Every traveler knows the feeling of desperately needing someone to turn to. In our Women Who Travel advice column, we'll be answering questions from our Facebook group members, readers, podcast listeners, newsletter subscribers, and travelers. Have a question? We'd love to hear from you. Email us at womenwhotravel@cntraveler.com.
Dear Women Who Travel,
After many pandemic delays, my fiancé and I are finally getting married this summer. Which also means we’re planning our honeymoon!
As someone who loves to travel, that’s the thing I’m most excited about. However, as we discuss our budget and where we want (or can) go, it’s brought up a big question we’ve sort of danced around until now. How much should we merge our finances?
We currently live together, and we tend to split things down the middle. Our bank accounts are separate. We Venmo each other like we do with our friends, and we’ve taken a similar approach with our wedding (which is on the smaller side), by just dividing costs. The honeymoon will actually be our biggest expenditure this far as a couple, and my fiancé has brought up the idea of setting up a joint bank account—we could use it to pay for everything on the trip, and transition to it for other things going forward.
I’m feeling nervous, though. I love my financial independence and never having to explain what I’m spending to someone. Is it silly to be Splitwise-ing my husband for dinners on our honeymoon, though? What do other people do? I need advice!
—Confused about money
Dear Confused Traveler,
First off, congratulations! You've got a lot to look forward to in the months ahead, so whenever these stressors rise up, take a moment to pause and remember that. Then, with a deep breath, roll up your sleeves and knock these challenges out of the way so you can get back to the fun stuff.
You raise such an interesting question, and I'd like to start by answering the last bit of it: What do other people do?
I'm sure you realize, even in asking this question, that there are a million ways to manage money in a relationship, just as there are a million ways to be in a romantic relationship. But figuring out your finances can be incredibly stressful because so few people speak openly about it. To give you a sense of how wide-ranging approaches to money and honeymoons are, I posed your question to our Women Who Travel community on Instagram.
One traveler, @captain_emilyg, said she and her husband struggled with how to split costs for their honeymoon in 2019, before they had joint accounts. They alternated paying for things during their road trip through Europe: He covered flights and a rental car, she covered accommodations and tours, and they took turns on everything else. Traveler @bridgetmorton1, on the other hand, said she and her significant other are merging finances ahead of their June '22 wedding. Another follower @deeinaus, suggested something in the middle: Creating a joint account through which you can pay for things upfront, like hotels and flights, then having your own cash for things you want to buy yourself. Of course, we also heard from women like @dinard, who is currently planning her own honeymoon and “not merging accounts anytime soon :).”