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Navin was doing very well in life when I met him 7 years ago. He was earning twice as much as I was and was very popular amongst his friends for always ‘getting the bill’. His generosity was impressive. We started dating and he would shower me with the best things in the world, he’d get me things that I wanted and even those that I never asked for. I felt like the luckiest girl in the world until there was a real problem.
After two years of dating, Navin asked me to marry him - his success and lifestyle really impressed my parents and within about a year’s time, we tied the knot. Everything was going smoothly till Navin wanted to buy a car. He liked a really fancy car that was for about 30 lakhs. He got a loan of about 20 lakhs. For the down payment, he asked me if I could pay the 10 lakhs. I was a bit taken-aback as that wasn’t a planned expenditure for me. So I asked him why he could not pay it himself - so he casually replied, ‘I don’t have, don’t worry I’ll pay you back in installments’. This came as a huge red flag to me.
‘How do you not have 10 lakhs when you earn so much?’ I asked him. ‘I spend it all, don’t worry, I’ll save up for our old-age’, he joked. That’s when I realized that Navin did not save. He lived month on month, on his salary and blew it all up like a school kid blows up his pocket money. This made me extremely uncomfortable. All the things that he was getting for me and all the money he was spending on friends was not thought through. I, on the other hand, had all my expenses planned. From PPFs to LICs to Mutual Funds, I was investing in everything, saving taxes, basically adulting. But Navin had no clue where his salary would go every month!
I was extremely insecure and that’s when I reached out to my brother who offered to help me out to get Navin to start to save. ‘Start with a joint account’, he suggested. ‘Decide a fixed amount that both of you will contribute to it on a monthly basis and make sure that the day you get your salaries, you transfer the agreed amount to the said account. This will feel like an equal partnership and will somewhat coax him into doing something he isn’t used to. Next, ask his bank to assign him an investment expert who can guide him professionally with how he can start multiplying his income. Let me know how it goes.’ My brother's words made a lot of sense.
The next morning, I told Navin that I would give him the money for the car down payment if he agreed to open a joint account with me. Navin said ‘Yes’ immediately, ‘as long as you figure it out for me - I am very bad at all this’. I wanted to tell him that I already knew how bad he was at it, but I didn’t say it. Instead, I held his hand and assured him that we could start afresh and work towards a secure future, together - one month at a time.
