We always link marriage and finances together, whether for good or for bad. It is a lot easier to have a successful marriage when you have your finances in order than with messy finances. But how do you get to the point where you are entirely in control of your finances, and you can simply focus on being happy together? Well, it takes time, patience, and education.
My name is Josh, and my wife’s name is Kristina (Kris), and we have been married for 15 years. We are now experiencing the freedom that having a solid grasp on finances can bring. Being able to breathe without debt and having extra cash flow has allowed us to focus on what is essential; our relationships, our children, and our dog.
How did we get to the point where finances are no longer our number one concern? Well, I can tell you that we didn’t start here. We learned our butts off and created multiple streams of income that paid our debt and still keeps cash flow coming in. Let’s review ten ways to build a strong relationship while enjoying the benefits of a robust bank account.
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1) Your relationship requires experience. To build healthy futures, we have to treat our relationship as it is a separate entity. When we were children, our parents created experiences to teach joy, happiness, and excitement throughout our childhood.
Relationships also need to have experiences. Kris and I traveled a lot during our 20s and 30s. We rode on hot air balloons, visited Disneyland, drove bumper carts, played mini-golf, and explored New York City.
These experiences were all part of “Josh & Kris.” Combining these trips with other education helped us build a solid foundation of love, trust, and excitement. I mention creating experiences for a specific purpose.
I do not want you to walk away from this article saying, “Okay, babe, no more traveling or fun, we need to pay down debt. That’s it; our life is over.” No, that is not the intent. The intent is to balance our work/play atmospheres by leveraging cheap entertainment and experiences.
I cannot tell you how vital it is to build your experiences as a couple. It is probably the most critical aspect of relationships for young couples. Learn how to maximize discounts, points, rewards, coupons, family, and other avenues to accomplish this mission.
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2) Control Expenses. The number one way to feel rich is to have more money coming in than going out. Expenses are things that we can’t permanently remove but we can control. I do not mean never use the air conditioning or recycle your toilet paper.
The expenses we can control are vices (alcohol, smoking, energy drinks, expensive coffee), shopping (only buy what you need), food (reduce your food intake and food bills), etc.
Controlling expenses is the long game—trying to save $5/month by setting the home to 85 degrees will just make you miserable.
3) Budget religiously. As a young couple, I had a “loose” budget. I had $1,000 that I directly deposited into my budget account. From there, we would pay all the bills, not tracking each individual payment.
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For the last four years, I have used a very detailed budget that goes down to the penny. I have never felt more in control of my finances. My wife and I can live very comfortably off $3,000/month because I know my expenses are roughly $800/month.
Next, you can add in our food budget, fun, gas, and random things, but all together, we can live an extraordinary life right at $3,000/month. It just helps that we bring in $17,000/month, which brings me to my next point.
4) Manage lifestyle inflation. Lifestyle inflation is the killer of wealth. Over the years, your lifestyle can slowly creep up with promotions and other success. We start to exchange our cars more frequently, searching for the new “hotness.” Our expenses begin to compound with too many subscription services, luxury foods, fine-dinings, trips, and furniture.
It is a very natural thing for lifestyle creep to sneak up on us all. The number one way to prevent lifestyle inflation is to have an air-tight budget. If you know that all your expenses are $900/month, food is $500/month, and extras are $500/month—there isn’t a reason for this to change over time.
I read once that your income should be increasing every single year. At first, I thought this was impossible and out of my control, but I was wrong. You are absolutely in control of your income, just not the revenue from your job. We will talk more about multiple streams of income later.
The idea, for now, is that every single year your income should be going up, but your lifestyle expenses should be staying flat. They could even be decreasing. The money in between your income and expenses is called cash flow, and those are two of the most important words to your marriage.
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5) Add investing into your monthly budget. Now, we get to the fun parts. You have your detailed budget that tracks expenses to the penny. We know how much your various payments are, including utilities, food, and entertainment. You and your spouse have made it a priority to stick to these numbers and budgets.
All of a sudden, you start to see money populate into your bank account. At this point, investing will become a separate, mandatory budget. Yes, that is right, investing will be every bit as vital as your utilities.
You see, investing is one reason why your income can increase every single year. When you invest in dividend-paying stocks, your income will start to snowball upwards. Not only do your stocks increase in value, but they also will pay more in dividends each year. You are also purchasing more stocks each year as well, either by direct purchase or by reinvesting dividends.
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So, instead of lifestyle inflation, your investment budget will start to inflate. Once you pay off your car, that money goes directly into your investment account. It is the same for paying off student loans, mortgages, credit cards, personal loans, tax returns, windfalls, stimulus checks, etc. It all goes into investments.
6) Learn about passive income. Now, as a couple, you will start to feel rich. Your friends will be out buying new cars, going on expensive trips, and purchasing designer items. You will be budgeting and investing.
