer the same question for me, because maybe they did something I can use to benefit my own life.
Follow Heather and Douglas’s newsletter The Joint Account, follow Heather on social media @averagejoelle, and buy their book, Money Together, wherever you find books.
Your turn
What questions or comments do you have for Heather and Douglas? Have you experienced challenges talking about money in a relationship? What lessons have you learned? What are you excited to learn more about in Money Together? Add your comments below for a chance to win a free copy!
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We loved your questions, Dana, and are just so grateful to share this space with your readers today!
I have a wonderful husband - we married late in life and he has 3 "adult" children. I have none. I use quotes because 2 of them are approaching 40 and still live in his house rent-free. They don't pay for repairs, taxes, insurance....nothing. This house is 50 years old! This is absurdly codependent to me. He moved into my house which we are still paying for as well as 2 car payments etc. We have many expenses, and he still works FT at 69. I have brought it up numerous times. If you were me would you insist that he start charging them at least $1000 a month to cover the cost of the home? How would you approach this sensitive topic? We have no financial goals and that bothers me as well.