My husband and I are probably a little more separate than many couples because of his work situation.  Most of the time we aren't even sharing living accomodations!

We have separate vehicles, separate closets, separate computes, separate cell phones, separate printers (although he always uses mine because the ink is too expensive for his and he ran out a long time ago).  We do share a GPS but I wouldn't mind having my own as there are times during the week I would make use of one.  My digital camera is an old second hand one so we usually share his.

We share a home (and all the rooms in it, including our closet), a small cabin, our bed . . . we share our computer, our tv, our stereo . . .

We have separate cell phones (his is work-related and mine is a cheapie that I pay only as I use it which isn't much), and separate vehicles.  We don't share toothbrushes, or other personal hygiene items.  The camera is mine - he isn't interested in photography.

We share our lives (but do have individuals interests and activities) and our love, we share our love for our children, our love for our families, and our hopes and dreams for the future.

Thanks Beloved.  You took something I started just for fun and turned it into something beautiful.

We keep separate bank accounts for various arcane reasons.

Car-wise we nominally each have "my car" but it's more a matter of preference (I find the SUV too big and high off the ground compared to my compact, she prefers having the bigger vehicle and extra safety features like traction control that it packs) and we do swap vehicles a lot.

I don't have my own computer at home, but share one with my son and also have an account on hers (I keep documents and favorites synch'ed between the two using Windows Live Mesh). The Kobos are nominally mine and my son's but are really shared among the three of us.

Now, having said all that, that's current reality. We lived apart much of the time, and therefore maintained two fully furnished, functioning households, for the first few years of our marriage but got that fixed (fortunately) around the time Little M was born.

Mendalla

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Early in our marriage, within the first eight or ten years, I discovered that sharing of income and bank accounts wasn't working for us.   We didn't have much disposable income, but we did have different priorities as to how it should be spent.  So, once I started working pretty much full time, we started keeping two separate bank accounts.   Once a month we sat down to pay the bills - you know, electricity, cable, telephone, water & sewerage.  We usually ended up in a big argument.  Why?  It is hard to understand since the bills came every month and usually didn't vary much.  Gradually we developed a system in which he gave me a certain amount each month.  From it I paid the routine bills, bought the groceries, looked after my personal needs and those of the children.  He made the car payment (he was the one who always wanted to trade the car as soon as it was paid off).  He also paid the rent - and then the mortgage.  Vacation time or Christmas we decided what we wanted to do and both contributed.   But generally - it was his money and my money.   We still do it that way when we are both relying on OAP and supplement,  and CPP.

In the beginning he had a car - I didn't.   He didn't even want me to get my drivers' license.   I took my income tax refund one year and took driving lessons.  After that I occasionally drove 'his' car, until he decided he needed a truck and I got to keep the family car (by then the kids were driving as well).   For a few years we each had our own vehicle.  Now we are back to one vehicle - our car.  

We share our home.  He does have a room in the basement for his model trains (I guess the laundry room is mine ).   We share our kids.  We share our grandkids.  

I guess you could say we share our lives.

We share the same kids and grandkids, some of the same freinds, many of the same interests, many of the same memories and quite a lot of 'history'.

 Physically we share a lot - our home, our car, our appliances, machines and general stuff.  We each 'own' certain hobby items but never refuse to let the other borrow them when we aren't using them.  He is NOT to use my toothbrush and I don't want to use his!  Neither of us throw out the other person's 'junk' and there are dedicated spots in the house for it to live.  We have a desk top computer and a laptop but usually use the one we prefer (he likes the laptop better).   

We too had many arguments about money and finally settled for having it in two different banks - 'his' money and 'mine', but they are both joint accounts.  His income is higher and I get an amount from that each month to pay regular bills, household expenses and gifts for the rest of the family.  My pension is mine to spend as I wish.  His bank account pays car expenses, house repairs, mortgage and car payment when applicable.  We tend to share the costs of trips, unexpected costs and special treats.  Now that we aren't paying a mortgage or car payment I'd like for us to be putting that money aside for house repairs and a new car when needed.  He prefers to spend whatever money is left over.

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I just realized that my husband and I don't even share a calendar.  Yesterday I put up my new UCC church calendar in the dining area of the kitchen closest to my chair.  He put up his new calendar (featuring a different train each month) in the wooden frame near his chair.   Mostly I mark appointments and upcoming events on my calendar - he will mark things that he is specifically interested in (train club events) on his.   

LOL- we have individual calendars that we share!

I have mine and he has his but we each write on the other's as needed.  It may be 'my' doctors appointment, but he is required to help with the driving to the city so I put it on his calendar.  It may 'his' club meeting but I have to be aware that the car won't be available that Saturday, so he writes it on my calendar.

We share all the household items and electronics except personal hygeine items. Although I have used his deodorant before and vice versa if one of us runs out....but it's not preferable just because I don't want to smell  spicey and he doesn't want to smell like flowers...I suppose we could even buy one neutral scent and share it...would that be gross? This idea doesn't bother me. We sometimes also share stuff like hair gel too, but he avoids using that anyway--he just goesn't like to put gunk in his hair. If we wanted to wear each other''s clothes, we could share, the sharing part isn't the issue...we are generous about sharing...it's because  they wouldn't fit and wouldn't look so good on each other. That said, I have worn his T-shirts as night shirts, that's okay...but he wouldn't fit into mine.

