Courtship and marriage affect every aspect of our financial lives. Courting a lady or gentleman and getting married is one of the major life-changing events that will continue to have huge long-term financial impact on our lives on earth.
While it might not seem romantic to think about them this way, courtship and marriages are basically interpersonal business deals.
Like any other business deal, you want to know whether it’s going to change your finances.
Lack of understanding of courtship and building relationship and also presents unnecessary pressure on young adults who desire to marry and in search for right partners. Instead of young adults undertaking trust and character assessment test to assure themselves of the right partner; it has become who can get each other expensive gift, support each other financially and partying.
Therefore, courtship is now becoming more expensive than marriage itself.
Currently, most young people are choosing their partners based on your financial status instead of vision, love, character, compatibility etc.
Today, a typical marriage means two incomes, sharing debts, setting joint long-term financial goals, and two different lifestyles.
Hiding financial resources or lack of transparency or openness in the management of resources is a recipe for financial crisis and insecurity in marriage.
It’s a well-known fact that, financial distress is one of the major reasons for marriage and courtship breakdown.
Therefore personal differences in spending, saving and accounting for money or resources affect courtship and marriage success.
Marriage goes with responsibilities and that if one fails to acquire all the necessary knowledge that makes courtship and marriage successful, then certainly divorce is inevitable.
One of the key responsibilities in marriage is to be able to provide financially for the family by both husband and wife.
But some walk into marriage by faith and that is good but appreciating the financial knowledge aspect of marriage is critical for an enjoyable and peaceful marriage.
This article is written to expose young adults and married couples to financial implications of courtship and marriage; for which most married couples have overlooked over the period and are still battling with poor the financial judgement at the time of choosing a partner and marrying.
Therefore young adults and marriage couples need to explore all resources available on courtship and marriage especially financial aspect before taking that step of faith into courtship and marriage.
THE NEED TO LOVE AND COST OF LOVING
The need to love and be loved has its own associated cost. Some spend a lot in making friends or choosing a partner.
These cost at the courtship level could be in in the form of partying, gifts, travels, financial assistance to partners, and support for family members of lovers. Despite these myriad of cost, people still come together to have a companion:
• To share enjoyable and painful moments together;
• To confide in the most hidden intimacies of their souls.
The decision to love presents some financial cost to every person during courtship and in marriage whether rich or poor.
In some cases people avoid much of the cost at courtship stage depending on the circumstance that brought them together and various activities people in love engage in.
The cost of courtship may differ from one person to the other. The cost further increases when one decide to marry.
The decision to marry if not analysed in terms of cost and a person’s ability to create wealth to meet the cost of both courtship and marriage can leads to marriage challenges and finally divorce.
For instance in the past , the choice of companion for marriage was the preserve or decision of parents or relatives whereas today, although this custom continues to exist in certain cultures, the free choice of partners for courtship or marriage, is now predominant and presents huge financial challenges to young adults.
In situations where parents choose partners for their young adults, the cost of courtship is lower compared to where young adults choose their own partners. Cost of getting a companion has aggravated today especially for both engagement and the wedding ceremony.
Therefore everybody makes personal decisions on a daily basis but the decision to court and get married presents unending financial challenges and requires financial knowledge on how to earn regular income and meet family expense to ensure a successful courtship and finally a peaceful and enjoyable marriage.
Unfortunately, majority of us do not examine the financial implications of such decisions.
These decisions will continue to have short –term, medium -term and long –term effects today’s marriage and courtship.
……………………………………… TO BE CONTINUED..
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Source: B&FT Obline