It may sound like a boring life, but the exact opposite is true. Investing and building passive income are some of the most fun that my wife and I have had together.
Imagine an Indiana Jones movie (I’m dating myself). Dr. Jones is in the desert, running, jumping, climbing, and fighting his way to grab the treasure. Building passive income is the same feeling. Each form of passive income is a unique treasure.
As a couple, it’s our job to harness the power of each form of passive income and maximize its potential. We never sit still and are always looking at ways to improve each source.
For example, my wife is now exploring getting a refinance on our third house. The new loan will save us $200/month. That is $200 that we can invest in dividend stocks or Bitcoin. Now imagine doing this every day as a team.
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Passive income doesn’t come for free; it requires knowledge. The stock market requires knowledge of debt cycles, inflations, interest rates, super-cycles, etc. If you put the time in, you will get the results.
7) Shift the focus from work. As you build passive income streams via dividends, businesses, royalties, and rental income, you will start to understand how unimportant your job is to happiness.
We grew up thinking that the job was the end all be all of the wealth-building, but in fact, it is the exact opposite. A job is just a job. A career is just a job over a long time. The only wealth that lasts are payments we receive when we don’t work.
These payments are called passive income. And each year, your passive income will increase. You will soon realize that you have the option to work or not work, which is the power of passive income and the compounding effect.
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I cannot describe the feeling of not being controlled by your job or its paycheck. We spent our whole life thinking that our job was in control and we have to be a slave to whatever it wanted. My wife and I are now free. We bring in enough passive income to survive without jobs. And this is without my military paycheck.
8) Enjoy your passive income. After two years of building up our passive income revenue streams, we can now start to enjoy the fruits of our labor a little. We still put the majority of our income into investments, but we have extra cash at this point.
Remember how the rich buy their bling. The rich buy assets (or create them), and once their assets produce money, they can buy nice things with that income stream. We are at this point now. I’ll give you a couple of examples.
Rents. We collect roughly $2,000+ in rents per month. We put this money into investments most of the time, but now our dividend portfolio is over $150,000. We have leeway to spend some of the income produced by rents on ourselves.
I currently live in Japan, but we can take a trip wholly funded on rental income when I get home. How cool is that? And the following month, those rents will be back in our pocket. It is truly is a prosperous life.
Dividends. We are at the point where our dividends are paying a significant amount. This week alone, I will be receiving a $30 dividend from Altria (MO), $50 from Pimco Income Closed-End Fund (PCI), and $35 from AT&T (T).
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We can use this $115 anyway we want. Shopping, restaurants, investing, or just have a night out. These concepts are so powerful that it is hard to describe in words. My wife and I both grew up without a lot of money, so the idea that we have money now is transformative.
9) Enjoy your relationship. Congratulations, you have now conquered the idea of living well and staying married. It is tough to do both. Many people get divorced to get to the point in their life where they are financially free.
But you did it while staying married. Trust me, it is rare, and you all should be proud. But we still have more life to live. There is one remaining concept of passive income that makes our journey always continuous.
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We can leave passive income investments to other generations, including book royalties, dividends stocks, Bitcoins, real estate, etc. It can significantly affect the wealth, health, and happiness of your children and grandchildren. So why stop now?
You will find that your passive income journey will make your relationship closer than ever because you are buying your freedom and your children’s freedom. The best feeling in my life is becoming financially free together with my wife.
10) Become kids again. I talked to Kris today, and I told her I feel like we are 23 and 20 years old again. That is the age when we met. We had no actual responsibilities when we met, and now we have freedom as well.
Sure, we have children, houses, tenets, jobs, etc. But we feel so free now because we have conquered what the world has thrown at us. We currently are in complete control, and we are steering the ship. Exactly how we felt 17 years ago when we first met.
Now, all we have to do is slowly add passive income streams, improve current streams, and teach this valuable information to our kids and grandkids. It is a truly remarkable life.
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And yes, money does make it easier to have a relationship. But it is not the money you make by working 20 hours a day or 90 hours a week. Or by becoming so stressed out at your job that you become addicted, depressed, or suicidal.
No, it’s the money you make while you sleep, spend time with family, and relax with your dogs. I know that I would rather be making money passively while drinking coffee with Kris than be at work getting yelled at daily? How about you?
What are some of the financial issues you want to conquer? How detailed is your budget, and have you experienced lifestyle inflation? Do you have any passive income streams? No matter the answer, today is the best time to start your passive income journey and build the best relationship possible.
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Disclosure: I am not a financial advisor or money manager, and any knowledge is given as guidance and not direct actionable investment advice. I am an Amazon Affiliate. Please research any investment vehicles that are being considered. I wrote this article myself, and it expresses my own opinions. I am not receiving compensation for it. I have no business relationship with any company whose stock is mentioned in this article.
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