Marriage: The Annual Family Financial Meeting

Sit down at least once a year, preferably more, throughout your marriage to have an involved discussion about your finances. Don't wait until crisis time to review and plan. That can lead to much more stress and general anxiety associated with financial discussions. Instead, your annual financial discussion allows you both to calmly and rationally assess where you are, determine if your financial goals have changed, and decide what you need to do to meet your goals. If you have this discussion more than once a year, you'll be that much more financially in sync.

Other topics of discussion should include:

Important Documents
You both should know exactly where all your important documents are located including insurance policies, wills, tax forms, bank account numbers, investment specifics and more.

Current Debts and Assets
Add up all of your debts. See how much you have paid off in the past year and decide if that's acceptable or if you need to try harder in the coming year. Do the same with assets. Understand how your money is working for you and try to determine if it should be working harder.

Budget
Get an idea of what you've been spending your money on. If your spending doesn't match your priorities, fine-tune your budget to help you get the most out of your income.

Re-evaluate Your Goals
Revisit the financial goals you made in the last annual meeting. Are you moving towards those goals? Do those goals still matter to you? Talk about any other goals you would like to work on, both short-term and long-term.

Find Your Vulnerability
Find the weak links on your financial armor. Do you have too much debt? Are either of your jobs/incomes not secure? Do you have insufficient income to cover your spending? Just identifying these weaknesses can help you avoid some pitfalls. But you should also talk about how you can strengthen these areas and incorporate these strategies into your financial goals.

Day-to-day Responsibilities
Is the division of responsibilities you made still practical? Is it working out or does one person feel overburdened?

Learning About Yourself
What have you learned about your financial self in the past year? It's as important that you talk about your feelings concerning money matters as it is to talk about the practicality of money.