For Richer, For Poorer – Mixed Credit Marriages

Many a potential bride or groom has zealously protected his or her credit scores for decades and carefully monitored purchases to make sure that credit card debt never became a problem only to fall head over heels for a spendthrift mate who’s never even made a budget.  Even though you would expect like minded couples to share similar attitudes toward credit ratings, love doesn’t always work just as we would predict.  Fortunately, credit reports archived by the three main bureaus serving the residents of the United States do not necessarily contain any data about the financial affairs of spouses unless the credit accounts are jointly held.  So long as a married individual keeps his debts to himself and insists upon maintaining a fully separate credit portfolio, there’s no reason at all why love should interfere with your FICO scores.

Of course, once you tie the knot, keeping anything private from the new spouse could be easier said than done as all semblances of privacy soon fall by the wayside during the rush toward a blessed (and all too final) union.  Even if you do manage to stave off the desire to take out at least one credit account as husband and wife – and it’s a hard heart indeed that could saunter through a department store, arm in arm with betrothed, without succumbing to the urgings of sales clerks toward a mutually agreed upon charge card – there’s a further hurdle to be dealt with, one that most couples don’t even think about until it’s too late.  Merely as a matter of convenience, most every wife will ask to be added as an authorizer used to the husband’s credit cards and vice versa, but that’s a slippery slope to the complete interweaving of debt histories.

Even if your new spouse wasn’t part of the original loan application for a card or a line of credit, he or she will be held just as responsible for all borrowing activity once recognized as an authorized user and then bear the brunt of the negative FICO scores should any payments become delinquent.  Of course, by the same token, allowing a new spouse access to credit opportunities he or she wouldn’t otherwise be able to garner could easily be seen as a kindness since there’s no better route toward improving credit ratings than by sharing the positive benefits of debt payments promptly and continuously issued.  Much as the eventual fights about monthly bills and monetary obligations could tear the seemingly happiest of marriages asunder, those unions borne under a true delight in mutual betterment are often the most successful.

Beyond even the ethical dilemma of whether or not to aid a life partner’s efforts to improve credit ratings and FICO scores, there’s also the practical issue of household expenses to be dealt with.  Many husbands and wives who’ve each taken pains to preserve spotless borrowing histories and maintain peak FICO scores would already have planned and discussed their unwillingness to share and share alike when it comes to credit ratings.  However, despite their oft stated goals to maintain financial independence and separate all possible debts from the moment of proposal on forward, there are so many costs that come from blending households that at least a single joint account to be paid in part by each would make more than a little sense and prevent future disagreements over the course of a lengthy cohabitation.

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