I don't think it's a good idea to share deoderant, just incase of transmitting infection... though I'm not sure how likely that is. Like they say you shouldn't share mascara or lipstick with other people... However, you could buy the unscented.

Funny to picture you and your guy sharing clothes Kimmio, though I do have a cute picture of me in hubby's raincoat. Kinda like wearing Dad's coat. : )

Inheritances??  I think we'd decide together what to do with a windfall like that, but all our parents and grandparents are dead and didn't have any money to leave us. 

At the time we married neither of us had anything much beyond our clothes and a few bits of household stuff (mostly hand me downs), so we didn't have anything to write a prenup about.  We were delighted to get some Corningware, Pyrex and tea towels for wedding gifts. 

The house was bought with both our names on the mortgage and the insurance policy that paid for the house if either of us died before the debt was paid off.

Maybe it was simpler in the 'olden days'? 

The thing with sharing deodorant...well, I wouldn't share it with a stranger, but my partner isn't a stranger. It's just his arm pits...lol...he puts deodorant on right after a shower, so do I...all clean. Since we share a bed and other things, and we have no known communicable diseases, I'm not afraid of getting an infection from him. It only happens rarely, but we have shared doedorant when we've run out. As far as I know, the chemicals, usually alcohol, in deodorant kill bacteria..maybe that's why it seems less gross to me. We don't share bath towels. I have my spot to hang mine and he has his. We don't share toothbrushes. No. It probably wouldn't kill us if we did, but that's just too gross to me. I have bought the unscented mitchum too, btw, elanor...my mom used to use that all the time too. That was in the 70's, early 80's. There were fewer choices then :)

We don't own any land or a house. I don't see that happening anytime soon. All the other stuff in our home...well it's not worth a whole lot of money anyway, and it's just stuff...if we ever split up, I'd be much more upset about being alone than being without stuff.

Deoderant is one thing we do share.   We buy unscented.  We have several sitting around the bedroom and bathroom.  We grab whichever is handier.  On trips, to save space, we usually only take one.  The same with toothpaste. But we have our own brushes.  And we each have our own towel rack.   When we had children we not only had four towel racks but our towels were colour coded.    We live in a small house with one bathroom (and a mud room in the basement that is hardly ever used now that the kids are gone).

Pre-nup agreement?   Never heard of in my circles 45 years ago.  And what did we have to claim?   His old rusty car, our clothes, my books, and the optomism of youth.  

Inheritances?    Fairly early in our marriage I inherited a couple hundred dollars from an aunt.  We put it in our savings for our downpayment (which was all of $4,000) for our first home.  

In the last decade we each qiote unexpectedly inherited some money from one of his brothers (me a lump sum - he a percentage of the residue that worked out to about 4x my amount - and our kids were also remembered).   We each put some towards something we had always wanted for ourselves, and added the rest to our seperate bank accounts.  Over the years we drew on it to take trips, spend on hobbies, and make life a little easier.    So in a way I guess we could say that it was both separate and shared.   We don't foresee any more windfalls unless he wins big in the lottery - and I'm not holding my breath.

What we leave? - it wouldn't be much except perhaps the house.    It will go the survivor, and then equally to the children (to divide equally or as they see fit - they get along).   

I think a prenup is acceptable in certain circumstances, like if one person is quite wealthy going in and the other isn't.  Or if one has children.  Sometimes it makes it a little easier for parents to accept a marriage if a prenup is signed.  If my partner had a lot of debt I probably would have kept my finances separate, but we have similar ideas about money so we combined them.

Originally, the plan was for my husband and I to have seperate bank accounts and one joint one.  We we at seperate banks and didn't really want to close everything.  We had set up a joint account at my bank but they kept screwing things up, we got really annoyed and closed it.  Now, I have 1 account there simply so I can keep my oldest credit card without fees.  His bank bases fees on minimum monthly balances so we decided to upgrade and make it joint.  He no longer has a separate bank account, but does have seperate credit cards.  The number of credit cards between us is probably slightly excessive, 1 joint and 2 separate each.  We might look into closing some, but as they are all no fee and we aren't carrying balances there is no hurry.

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Only one of our children is married.  Our Wills don't make provision for a sil.   If our  unmarried child predeceases me and my husband our other child will inherit it all.  If the married child predeceases, I believe the laws of inheritance in this province would give her share to her children and it would be divided between them and held in trust until they reach the age of majority.  (I probably should confirm that and/or have my wishes written into my Will which I haven't reviewed or revised for some time.   My sil will not inherit.  However my daughter may choose to share with him - and if something happened to her after she inherited from me, it would be part of her estate and be disposed of according to her Will or if she died intestate the bulk of it would go to my sil - but I would have no control over that and I would be long gone. 

If my daughter chooses to share her inheritance with her spouse, even if I didn't like him (and I do), that is her choice, not mine.  

Thanks Seeler.