Bad romance and bad finance go hand-in-hand.
More than half of Americans (58%) say they wouldn’t marry someone with significant debt, according to a new study of more than 2,300 adults from legal industry site Avvo. And when it comes to committed partnerships, most people don’t want to be responsible for all of the bills. Some 58% said they would feel uncomfortable in a relationship if they had to be the main breadwinner: 69% of women say they’d be uncomfortable footing most of the bills, compared to 46% of men.
This isn’t the first study to align financial and romantic aspirations. Couples’ credit scores can predict how likely it is that your relationship will last, according to a 2015 study of roughly 12 million consumers by researchers at the Federal Reserve Board, the Brookings Institution and UCLA. The higher your credit score, the less likely people are to separate from their partner — and for every 105-point spike in that credit score there is a 32% drop in the likelihood of them separating.
People on dates used to ask for your telephone number or other intimate details like how many partners you have had before. And now? “That question is replaced with, ‘What number is your credit score?’” says April Masini, a relationship advice columnist. Low credit scores and high debt levels are not only a sign of financial difficulties, they can also reveal a lot about a person’s judgment, lifestyle, impulsiveness and even his or her trustworthiness, studies suggest.
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Of course, people want to live in a big house and send their children to nice colleges, experts say, and while it may sound superficial, they’re less likely to marry someone who is up to their eyes in debt. “People don’t want to be in a relationship that will economically disadvantage them,” said Moira Weigel, author of “Labor of Love: The Invention of Dating.” Others, she says, judge potential partners for even more than that, including the school they attended, job and where they grew up.
One, perhaps, small irony: While people take financial responsibility in their relationships seriously, they don’t get around to a prenuptial agreement before they say, “I do.” Only 4% of Americans who have ever been married have gotten a prenuptial agreement, the Avvo survey found. But when they are asked about a prenup before marriage, nearly one-third said they would ask their partner to sign a prenup to protect their assets if they were engaged.
Not everyone cares about money. Only 9% of Americans who have been in a relationship or married say they stayed committed longer than they wanted to because they had already spent a lot of money to make it work. And an overwhelming majority of respondents (79%) said the primary reason for marriage is love. Nika Kabiri, law and society analyst at Avvo, says when they have already fallen head over heels, “Most people won’t put their finances before their happiness when it comes to love.”