Why Financial Literacy Is Vital In Your Marriage?

Today we have a reader, Margaret Chua, a wife in her thirties is being generous by sharing her life lesson on financial which is a norm for Malaysian couples, however too few would like to share. We are grateful that Margaret is willing to open up so many people out there will be able to learn something from her story.

Her Story

I do not have financial planning all the while in my life until age 34 when I noticed my husband owed several credit cards with total debt amount about RM100,000 in year 2013. We are always financially independent when we met and that continues until we are married. We shared equally required home expenses, housing loan debt, kids expenses, etc all the time.

I noticed he started to change a lot and beginning to be very temperamental including his behaviour towards our children. That went on for at least a year.  One day, he came to me and requested me to refinance our house in order for him to restructure his debt as he was not able to cope monthly minimum credit card payment anymore.

Only then I realised that he owed several credit cards debt for quite some time and the debt accumulated to more than RM100,000. A few months before approval of our house loan refinance, he borrowed RM7,000 from me to pay for his monthly credit card payment. I was shocked and very disappointed with this man because I never imagined such thing will happen to us.

My Financial

I took a loan from PTPTN to support my education, and  I worked oversea for few years after graduated. I am an engineer in a multinational oil and gas company and still doing comfortable in the same industry. I do not have much financial problem so far in my life. I bought a house before I start my family. I do not spend on materials and I consider myself as not a materialistic person. I save my monthly balance and invest in unit trust.

My Husband

My husband is also an engineer graduate and works in sales. He was always a big spender, and personally I think he did not manage his finance well. Hence, as we went into the marriage we came to a mutual agreement that we both will manage our own finances separately. Our shared expenses are like food and necessities are divided accordingly. I waited patiently for 8 years hoping his financial status to improve or  better year by year. However, what happened in year 2013 was a major disappointment.

Solving The Problem

After we refinanced the house and settled his debt, I quickly realized the importance of financial planning. Financial planning in a family should not depend on husband and wife together. It can be started individually as both individual may have different views on financial planning or life security and life requirement.

I bought a condominium near us in year 2014 by my own a year after my husband’s debt was settled. This condominium cost me RM640K and tenanted with monthly rental RM2000. However, I am still down by RM1200 for monthly installment and maintenance fee as the rental do not cover the whole investment expenses.

However, I see this as a first step for me to start my financial planning journey rather than hoping one day my husband will be ready to buy another house together with me, etc. I know I need to start to do something to make a change in my life.

In the same year, I started to read a lot of financial books, joined financial learning relevant website (Kclau.com, etc), read financial magazine and economy section in newspaper, etc. I saw the opportunity in share market, I started to ask friend around, started to read stock forum and learn to read stock chart, etc.

Taking The Leap

A year later, I began to accumulate my investment capital for stock markets. I cut down my un-necessary life expenses and try to accumulate my capital for stock investment. I read stock relevant books, I made a first move to buy stock as stock market was in downside in year 2015. I slowly sharpen my stock investment skill and able to have RM80,000 capital in my stock investment plus RM20,000 profit in year 2016. And in year 2017, with RM100,000 capital in stock investment plus gaining of RM20,000. I hope to achieve my 2017 target for total RM100,000 profit in stock investment. I hope I can achieve this target.

At the same time, I plan to either settle part of my housing loan or buy a third property in this weak property market, and still studying the market. I hope that with the gain from stock investment and year 2017 saving, I am able to settle part of my existing housing loan and hope to grab a landed property by year-end 2017 or early year 2018.

I understand that 3rd property need 30% down payment. If I go for second hand landed property it will cost me around 35% to 40% downpayment. Say for a RM750K landed property, I need to have at least RM300K in hand. Optionally, if I go for condominium, there are plenty of 20% or 30% discount condominium offer in KL city center. However, I would prefer to go for a landed property as I own two condominiums already.

Moving Forward

I contacted bank mortgage personal and was informed that i can get at least RM600K loan approval, however, the RM300K down payment is my most headache now if I wish to achieve my 3rd property (landed) goal. Third option is that I need to settle one of my housing loan to enjoy 90% loan approval. However, I need time to accumulate my 10% downpayment. Headache. Anyway, i found that my financial status now is very much better than the past since i start to know the real meaning of FINANCE or FINANCIAL planning.

Thanks to Kclau.com. I joined several financial learning website. So far, I feel kclau.com is my most preferred website. I try to join the PWM membership but i missed the last offer in March 2017. I will definitely join the next offer section in June 2017. The usual selected topic in kclau.com and the webinar video is very useful to me and I love to know more about financial.

I hope that my article is not too long or too boring but this is my real life story. I concluded that if we do not do proper financial planning, a family happiness will definitely gone as money is the fundamental element to support a family basic life. Thanks KC to give me this chance to share my story. Thank you and have a nice day ahead.

Your Feedback

Once again, we are grateful that Margaret is open enough to share her life story. Most importantly the story will open many readers eye, and motivate them to make a change for better financial status. We would to hear your comment below or share your stories by sending them to kclau@kclau.com