Money, Love: How Successful People Split Financial Chores

Money can't buy me love, wrote Lennon and McCartney. But loving couples could be doing a better job managing their money.

So concludes a new study of couples' financial management styles-and how they can get the best retirement planning outcomes. Released on Valentine's Day, the Hartford Financial Services Group /MIT AgeLab study reflects interviews with more than 800 pre-retirees and retirees age 45 and 74 who were married or living with a partner.

Say you don't care too much for money? If so, you're typical.

For about a third of American couples (36 percent), one spouse is the dominant financial manager. These so-called "drivers" (17 percent of respondents) handle all the household finances, while the "passengers" (19 percent) are minimally involved or completely hands off.

The partners in just over half of couples (53 percent) share financial management duties. These "joined at the hip" couples don't split or delegate financial chores, and they make all the decisions together.

The remaining 11 percent have found the financial promised land. These are what Hartford and the AgeLab call "power couples." In these "divide and conquer" relationships, each partner takes the lead on some aspect of household finance, and a secondary role in other areas.

These shared-management couples registered the study's best financial outcomes. They were most likely to have a long-range plan that assures the financial security of the surviving spouse, and to have saved at least $750,000 for retirement.

The AgeLab does research on innovation in transportation, health and wellness, aging and longevity planning at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. The joint study with Hartford aimed to identify the factors that lead to poor financial decision-making in the years leading up to retirement.

The study didn't find men any more likely than women to take the lead on money management. But one of the researchers' concerns was the impact on women of poor retirement planning. Women tend to have greater longevity than men, and in old age they experience some of the highest rates of poverty among all demographic groups.

Mohyde wants couples to ask themselves several questions to judge their own degree of preparation:

What would happen to your household income if you die first, or your spouse does?

What happens to your household assets if you or your spouse dies following a protracted and expensive illness?

Are both you and your spouse prepared to step in and manage the finances?

The study showed that very few American couples have good answers to all those contingency questions. We're either too busy-or too overwhelmed by the complexities of money and investing-to deal with it.

If that sounds like you, the researchers suggest getting some help from a financial advisor.

That may sound like self-serving advice coming from Hartford, which sells retirement products through a network of independent advisors. But on Valentine's Day, it sounds like pretty good advice ... even if you're 64.